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The Mueller Report covered 448 pages.
For context, the 1998 Starr Report about President Clinton and Monica Lewinsky consumed 445 pages.
Other works of popular literature clocking in at around 400 pages or so?
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen (409 pages). The Shining by Stephen King (447). Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (449). Ready Player One by Ernest Cline (374). The Neverending Story by Michael Ende (396).
CLICK HERE TO READ THE REDACTED MUELLER REPORT
Perhaps the last title is most pertinent here.
Attorney General Bill Barr released the Mueller Report in the middle of the first major Congressional recess of the year. Both the House and Senate usually break for more than two weeks in March or April to observe Good Friday, Easter and Passover.
Barr long ago announced he’d make the Mueller Report public in mid-April. But that decision frustrated Congressional Democrats, who viewed the timing as nefarious since Congress was out of session and lawmakers were spread to the four winds.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., was in Europe, just concluding a speech to the Dail, or Irish parliament, in Dublin. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., was in Rwanda. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., was in New York City.
“The logistics make the release much more difficult,” protested Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., a member of the Judiciary Committee. “The administration seems to be purposely creating obstacles and hurdles to prevent full disclosure.” Blumenthal added that Barr should have published the report ‘well before the recess. It should’ve been released the day before it was ready.”
Nadler argued that Barr’s decision to hold a press conference ahead of publicizing the report was villainous. Nadler portrayed this as an effort by the administration to seize control of the messaging in the absence of lawmakers prowling Capitol Hill. Nadler suggested Barr could then spin the conclusions on behalf of President Trump.
“The Attorney General is not letting facts speak for themselves, but baking in a narrative that benefits the White House and doing it before a holiday weekend so it would be hard for people to react,” said Nadler, who held a press conference in New York City late Wednesday to pre-empt Barr – then suggested the attorney general cancel his morning presser.
Releasing the report during the recess may mute some Congressional response. But satellite dishes and TV studios are available this time of year. Twitter remains operational. Most of the country doesn’t hang on every word out of Washington and know whether Congress is in or out of session. Many Americans wouldn’t interrupt their workday to cull through the Mueller Report, let alone actually read it. They’ll rely on others to divine meaning from the special counsel’s missive.
The timeframe didn’t matter to Lindsey Graham.
“The world keeps turning,” said Graham late last week as he departed the Capitol, en route to Africa. “I don’t need to know any more. I am done.”
There were only a few lawmakers on Capitol Hill when the report hit Washington Thursday morning.
The Constitution requires the House and Senate to convene every three days unless one body grants the other leave to abandon Washington. Otherwise, the House and Senate meet in brief, “pro forma” sessions, when each body just gavels in and gavels out. However, that requires the presence of at least one lawmaker.
Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., drew the lot to serve as the GOP’s designated, in-person-at-the-Capitol-spokesman-on-the-Mueller-Report once he rapped the gavel at 11:46 a.m. Thursday. Journalists waited for Blunt in the basement of the Russell Senate Office Building to get his views on the report. A couple of reporters sought out Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., who presided over the House’s pro forma session late Thursday afternoon.
Congressional Democrats now see a yawning chasm between the contents of the Mueller Report and the interpretation presented by Barr and want to explore that daylight. It starts with the attorney general appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 1 and the House Judiciary Committee on May 2. That’s followed by a prospective appearance by Mueller himself sometime next month.
Nadler believes Mueller left a Hansel and Gretel trail of breadcrumbs through the impeachment forest. When asked Thursday about impeachment, Nadler wouldn’t rule it out – despite previous statements by Pelosi to the contrary. A top Pelosi aide tells Fox that impeachment remains out of the question. We may hear more from Pelosi on this score in the wee hours of Friday morning when she appears in Belfast, Northern Ireland and takes part in a Q&A.
There is peril for Democrats if they continue to discuss impeachment, which is why they must drive down both sides of the street. Impeachment talk harms moderate Democrats from battleground districts and lots of them would prefer to focus on policy issues like health care, prescription drugs, infrastructure and even gun policy before discussing impeachment.
However, if liberals push impeachment, moderate Democrats have a chance to contrast themselves, not with Republicans, but with members of their own party. They can say “No. I’m not for impeachment. Let’s work on bread and butter issues.”
But there is a risk for Democrats if they overplay their hand. That’s why Republicans are more than happy to lump all Democrats together. The key is how Democrats finesse this to satisfy both wings of their caucus.
House Freedom Caucus leader Mark Meadows, R-N.C., told Fox News Thursday that Democrats won’t stop attacking the President. Republicans want Democrats to attack the President. That works for the GOP.
The Mueller Report will dominate the news cycle over the holiday weekend, then wane next week as Congress remains out of session. It could then rise like a phoenix when Congress returns at the end of the month, punctuated by Barr’s testimony. That could spark another round of media frenzy, which would then die down before ramping up again if or when Mueller testifies.
This is the downside for Democrats, especially moderates who need to hold their seats in challenging districts. Too much talk about the report diverts attention from other policy priorities. Remember that the only other big legislative item on the docket this year is an imbroglio over the debt ceiling, a government shutdown, and, you guessed it, the border wall.
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The recess may have actually helped Republicans. They did not want to be in Washington for the release of the report. This is how some Republicans prefer to embrace President Trump: from afar. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said it was time to move on. House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., said Democrats should apologize and quit harassing the President and his family.
But remember, the hot take is not always the lasting take. Public perception could shift on this, and that could be damaging to Republicans rushing to embrace what Barr said.
After all, this seems to be the never-ending story.
Source: Fox News Politics
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairman, Tom Perez, seemed to sidestep a question on Thursday about whether it was wise for his party to file articles of impeachment in the months leading up to the 2020 presidential election.
“Do you think politically, as the chairman of the Democratic Party, that that is the right thing for the Democratic Party to do?” Fox News host Bret Baier asked during his show, “Special Report.”
Perez didn’t give a “yes” or “no” answer, instead saying that Democrats could “walk and chew gum” by pushing policies, like coverage for pre-existing conditions, while conducting effective oversight in Congress. “I think that there are more questions to be asked here,” Perez said after Baier repeated the question.
“We don’t know whether obstruction occurred. There were 954 redactions,” he said in reference to the investigative report released by the Justice Department earlier in the day.
HIGHLIGHTS FROM MUELLER’S REPORT ON RUSSIA INVESTIGATION
While Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report did not formally accuse Trump of obstructing justice, it also didn’t “exonerate” the president. Instead, the report listed 10 items concerning potential obstruction — details that congressional Democrats could well use to continue pressing the administration.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., has already requested that Mueller testify before his committee, and said he would subpoena the full, unredacted report. Although some Democrats have previously raised the prospect of impeachment, the House Democratic leadership recently rejected the idea.
Impeachment proceedings could arise out of further investigation into whether the president committed obstruction of justice. And according to Perez, that was still a possibility. He pointed to Mueller’s own language, which indicated his team wasn’t confident that Trump hadn’t obstructed justice.
FOX NEWS POLL: INTEREST IN 2020 ALREADY AT ELECTION DAY LEVELS
“The notion that there’s no obstruction is just hogwash,” Perez asserted. He also suggested that Rudy Giuliani, the president’s attorney, jumped the gun in arguing that the president didn’t have corrupt intent.
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Source: Fox News Politics
Hours after the Department of Justice on Thursday released a redacted version of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the Russia investigation, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez committed to adding her name to an impeachment resolution aimed at President Trump.
The New York Democrat revealed her intentions on Twitter, vowing to sign onto the resolution put forward by fellow freshman lawmaker Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., last month.
The proposal calls on the House Judiciary Committee to probe whether or not the president committed any offenses that rise to the level of impeachment.
In announcing her decision, Ocasio-Cortez addressed the report, writing it “is clear in pointing to Congress’ responsibility in investigating obstruction of justice by the President.”
“While I understand the political reality of the Senate + election considerations, upon reading this DoJ report, which explicitly names Congress in determining obstruction, I cannot see a reason for us to abdicate from our constitutionally mandated responsibility to investigate,” she wrote in a follow-up tweet.
TRUMP DECLARES VICTORY AS MUELLER REPORT DROPS: ‘NO COLLUSION, NO OBSTRUCTION’
The report showed that investigators did not find evidence of collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia. Mueller, however, did not reach a conclusion on whether the president’s conduct amounted to obstruction, stating: “[W]hile this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”
Ocasio-Cortez continued on Twitter, explaining that she doesn’t often speak about the matter of impeachment and would rather focus her attention on other matters. But the report’s release brought the subject to the forefront, she argued.
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“Many know I take no pleasure in discussions of impeachment. I didn’t campaign on it, & rarely discuss it unprompted,” she tweeted. “We all prefer working on our priorities: pushing Medicare for All, tackling student loans, & a Green New Deal.”
“But the report squarely puts this on our doorstep,” she wrote.
Fox News’ Brooke Singman and Liam Quinn contributed to this report.
Source: Fox News Politics
Axios’ editor in chief, Nicholas Johnston, said on Thursday that controversy surrounding the Russia investigation was far from over, given the criminal referrals and the copious redactions in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report.
“This is the beginning of the beginning,” Johnston said of the report, which included 14 criminal referrals and concerns about obstruction of justice.
“There are 14 referrals from the Mueller investigation — we know what two of them are. There are 12 more that were completely unknown which can also lead to other criminal prosecutions,” Johnston told Fox News host Shepard Smith.
“There are at least … nine ongoing investigations in Congress and on state and local levels,” he added on “Shepard Smith Reporting.”
Johnston’s comments came just hours after President Trump declared “Game Over” in the Russia investigation.
White House adviser Kellyanne Conway also appeared to take a victory lap on Thursday when she told reporters she would accept their apologies and that the report ended the “lie” they’d “let fly” for the first two years of Trump’s presidency.
MUELLER REPORT SPARKS NEW DC WAR OVER RUSSIA PROBE: SUBPOENAS, PAYBACK AND MORE
While the Mueller report didn’t find evidence of collusion with Russia, it did highlight 10 concerns related to potential obstruction of justice.
Both Attorney General William Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein concluded that the report didn’t show sufficient evidence to warrant obstruction charges, although Mueller said he didn’t “exonerate” the president.
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Democrats are expected to continue pursuing the obstruction concerns as part of ongoing congressional investigations and in connection with their strategy for defeating Trump in the 2020 presidential election.
Johnston said Mueller provided a “roadmap” for Congress to continue investigating the president, but predicted the report itself wouldn’t create much change in polling on the issue.
Source: Fox News Politics
Fox News legal analyst Mercedes Colwin said Thursday that after looking at Robert Mueller’s redacted investigative report, it looked like the special counsel struggled to find a crime that wasn’t there.
“What Mueller struggled with there wasn’t an evidence of an underlying crime. Usually, when you have obstruction of justice, the reason someone tampering with the investigation is because they are guilty of a crime. Here, you don’t have that,” Colwin said on “Shepard Smith Reporting.”
“Which is one of the things that Mueller even talks about at the very beginning of the executive summary. Usually, that’s not how it plays out. Usually we have a crime that is trying to be covered up but we don’t have a crime.”
After two years, Mueller’s report was released Thursday showing investigators did not find evidence of collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia but revealed an array of controversial actions by the president that were examined as part of the investigation’s obstruction inquiry.
According to the report, Trump allegedly told his White House counsel in June 2017 to inform the acting attorney general that Mueller had conflicts of interest and “must be removed.”
Trump also fumed over the original appointment — lamenting it would mean the “end of my presidency” — first telling then-DOJ leader Jeff Sessions he should resign, and later trying to get Sessions to take back control of the probe.
Colwin said that Thursday’s release is the beginning of the next chapter of the Russia collusion investigation, noting that the Southern District of New York was known to be more aggressive.
The attorney also pointed to what she said was the benefit of the doubt Trump was given in the investigation.
“As defense attorney, I hope that some of my clients that are facing these type of charges get the benefit of the doubt that the president was given. Because frankly, when you see the list of actions that Mueller identified in his executive summary … all of these overtures to staff members, you almost read it and it was like, ‘OK, they’re going to conclude there had been something that had been wrong,’” Colwin said.
Fox News’ Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
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Judge Napolitano: AG Barr releases the Mueller Report
Judge Napolitano’s Chambers: Judge Andrew Napolitano analyzes the Mueller Report and tells us that even though there is much for the President to rejoice over, there are still things he needs to be concerned about.
The public release of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Thursday marked the dramatic final note of a lengthy and contentious investigation, but also sparked a tinderbox of new calls for subpoenas, congressional testimony, resignations, and even impeachment proceedings — all despite the probe’s central finding that no evidence showed that President Trump’s team “coordinated or conspired” with Russia.
The whirlwind moments kept coming, even hours after the report’s release, as more and more revelations from the 448-page document trickled out. The White House, for its part, claimed total victory and vindication for the president who, according to the report, once fretted that the special counsel’s appointment marked the “end” of his presidency and that he was “f—ed” beyond the possibility of redemption.
“As I have been saying all along, NO COLLUSION – NO OBSTRUCTION!” Trump wrote on Twitter.
Wrote journalist Glenn Grenwald on The Intercept: “Robert Mueller Did Not Merely Reject the Trump/Russia Conspiracy Theories. He Obliterated Them.”
But Democrats and media outlets that long advanced the idea that the Trump campaign had worked with Russia quickly turned their focus to whether the president had, instead, deliberately and corruptly interfered with the now-completed investigation into such an alleged conspiracy.
Attorney General William Barr leaves his home in McLean, Va., on Wednesday morning, April 17, 2019. (AP Photo/Sait Serkan Gurbuz)
Within minutes of the report’s publication, House Judiciary Committee Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., charged that the special coounsel had provided “disturbing evidence that President Trump engaged in obstruction of justice” and, referencing the report’s limited redactions, finished with a tantalizing flourish: “Imagine what remains hidden from our view.”
Nader immediately called on Mueller himself to testify, and top Republicans, including Trump personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and Attorney General William Barr, said they would have no objections to him doing so.
Like previous heated hearings featuring former FBI Director James Comey, counterintelligence head Peter Strzok, and ex-Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, a moment with Mueller in the congressional hot-seat would promise to be yet another spectacle in a long-running investigative saga.
Nadler also announced he would subpoena the full, unredacted version of the Mueller report and any underlying grand jury evidence. That move set up a likely legal confrontation with the Justice Department, where attorneys worked with Mueller’s team to redact legally sensitive matters concerning classified information, ongoing investigations, unnecessary personal information and grand jury proceedings.
“The attorney general deciding to withhold the full report from Congress is regrettable, but not surprising,” Nadler said during a press conference, at which he refused to rule out impeachment proceedings. “Even in its incomplete form, the Mueller report shows disturbing evidence that President Trump obstructed justice.”
However, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., cautioned against impeachment proceedings. “Based on what we have seen to date, going forward on impeachment is not worthwhile at this point,” he said. “Very frankly, there is an election in 18 months and the American people will make a judgement.”
Republicans, meanwhile, claimed vindication, pointing specifically to several portions of Mueller’s findings that debunked long-held conspiracy theories and media reports that misrepresented the Trump team’s contacts with Russia.
For example, notably absent from Mueller’s analysis was any mention of the unverified report that former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort had “secret talks” with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in London’s Ecuadorian embassy months before stolen emails damaging to Hillary Clinton’s campaign were published.
Closely scrutinized communications between the Russian ambassador and Trump campaign officials at the Republican National Convention and at a speech in Washington, D.C. were “brief, public, and non-substantive,” Mueller wrote.
Similarly, breathless coverage of a meeting between the ambassador and Jeff Sessions in Sept. 2016 in Sessions’ office amounted to little more than a footnote in Mueller’s report, which said Sessions’ talks included a “passing mention of the presidential campaign.”
TRUMP WORRIED MUELLER APPOINTMENT WOULD DISTRACT FROM HIS PRESIDENCY: ‘THIS IS THE END. I’M F—ED’
And “the investigation did not establish that one Campaign official’s efforts to dilute a portion of the Republican Party platform on providing asssistance to Ukraine were undertaken at the behest of candidate Trump or Russia.”
The FBI, in its warrant application to surveil former Trump aide Carter Page, quoted directly from a disputed Washington Post opinion piece which noted that a Trump campaign official vetoed a proposed platform amendment that would have called for providing lethal arms to Ukrainian forces fighting Russia, and suggested the move was a possible indicator that the campaign had been compromised.
One-time adviser of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, Carter Page, addresses the audience during a presentation in Moscow (Reuters)
The Trump campaign, at the time, supported providing only defensive arms to Ukrainians, and rejected a single Republican delegate’s proposed platform amendment that called for providing lethal arms. Later, the Trump administration changed course and approved lethal arms sales to Ukraine.
The FBI did not provide its own independent assessment of whether the Washington Post opinion piece contained accurate information, and did not mention that the Obama administration had the same policy towards arming Ukraine as the one Trump’s team supported.
Separately, Mueller wrote that investigators “did not establish that Manafort coordinated with the Russian government on its election-interference efforts,” despite reports that he shared polling data with an individual linked to Russian intelligence.
PRIVATE COMEY MEMOS CONTAINED FAR MORE SENSITIVE INFORMATION THAN PREVIOUSLY KNOWN
Mueller’s team “did not identify evidence of a connection between Manafort’s sharing polling data and Russia’s interference in the election, which had already been reported by U.S. media outlets at the time of the August 2 meeting,” the report stated.
Referring to a discredited BuzzFeed News bombshell report, Mueller wrote, “The evidence available to us does not establish that the President directed or aided Cohen’s false testimony [concerning the Trump Tower Moscow project],” even though evidence showed that Trump “knew” Cohen had lied to Congress.
BuzzFeed has inexplicably stood by its reporting that Trump directed Cohen to lie to Congress in the face of mounting inconsistencies, even though the story has been contradicted explicitly by Mueller, Cohen, and every other relevant on-record source.
Summing up the positive news for his administration in the report, Trump tweeted a reference to the popular “Game of Thrones” television series, with the words, “No collusion, no obstruction. For the haters and the radical left Democrats — Game Over.”
And White House adviser Kellyanne Conway told reporters that Thursday was the “best day” since Trump’s election, calling the Mueller probe a “political proctology exam” and the final report a “clean bill of health.”
“It should make people feel really great that a campaign I managed to its successful end did not collude with any Russians,” Conway said. “We’re accepting apologies today, too, for anybody who feels the grace in offering them.”
Democrats, however, claimed their own vindication, and charged that Barr had improperly given cover for the president. 2020 presidential contender Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., called on Barr to “resign,” after Barr pointed out in his press conference that Trump’s mental state — including his apparent frustration at the long-running investigation — was relevant to the question of whether he obstructed justice.
On collusion, according to the report, former national security adviser Michael Flynn told investigators that Trump repeatedly requested that his team find tens of thousands of emails deleted from a private server controlled by Hillary Clinton.
At a July 2016 campaign rally, Trump remarked sarcastically, “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.”
After that statement, Flynn contacted operatives in the hopes of uncovering the documents, according to Mueller. And Peter Smith, a GOP consultant, “created a company, raised tens of thousands of dollars, and recruited security experts and business associates,” the report stated.
Smith told Mueller’s team “he was in contact with hackers ‘with ties and affiliations to Russia’ who had access to the emails, and that his efforts were coordinated with the Trump Campaign” — a claim Mueller could not verify.
Regardless, Mueller found no evidence that the Trump team had “initiated or directed Smith’s efforts.”
Multiple media reports, and several commentators, focused on a section of Mueller’s report that read: “According to notes written by (Sessions’ chief of staff Jody) Hunt, when Sessions told the President that a Special Counsel had been appointed, the President slumped back in his chair, and said, ‘Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I’m f…….’ … The President became angry and lambasted the Attorney General for his decision to recuse from the investigation, stating, ‘How could you let this happen, Jeff?’”
But Mueller’s report went on to make clear that Trump’s concern was with losing a political mandate, not going to jail: “The president returned to the consequences of the appointment and said, ‘Everyone tells me if you get one of these independent counsels it ruins your presidency. It takes years and years and I won’t be able to do anything. This is the worse thing that ever happened to me.’”
Mueller further referenced several incidents described in the report in which top Trump advisers resisted or defied the president’s “efforts to influence the investigation” — while saying those efforts were unsuccessful because of that defiance.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller exits St. John’s Episcopal Church after attending services, across from the White House, in Washington, Sunday, March 24, 2019. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen)
For example, the report detailed Trump’s alleged effort to have Mueller sidelined, amid reports at the time that the special counsel’s office was investigating the president for obstruction of justice. The report detailed a dramatic moment where the president’s White House counsel apparently rejected the push.
“On June 17, 2017, the president called [White House Counsel Don] McGahn at home and directed him to call the Acting Attorney General and say that the Special Counsel had conflicts of interest and must be removed. McGahn did not carry out the direction, however, deciding that he would resign rather than trigger what he regarded as a potential Saturday Night Massacre,” the report stated, referencing the Watergate scandal.
The report noted that Trump did not follow up with McGahn in a later meeting as to whether he would fire Mueller, and ultimately decided not to terminate him.
The report also detailed the run-up to Trump’s decision to fire Comey, after the FBI Director repeatedly refused to publicly confirm that Trump was not under investigation — even though Comey had privately confirmed that to Trump.
According to Mueller’s report, there was “substantial evidence” that Comey’s termination had to do with his “unwillingness to publicly state that the president was not personally under investigation.”
Mueller cited reports that the day after Comey was fired, Trump told Russian officials that he had “faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”
Comey acknowledged in testimony last December that when the agency initiated its counterintelligence probe into possible collusion between Trump campaign officials and the Russian government in July 2016, investigators “didn’t know whether we had anything” and that “in fact, when I was fired as director [in May 2017], I still didn’t know whether there was anything to it.”
In remarks late Thursday, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe — who was fired last year for making unauthorized leaks to the media and lying to investigators about them — sounded a rare, nonpartisan note of optimism amid the brouhaha gripping the nation.
“The Mueller Report is a remarkable document – detailed, thorough, objective, and full of facts rather than rhetoric,” McCabe said in a statement. “It stands as a tribute to the hard work of the team of FBI agents and lawyers who, despite the endless stream of attacks on law enforcement from this Administration, worked for two years to find the facts and the truth amidst a swamp of lies and misinformation. It shows what our law enforcement personnel – especially the dedicated men and women of the FBI – do every day on cases large and small throughout this country. We owe them our profound gratitude.”
Fox News’ Jake Gibson, Bill Mears, Catherine Herridge, and Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
Source: Fox News Politics
“Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade said Thursday President Trump was “right” to appear angry after Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s appointment, adding “It’s been two years of hell for him.”
Kilmeade made the statement while joining Fox News chief national correspondent Ed Henry on “The Daily Briefing with Dana Perino” and in response to an excerpt in the Mueller report that Perino said could be “misinterpreted” by some of President Trump’s opponents.
According to the excerpt, which was released to the public on Thursday morning, Trump said his presidency was finished, going so far as to state he was “f—ed”, after being told of Mueller’s appointment by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
TRUMP THOUGHT PRESIDENCY WAS OVER WHEN TOLD OF MUELLER’S APPOINTMENT: ‘THIS IS THE END… I’M F—ED’
“According to notes written by (Sessions’ chief of staff Jody) Hunt, when Sessions told the President that a Special Counsel had been appointed, the President slumped back in his chair, and said, ‘Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I’m f……’,” the report reads.
“The President became angry and lambasted the Attorney General for his decision to recuse from the investigation, stating, ‘How could you let this happen, Jeff?’
“I think the critics are going to pounce on this,” said Henry, adding that the excerpt could be misinterpreted to mean that it was at this point the President knew he was in trouble because “he did criminally bad things and he’s going to get caught.”
Henry added, “That’s not what the President was saying based on the rest of the report in the full context. In fact, there are other lines right after that that suggest what we’re saying, that the president knew politically, this is going to be so damaging and he couldn’t believe that Jeff Sessions had recused himself.”
“By the way, he (President Trump) was right. It’s been two years of hell for him,” Kilmeade said.
“Two years of wasted parts of his presidency,” said Henry in agreement. “Meanwhile the economy is still doing pretty well. He’s still trying to crack down on immigration.”
Henry then brought up what the president said at a news event on Thursday, shortly after Barr held a press conference discussing the Mueller report.
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“He (President Trump) talked about the acting defense secretary and wiping out ISIS. All of that has been going on while Washington and others have been consumed by this (the Mueller investigation) which turns out to be a whole lot of nothing,” said Henry.
“I don’t want to say nothing all together, there’s some troubling information about alleged obstruction. But we’ve been told for two years by Adam Schiff and others, there’s evidence, not allegations, evidence of collusion and there’s not.”
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Special Counsel Robert Mueller‘s office made 14 referrals for investigation of “potential criminal activity” that fell outside the scope of its investigation into allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials, as well as potential obstruction of justice by the Trump administration.
Among those referred for criminal investigation were Michael Cohen, Trump’s onetime personal attorney, and Gregory Craig, a former White House counsel under President Barack Obama. The other 12 referrals were redacted, citing “Harm to Ongoing Matter.”
Cohen was sentenced in December 2018 to three years in prison after pleading guilty to campaign finance violations, tax evasion and lying to Congress about Trump’s past business dealings in Russia. In his plea, Cohen said he arranged “hush money” payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal in the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign “at the direction” of then-candidate Trump.
Mueller’s report noted that Trump’s conduct toward Cohen changed from praise to castigation after Cohen began cooperating with prosecutors following an FBI raid on his home, office and hotel room in April 2018. The report said the evidence could “support an inference that the president used inducements in the form of positive messages in an effort to get Cohen not to cooperate, and then turned to attacks and intimidation to deter the provision of information or undermine Cohen’s credibility once Cohen began cooperating.”
Cohen is scheduled to report to prison next month, though his legal team has claimed he is still sorting through documents that might be of interest to Democratic lawmakers investigating the president. Cohen’s attorneys have also said that they are holding out hope that federal prosecutors in New York will not only back another delay in the start of his prison term, but also would agree to reopen his case and advocate for a lighter sentence.
On Thursday, Cohen’s attorney, Lanny Davis, tweeted that Cohen “knows and can fill in the bulk of the redactions” in the Mueller report. Cohen concurred, tweeting: “Soon I will be ready to address the American people again…tell it all…and tell it myself!”
Craig was indicted last week on two counts of making false statements and concealing information from investigators regarding his work for former Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych. Craig, 74, has pleaded not guilty and called the prosecution “unprecedented and unjustified.”
The case against Craig intersected with the Mueller probe because former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was involved in the financing of a report Craig authored in 2012 for the Yanukovych government that sought to legitimize its prosecution of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
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Manafort was convicted last year by a federal jury in Virginia on eight counts of bank and tax fraud and was sentenced to 47 months in prison. He subsequently pleaded guilty to two felony conspiracy charges related to his overseas lobbying work with Ukraine and was sentenced to 73 months in prison by a D.C. federal judge. Manafort’s former deputy Rick Gates pleaded guilty last year to one count of conspiracy against the U.S. and one count of making false statements to FBI agents and cooperated with prosecutors against Manafort.
All told, Mueller charged 34 people, including Manafort and Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, and three Russian companies. Twenty-five Russians were indicted on charges related to election interference, accused either of hacking Democratic email accounts during the campaign or of orchestrating a social media campaign that spread disinformation on the internet.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Source: Fox News Politics
Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, says that Rep. Jerrold Nadler is within his rights to subpoena the full special counsel report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
In an interview with Fox News host Harris Faulkner on Thursday, Dingell said that as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Nadler, D-N.Y., “has the right” to issue the subpoena. Dingell also called on the special counsel, Robert Mueller, to “come to the Hill” and talk about the report.
“We need to have these hearings, we need oversight, we need to understand,” said Dingell, who is co-chairwoman of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee.
Nadler said Thursday that he’ll be issuing a subpoena for the full special counsel report and the underlying materials. The Justice Department is expected to fight that subpoena.
CLICK HERE TO READ THE ROBERT MUELLER REPORT
Nadler said the report “outlines disturbing evidence” that President Trump engaged in misconduct.
Nadler said Attorney General Wiliam Barr’s decision to withhold the full report from lawmakers is “regrettable, but no longer surprising.”
He said it now falls to Congress to hold the president accountable for his actions relating to the Russia probe. The chairman has asked Mueller to testify before the panel by May 23.
Dingell said Barr’s demeanor when speaking earlier Thursday at a press conference about the report concerned her.
“Today I was a little concerned listening to the attorney general that he did sound more like a defense attorney than the chief law enforcement officer of this country.”
MUELLER REPORT REVEALS CLASHES IN TRUMP’S INNER CIRCLE OVER RUSSIA PROBE
Dingell said she did not want to comment on specific parts of the report until she’d read the document for herself.
“I think too many of us are commenting on other people’s comments,” Dingell said. “I want to read all 400-something pages before I make comments. I think we have to be very careful with this ‘he said she said’ stuff.”
Dingell said both lawmakers need to focus on the everyday concerns of Americans.
“I’m frustrated with everybody,” she said in answer to Faulkner’s question about whether the congresswoman was frustrated with her fellow Democrats.
“We’ve got to come together,” Dingell said. “I’ve got people in my district … that are worried about the cost of prescription drugs. When I think about a single mother who is working two jobs and is still at poverty level and has got an inhaler for a child who is asthmatic that is $700 …
“We can’t have Russians intervening in our elections, but we’ve got to do something about prescription drugs.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Source: Fox News Politics
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., said on Thursday that he plans to issue a subpoena for the full, unredacted version of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 election, while blasting Attorney General Bill Barr for not giving Congress such a copy from the start.
Nadler said even the redacted version released earlier in the day “outlines disturbing evidence” that President Trump engaged in misconduct and possibly obstructed justice.
“The attorney general deciding to withhold the full report from Congress is regrettable, but not surprising,” Nadler said during a press conference. “Even in its incomplete form, the Mueller report shows disturbing evidence that President Trump obstructed justice.”
SPECIAL COUNSEL ROBERT MUELLER’S RUSSIA PROBE REPORT RELEASED BY JUSTICE DEPARTMENT
Trump and his allies have declared victory in the wake of the report’s release, based on Mueller not finding evidence of collusion with Russia and not reaching a conclusion on the obstruction issue. But Nadler is among the key Democrats sure to pick up where Mueller left off.
Nadler would not speculate on whether or not congressional Democrats would file articles of impeachment against Trump, but added that he was not taking the option off the table.
“Congress must get the full, unredacted report along with all the underlying materials from Special Counsel Mueller,” Nadler said. “We have to get to the bottom of this and we’ll see what happens.”
Nadler also noted that Barr will be testifying before the House Judiciary Committee next month and he has requested that Mueller also appear before the committee to testify on his findings.
“I have been and continue to be prepared to make every effort to work with the Attorney General to find a solution that allows Congress to review the entire record—and not merely the fragments he chose to share with us today,” Nadler said in a statement.
Barr on Thursday said that a version of Mueller’s report with fewer redactions will be made available to a small group of lawmakers.
In a letter to Congress, Barr noted the second version of the report would be given to the “Gang of Eight,” the top-ranking House and Senate lawmakers from both parties who can view sensitive classified information. The chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate judiciary committees will also receive it.
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Barr said all redactions would be removed from that version of the report except those relating to grand-jury information.
The attorney general said, “I do not believe that I have discretion to disclose grand-jury information to Congress. Nevertheless, this accommodation will allow you to review the bulk of the redacted material for yourselves.”
The Mueller report is most heavily redacted in its first section, which covers Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election and examines contacts between Russian representatives and the Trump campaign. The report concluded there was no criminal culpability by Trump aides.
Several pages in that first section are almost entirely blacked out. The report’s second section, examining possible obstruction by Trump, appears more lightly redacted.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Source: Fox News Politics
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