‘This is the end of my presidency. I’m fucked.' - A Yellow Wall Nightmare

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#Resist

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The Daily 202: The six most important quotes from Mueller’s six hours of testimony

THE BIG IDEA: Bob Mueller chose his words carefully. The former special counsel responded monosyllabically to hundreds of questions on Wednesday. He clearly did not want to be on Capitol Hill, declined repeated requests to read aloud passages from his 448-page report and took special care to never utter the I-word: impeachment. This makes the handful of moments when Mueller volunteered to elaborate, or emphasized something emphatically, worthy of special attention.

The overwhelming majority of Americans did not devote six hours of a summer workday to watching the 74-year-old answer five-minute rounds of questions from dozens of grandstanding lawmakers. Much of the press coverage this morning focuses less on substance than optics. That’s not totally unfair: Democrats subpoenaed Mueller to appear because they wanted made-for-TV moments, and they acknowledge they didn’t get what they hoped for.

Instead of reading the theater criticism, however, citizens who missed the cable circus might be better served by reading the transcripts. In his own understated, patrician and old-school way, Mueller undercut so much White House spin and drew attention to how many false statements President Trump has made to the American people. Here are the six most significant quotes from the former special counsel’s six hours in the hot seat – and why they matter:

1) On Russian interference in domestic politics: “They’re doing it as we sit here, and they expect to do it in the next campaign.”

The former FBI director, who earned a Purple Heart as a Marine in Vietnam and helped guide law enforcement during the traumatic aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, came out of retirement to investigate the Kremlin’s efforts to sway the 2016 presidential election.

“We have underplayed to a certain extent that aspect of our investigation,” Mueller told the House Intelligence Committee in the afternoon, explaining that Russia’s effort to undermine elections could do “long-term damage to the United States that we need to move quickly to address.”

Mueller said he wrote the first volume of his report to serve as “our living message to those who come after us” so that they “don’t let this problem continue to linger as it has over so many years.” And he warned that “many more countries” are developing capabilities to do the same, emboldened by the success of Moscow, as he reiterated the need for “swift” action.

Asked about Trump campaign officials interacting with Russians who offered help to their election efforts, and the failure to report such overtures to the FBI, Mueller said he hopes future campaigns don’t think it’s acceptable to accept assistance from foreign governments. “I hope this is not the new normal,” he said, “but I fear it is.”

From someone who spent 28 years in the CIA’s clandestine service, including in Moscow and running the agency’s Russia operations:

https://twitter.com/john_sipher/status/1154069027754532864

2) On Trump’s past praise for WikiLeaks: “Problematic is an understatement in terms of what it displays of giving some hope or some boost to what is and should be illegal behavior.”

Mueller faulted Trump for previously praising the anti-secrecy group, whose leader Julian Assange now faces federal charges, and which allegedly served as a conduit for the Russians to disseminate hacked emails of Hillary Clinton campaign officials.

Mueller said he agrees with Mike Pompeo’s characterization of WikiLeaks as a “hostile intelligence service.” Trump said “I love WikiLeaks” at a rally in the fall of 2016. His son Don Jr. tweeted a link to stolen documents that Mueller’s report said was provided to him by WikiLeaks in a Twitter direct message.

Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) asked Mueller whether knowingly accepting foreign assistance is an unethical thing to do. “And a crime, given certain circumstances,” Mueller replied, nodding. “It’s also unpatriotic,” said Schiff. “True,” replied Mueller.

3) Rebutting Trump’s claims of total exoneration: “The president was not exculpated for the acts that he allegedly committed.”

Mueller clarified his position on whether he would have indicted the president if not for the opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel that says a sitting president shouldn’t face criminal charges. “We did not reach a determination as to whether the president committed a crime,” he said.

“We did not address ‘collusion,’ which is not a legal term,” Mueller said in his opening statement. “Rather, we focused on whether the evidence was sufficient to charge any member of the campaign with taking part in a criminal conspiracy. It was not.”

Asked whether the president, under Justice Department policy, could be prosecuted for obstruction of justice after he leaves office, Mueller kept his answer succinct: “True.”

4) Finally defending the integrity of his investigation: “It is not a witch hunt.”

For two years, Mueller kept quiet as Trump and his allies impugned him and his team. Even during the news conference in May to announce his resignation as special counsel, Mueller did not offer a full-throated defense of his methods or personnel. On Wednesday, he replied to GOP criticism that some of the career prosecutors on his team previously gave money to Democrats.

“I’ve been in this business for almost 25 years. In those 25 years, I’ve not had occasion once to ask about somebody’s political affiliation,” Mueller said. “It is not done. What I care about is the capability of the individual to do the job and do the job seriously and quickly and with integrity.”

Justice Department policy prohibits asking about political views as part of a job interview. Mueller also explained that he moved former FBI official Peter Strzok off his team as soon as he found out about anti-Trump text messages in 2016.

Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.) accused Mueller of including only “the very worst” information about Trump in his report. “Not true,” he replied, adding that the team “strove to put in exculpatory evidence” about Trump’s conduct.

5) On why he didn’t subpoena the president: “We decided that we did not want to exercise the subpoena powers because of the necessity of expediting the end of the investigation.”

The former special counsel conceded that Trump’s written answers to his questions about Russian interference — the president refused to answer any questions about the 10 episodes of potential obstruction of justice that his office explored – were “certainly not as useful as the interview would be.”

Despite Trump’s claims that he fully cooperated, Mueller noted that the president’s team stonewalled in negotiations for over a year about a sit-down interview and said he assumed Trump “would fight the subpoena.” Mueller explained that he needed to decide “how much time you are willing to spend in the courts litigating an interview with the president.”

Despite claims that Mueller wanted to drag out his investigation, he made clear that he hoped to get it wrapped up as soon as possible. “The reason we didn’t do the interview was because of the length of time that it would take to resolve the issues attendant to that,” he said.

6) There was a coverup: “A number of people we interviewed in our investigation, it turns out, did lie.”

Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen, Rick Gates and George Papadopoulos have each acknowledged that they lied to the FBI. Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.) asked Mueller whether it was “fair to say” that Trump’s written answers were “not only inadequate and incomplete, because he didn’t answer many of your questions, but where he did, his answers showed that he wasn’t always being truthful.”

“I would say, generally,” Mueller replied.

Mueller acknowledged that he caught many former members of Trump’s team not telling the truth, and this made it harder to investigate what really happened. “That would be accurate,” he said.

“And then,” Schiff said, “they lied to cover it up?”

“Generally, that’s true,” said Mueller.

Trump tweeted as soon as the second hearing ended: “TRUTH IS A FORCE OF NATURE!”

Indeed.

#Resist

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Three years ago, Trump dismissed the ‘new joke in town’: That Russia wanted to help him win

Among the details offered during former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s Capitol Hill testimony on Wednesday was his reinforcement of something that has been rumored since December 2016: Russia interfered in the presidential election that year in part to help Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton.

Mueller’s report, released in April, documented how hackers linked to Russia’s intelligence service stole information from servers belonging to the Democratic National Committee and an email account belonging to Clinton’s campaign chairman.

“Did your investigation find that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from one of the candidates winning?” Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) asked Mueller during the hearing before the House Judiciary Committee. Yes, he replied: Trump.

In May 2017, I created a Twitter bot called @trumphop. It’s straightforward in its purpose, retweeting old Trump tweets on the same day and at the same time as they were tweeted by Trump in the first place. My thinking in creating it was that there might be interesting moments of synchronicity, where Trump’s remarkable history of having tweets for nearly everything he does might occasionally result in old tweets turning up at particularly coincidental times.

On Thursday morning, there was a particularly good example of that. Three years ago Thursday morning, Trump, then a candidate for the presidency, tweeted about Russia’s interference efforts.

He was responding, first, to the release of information stolen from the Democratic National Committee by WikiLeaks, a data dump that began on July 22, 2016. The Washington Post had reported more than a month earlier that experts believed that Russia had gained access to the DNC computer network. We learned from indictments obtained by Mueller’s team against the Russian hackers that WikiLeaks had contacted the hackers in late June to offer to host the stolen material.

It was published shortly after the Republican National Convention ended in 2016 in an apparent effort to throw the ensuing Democratic convention into chaos. To some extent, that worked. The release forced Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) to step down as party chair and helped boost anti-Clinton protests at the convention itself.

Trump, though, didn’t get into all of that. Instead he referred to what he called the “new joke in town,” implying that rumors about his being helped by Russia were swirling in Washington.

What he was referring to specifically, it seems, was an appearance by Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook on CNN on July 24 — three years to the day before Mueller presented Congress with his evidence about Russia’s efforts.

Mook was asked by host Jake Tapper how the campaign reacted to the material released by WikiLeaks.

“I think the DNC needs to look into this and take appropriate action, and I’m sure that they will,” Mook replied. “What’s disturbing to us is that we — experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC, stole these emails. And other experts are now saying that the Russians are releasing these emails for the purpose of actually helping Donald Trump.”

Tapper called that a “very, very strong charge.”

Mook replied: “Well, this isn’t my assertion. There are a number of experts that are asserting this. I think we need to get to the bottom of these facts. But that is what experts are telling us.”

That evening, the network’s Erin Burnett interviewed Paul Manafort, then Trump’s campaign chairman. Her first question was about Mook’s allegation.

“They certainly are getting desperate rather early in the game,” Manafort replied. He then shifted the conversation to the private email server Clinton had at her house. “Mr. Mook’s attempt to change the agenda and the discussion falls flat,” he added.

By this point in the campaign, there had already been significant scrutiny paid to Trump’s relationship with Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin. Manafort himself was known to have worked for a pro-Putin political party in Ukraine.

So Burnett pressed him on the point: “Why is it so far-fetched to blame the Russians and say that the motive was to help you?”

Manafort replied: “I mean, it’s just absurd. I mean, Donald Trump is running for president of the United States. Donald Trump is talking about the failed leadership of the Obama administration. I don’t know anything about what you just said. You may know it. If you do, then you ought to expose it. But to say, you know — I don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s crazy.”

Later in her show, Burnett spoke to Karen Finney, who was a spokeswoman for Clinton’s campaign. Finney was not eager to echo Mook’s claim.

“Well, some time ago, when this first surfaced, there were reports that some of the actors who had participated in this did have connections to the Russian government,” she said. “Obviously there’s an investigation ongoing in terms of that, and I think, as you raised, there are some connections — some interesting connections there. There seems to be quite a lovefest of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.” She then tried to change the subject.

“So just to be clear at this point,” Burnett asked, “you don’t have any specific evidence that it is true?”

“I can only go off of the public reports that we’ve seen that have indicated that there were connections to the Russians,” Finney replied. “And, you know, I think that’s what Robby was speaking to.”

All of this happened early enough in the campaign that Trump himself hadn’t yet sworn off CNN as fake news. It seems likely that he was quickly made aware of Mook’s allegation. It’s quite possible that he found the allegation to be completely ludicrous and chose to highlight it on Twitter as a sign of how desperate Clinton and her team were to shift the narrative on the WikiLeaks releases.

It remains unclear whether Mook had any information suggesting a pro-Trump motive in the releases. Before Trump’s tweet, there don’t appear to have been public analyses from cybersecurity or foreign policy experts alleging that the goal of the effort was to boost Trump. In fact, it took significant debate within the intelligence community after the election was over before there was consensus that this was, in fact, one of Russia’s goals.

Last December, Mook revisited his accusation in an essay published by The Washington Post. In it, he again made vague references to having merely reiterated “what cybersecurity experts had determined.” To bolster that claim, he listed a number of ways in which Trump’s ties to Russia had been questioned and pointed to reporting that linked the DNC hack to Russia.

“When I and other members of the campaign repeated that Russia was responsible for the hack and was doing this to help Donald Trump, many in the press seemed skeptical, treating the assertion as mere spin,” Mook wrote. “A lot of people appeared to believe that the idea of Russia helping Trump was far-fetched. Even some of our staunchest supporters seemed to think I might have lost my marbles.”

As it turns out, of course, there is strong evidence that Russia did want Trump to win, part of its broad effort to disrupt the United States’ international strength and heighten our internal tensions. If Mook had any specific knowledge to that effect at the time, it’s not clear where it would have come from.

Nonetheless, three years later, the incident shines a spotlight on Trump’s campaign, not Clinton’s. Trump is the one who publicly dismissed the idea that Russia was helping him, which it was. Mook may have been guessing, may have been simply trying to change the discussion, but he ended up being right. Manafort’s broad dismissal of the idea is itself colored by what we’ve learned about him since — and the fact that he now sits in federal prison.

#Resist

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Watch Trump deny that Mueller said things he definitely said

Less than two hours after former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III finished six hours of testimony on Capitol Hill, President Trump spoke to the news media about Mueller’s testimony.

“There was no defense to this ridiculous hoax, this witch hunt,” Trump said less than a minute into his remarks. Except Mueller said it wasn’t a “witch hunt” in his testimony, which Trump watched.

It was among several things that Mueller said that Trump then falsely claimed were not said. You can watch what Trump said Mueller said vs. what Mueller said in the video above.

Trump called two reporters “fake news” for correctly saying that Mueller said Trump could be indicted after leaving office.

Trump then falsely said Mueller corrected his comments during the second hearing about Trump facing a possible indictment after his presidency. Mueller said only that he reached no conclusion on whether Trump obstructed justice because of the Office of Legal Counsel opinion.

Asked about Mueller suggesting that some of Trump’s answers were “untruthful,” Trump replied: “He didn’t say that at all. … You are untruthful.” (Washington Post reporting later clarified Mueller’s testimony on this).

Trump said his campaign did nothing wrong. Mueller said Trump’s touting of WikiLeaks “calls for investigation.”

Trump said WikiLeaks was a hoax. Mueller said it wasn’t.

And told that Mueller did not exonerate him, Trump shot back, “He didn’t have the right to exonerate.”

Four months ago, Trump had a much different view of “exoneration” when he was asked about the completion of Mueller’s investigation.

“It’s complete exoneration. No collusion. No obstruction.”

#Resist

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What Russian interference? While grilling Mueller, Republicans repeatedly downplay it.

The Russia investigation has been one long, highly politicized slog. But even as Republicans have cast doubt on the idea that President Trump obstructed justice or colluded with Russia, there was one thing most everyone generally agreed upon: Russian interference in the 2016 election was bad, and a recurrence must be stopped.

You wouldn’t know it from having watched Republicans on Wednesday.

At two hearings featuring former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s testimony, House Republicans generally mentioned Russian interference only while absolving Trump of blame or while attempting to poke holes in Mueller’s report. And often, they cast doubt on the importance of the interference and downplayed Mueller’s findings and indictments related to it.

The top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Douglas A. Collins (Ga.), started by saying, “We were told this investigation began as an inquiry into whether Russia meddled in our 2016 election,” suggesting doubt about that original purpose. He went on to ask Mueller whether other countries were investigated, echoing Trump’s repeated suggestions that Russia’s interference might not be exceptional.

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) suggested it was relatively pointless to indict “Russians no one’s ever heard of, no one’s ever seen, no one’s ever going to hear of them, no one’s ever going to see them.”

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) homed in on a theory that the Steele dossier was full of lies fed either by a deliberate Russian “disinformation campaign” or by Christopher Steele himself. Mueller had already said he couldn’t talk about the dossier, given that it’s part of the Justice Department’s investigation of the Russia probe’s origins.

Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.) argued that Mueller had implied an unfounded connection between the Russian troll farm behind the 2016 interference and the Russian government. (A judge has agreed with this. What McClintock failed to mention? The judge also faulted Attorney General William P. Barr for linking the two.)

Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) probed Mueller on whether Russia’s interference had affected any votes, suggesting there was no proof it had. Steube did this even though it’s completely unknowable what the impact was, as has been noted ad nauseam.

It wasn’t until the second hearing — the one more focused on intelligence matters — that a House Republican even acknowledged the gravity of the situation.

“Well, first of all, director, I very much agree with your determination that Russia’s efforts were sweeping and systematic,” Rep. John Ratcliffe (Tex.) began. “I think it should concern every American. That’s why I want to know just how sweeping and systematic those efforts were.”

Then Ratcliffe immediately proceeded to pick up on Gaetz’s conspiracy theory, which Mueller had already declined to discuss. Rep. Eric A. “Rick” Crawford (R-Ark.) followed that by trying again, asking whether “there could have been disinformation that was going from the Kremlin into the Clinton campaign and then being fed into the FBI?” Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) asked whether Mueller had identified Steele’s sources. All three times, Mueller, who again had made clear that he wouldn’t talk about this, demurred.

At long last came Rep. Will Hurd (R-Tex.), a former CIA agent who represents a swing district. Hurd was the second-to-last Republican questioner of the day, but he became the first to earnestly probe the severity of Russia’s interference without invoking some kind of pro-Trump and/or anti-Mueller framing.

“As a former CIA officer, I want to focus on something I think both sides of the political aisle can agree on: that is, how do we prevent Russian intelligence and other adversaries from doing this again?” Hurd said, after two dozen of his colleagues declined to broach the topic.

This exchange followed:

HURD: After overseeing counterintelligence operations for 12 years as FBI director, and then investigating what the Russians have done in the 2016 election, you’ve seen tactics, techniques and results of Russian intelligence operations. Our committee made a recommendation that the FBI should improve its victim notification process when a person, entity or campaign has fallen victim to active measures attack (ph). Could you agree with this — with this?

MUELLER: It sounds like a worthwhile endeavor. I will tell you, though, that the ability of our intelligence agencies to work together in this arena is perhaps more important than that. And adopting whatever -- and I’m not that familiar with legislation, but whatever legislation will encourage us working together — by us, I mean the FBI, CIA, NSA, and the rest — it should be pursued aggressively, early.

…

HURD: In your investigation, did you think this was a single attempt by the Russians to get involved in our election, or did you find evidence to suggest they’ll try to do this again?

MUELLER: It wasn’t a single attempt. They’re doing it as we sit here, and they expect to do it during the next campaign.

And with that last response, Hurd earned one of the headlines of the hearings.

None of this is to say that Republicans were the only ones playing politics on Wednesday. But their questioning was more single-mindedly focused on the domestic partisan debate. They were aiming to protect Trump by picking apart not just Mueller’s findings on Trump but also his findings on Russian interference.

The latter used to be something only Trump and a handful of his strongest allies — Gaetz and Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), among them — would do. On Wednesday, it permeated almost the entire GOP side of the dais.

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Mueller just showed why impeachment proceedings should begin soon

In testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III reiterated a central conclusion from his report: Under Justice Department policy, a president cannot be prosecuted while in office. He also emphasized a point lost on many Americans. Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) asked Mueller, “Could you charge the president with a crime after he left office?” Mueller answered “Yes.” Buck, who seemed surprised, asked again whether Trump could be charged specifically with obstruction of justice. Mueller again said clearly, “Yes.”

Mueller’s answer needs to be front and center as Congress decides its next move. If the president is reelected and serves his full term, the five-year statute of limitations on obstruction of justice will run out before he leaves office. Thus, reelection would almost guarantee that Trump will never stand trial for his crimes. The only way Congress can ensure Trump is ever held accountable is to begin impeachment proceedings.

The first moments of Mueller’s testimony clarified a crucial point. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, asked whether the special counsel’s report exonerated Trump on the crime of obstruction of justice. Mueller’s answer was a blunt "no." The 10 instances of potential obstruction of justice listed in his report kept Mueller from concluding that the president had not committed a crime. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), who is a lawyer, even argued persuasively that the report built a strong enough legal case to sustain an obstruction of justice charge. Mueller, at first, agreed but later in the day declined to go that far: “We did not reach a determination as to whether the president committed a crime.”

That is because Trump is a sitting president, and therefore, per the internal Justice Department policy Mueller cited, cannot be indicted. As the report and Mueller’s testimony clarify, presidents can be indicted and put on trial after they leave office. The special counsel’s factual investigation, as Mueller noted in the report, was conducted “in order to preserve the evidence when memories were fresh and documentary materials were available.” Preservation implies that future action or accountability might be needed.

A legal loophole threatens to undermine this idea of criminal accountability. That loophole is the statute of limitations, which defines the length of time during which a person can still be charged with a crime after it has been committed. The statute of limitations for obstruction of justice is five years, meaning it would expire during Trump’s second term.

The statute of limitations is designed to ensure that no one faces an endless possibility for indictment. Prosecutors must indict or not within a reasonable amount of time. What the statute isn’t designed for is allowing criminal wrongdoing to escape punishment, yet that’s exactly what the Justice Department policy provides if Trump wins reelection.

So, the only way for justice to be served is if Trump is unable to complete a second term, which could occur if the president loses his reelection bid. But justice should not be left that much up to chance. Fortunately, there is another “constitutional process,” as the Mueller report calls it, to address presidential wrongdoing: impeachment. The only surefire way for the president to face real punishment for his acts of obstruction is if Congress decides to impeach and remove him. It is true that the time limit would still allow for a trial if Trump is impeached early in his second term, but impeachment takes time, and the longer the country waits, memories fade, and fresh evidence becomes stale. This is the best time to move forward.

Impeachment exists precisely for this purpose. Alexander Hamilton argued that presidents are immune from criminal prosecution while in office, but only because impeachment should come before indictment. Hamilton wrote that the president “would be liable to be impeached, tried, and, upon conviction . . . removed from office; and would afterwards be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law.”

This suggests different standards for impeachment and indictment. To impeach and remove a president, there does not yet need to be conclusive proof that a president committed a crime. It’s up to the House and Senate to decide whether the evidence suggests a crime was likely committed. If they do, impeachment will clear the path to criminal indictment after removal from office. If Congress fails to act, Trump will walk away scot-free. Absent impeachment, the Democratic mantra that “no person is above the law” will become meaningless.

Some Democrats argue that impeachment would ultimately fail and would imperil the Democrats’ chance of taking back the White House, but no one has a crystal ball that can predict the true effect of impeachment on the election. Moreover, the question of whether to impeach must be based on constitutional duty, not political considerations.

Near the end of Wednesday’s hearing, Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Tex.) said, “This hearing has been very helpful to this committee as it exercises its constitutional duty to determine whether to recommend articles of impeachment against the president.”

Escobar is right to note this urgent imperative. If impeachment proceedings do not begin now, the president will be treated by our legal system as though he is above the law, empowered to use the office of the president to avoid legal consequences. The Constitution demands that justice be served; impeachment should now be the route to making sure it is delivered.

#Resist

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How Mueller showcased the obstruction case against Trump

Robert S. Mueller III’s testimony on Capitol Hill highlighted the divide between the two parts of his investigation: Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, including possible involvement of members of the Trump campaign, and alleged obstruction of justice. The separate inquiries were covered in two different volumes of Mueller’s report and addressed in two different congressional hearings. But Mueller’s testimony highlighted another key distinction between the two areas: the role played by the Justice Department policy that a sitting president cannot be indicted. That, in turn, showcased the strength of the obstruction case against the president.

The Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel has issued two opinions stating that it would be unconstitutional to prosecute a sitting president. Many have challenged the analysis and conclusions of these opinions, but as a Justice Department prosecutor Mueller could not simply disregard them. His report repeatedly made it clear he felt bound by this policy, and he said so again early in his congressional testimony. But that policy had a dramatically different impact on the two different areas of the investigation.

On Russian interference, Mueller’s testimony reiterated the key conclusions of his report: There were multiple contacts between Russians and members of the Trump campaign, the Russians believed they would benefit from a Trump victory, the Trump campaign knew about and welcomed the Russian support, and individuals associated with the campaign lied to conceal their Russian ties. Many of these contacts would amount to “collusion” as commonly understood. But as Mueller emphasized again, the appropriate criminal law term is conspiracy, and his investigation concluded there was insufficient evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy.

When it came to obstruction of justice, of course, Mueller did not reach a similar conclusion. As he said in the report, “if we had confidence ... the President clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state. Based on the facts and applicable legal standards, however, we are unable to reach that judgment.” Mueller emphasized once again during the hearings that his decision not to make a “traditional prosecutorial judgment” on obstruction was based primarily on the OLC policy about prosecuting a sitting president.

But Wednesday’s hearings highlighted the fact that the OLC policy works only in one direction. The policy does not say a president cannot be cleared of criminal allegations, only that he cannot be indicted. When the evidence did not support criminal conspiracy charges, Mueller had no problem stating that conclusion. That he has never made the same statement concerning obstruction has always suggested Mueller believes the evidence of obstruction was sufficient but his hands were tied. His testimony Wednesday only strengthened that impression.

Democrats did an effective job walking Mueller through some of the more compelling evidence of obstruction contained in the report. But some of the most revealing questioning on obstruction came, presumably unwittingly, from a Republican: Rep. Ken Buck (Colo.). Buck took Mueller through a series of questions contrasting how Mueller’s report treats the questions of Russian conspiracy and obstruction of justice. He pointed out that when there was insufficient evidence of a crime Mueller had no problem saying so — which makes his refusal to say so regarding obstruction all the more telling. Buck also had Mueller forcefully confirm that a president could be prosecuted for obstruction of justice once he left office, which was cited in the report as one reason for completing the obstruction inquiry. When Buck was finished, it seemed pretty clear that Mueller’s decision not to indict Trump for obstruction was based not on the facts or evidence but strictly on the OLC policy.

During questioning by Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), Mueller even appeared to say he would have indicted President Trump for obstruction had it not been for the OLC policy. This apparent bombshell set off a brief flurry on social media and cable news. But when he began his afternoon testimony before the House Intelligence Committee, Mueller walked back that answer, saying he meant to say only that the OLC policy precluded him from even engaging in the process to reach a conclusion on obstruction.

But, as former Justice Department spokesman Matthew Miller wrote, whether it was a simple misstatement or a Freudian slip, Mueller’s initial response to Lieu was likely the truth: If Trump were not the president, Mueller would have indicted him for obstruction. More than 1,000 former federal prosecutors have signed a letter saying anyone other than the president would face obstruction charges for the conduct in Mueller’s report. Although Mueller declined to testify whether he agreed with that letter, Wednesday’s hearings should leave little doubt about where he would come down.

#Resist

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Mueller’s Testimony: The Baton Passes to Congress

There was something very sad about the atmospherics of today’s testimony by Robert S. Mueller III at the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees—at least at first. It wasn’t just the frank and nearly absolute partisanship of both affairs, with interest in the substance of Mueller’s findings confined almost exclusively to the Democrats and interest in discrediting Mueller and his investigation emerging as the chief concern of nearly every Republican. It was Mueller himself, whose performance fell short of the commanding one his towering reputation had led so many to expect. He appeared halting much of the time. He was unable to answer some basic questions. He sometimes seemed confused both about what was being asked and about the contents of the report that colloquially bears his name.

As a matter of principle, Mueller said outright that he did not want to engage Congress beyond what was strictly necessary and appropriate for him to say. But even within those self-imposed constraints, he was having some trouble.

Yet Mueller’s testimony, notwithstanding the atmospherics, was a productive exercise. Over the course of the day, he seemed to gain confidence and by the end managed to have some genuinely moving exchanges with key members on important issues. He proved sharper, and more forthcoming, about matters directly related to President Trump in the afternoon Intelligence Committee hearing than he did in the morning before the Judiciary Committee. Perhaps he had better command over the subject matter of Russian electoral interference, which dominated the second half of the day, than he did over the discussion of obstruction that dominated the first half. Perhaps it was just his getting used to the high-pressure setting of public testimony after years out of the spotlight. But by the end of the Intelligence Committee hearing, he was offering thoughts and views that went ever-so-slightly beyond the four corners of the report itself. And they are thoughts and views every American should pause over.

Even apart from that, however, Mueller’s appearance today had a significance that outstrips any single thing he said. His testimony is not ultimately important for any bombshells or any revelations—of which there were none, in any event. Its significance, rather, lies in the hearings’ initiating of the long-belated creation of an Article I record of the president’s conduct—a shifting of the investigative locus from the executive branch to the legislative branch. That should have happened months ago. It finally happened today.

The Mueller report is an executive document, after all. When a member of Congress gets Mueller to answer questions about his findings at a hearing, his testimony becomes a part of a legislative record. That is in part a symbolic difference, since Congress is entitled to act on the basis of executive branch facts if it wishes. But there is still something important about Congress engaging the process, doing its own job, rather than sitting back on its heels waiting for Mueller to tell it what to do. While that process is not pretty, it is not trivial either. And it provides a basis for further congressional inquiry.

Because Mueller was true to his promises not to stray into discussions of ongoing investigations or investigations not within his purview, he did not offer many details on how he made his decisions. When asked about the contents of the report, he referred back to the report. This posed a challenge to both Republicans and Democrats. How does a member of Congress engage with such an intentionally untelegenic figure?

The Democratic members were ready to make a certain uneasy peace with this reality. Their preparation and coordination were unusually good for House members. They generally stuck to the four corners of the report. For the most part, they asked questions that Mueller could answer with one word: “Yes.” “Accurate.” “True.” Occasionally, he added a second word: “Generally true.”

And the Democrats split up the points to be made and issues to be covered. They coordinated on their key takeaway message, which different members repeated over and over again: The president had committed a range of obstructive acts and his campaign engaged in a multitude of alarming contacts with Russian-linked individuals. The result is that Democrats were able to lay down certain core substantive findings of the report about actions by Russians, by members of the campaign, by Trump administration officials like former White House counsel Don McGahn and by Trump himself. Over the course of the day, this became increasingly effective—even though many of the specific exchanges were merely members asking Mueller to verify the contents of his report.

Indeed, much of the Democratic effort consisted merely of eliciting such on-air confirmation of key facts sitting there in the document. Members walked Mueller through section after section of the report, with each member taking a different slice of the story. Their questions were most effective when they stuck to asking Mueller for simple yes-or-no answers. He often seemed uncomfortable when asked to respond at length. But over time, notwithstanding his reticence and discomfort and occasional confusion, they largely succeeded in sketching out the contents of the document, with the Judiciary Committee majority focused primarily on Volume II and the Intelligence Committee majority focusing more on Volume I.

On the Judiciary Committee, Chairman Jerry Nadler set up Democratic members to drill down on five specific instances of potential obstruction of justice by setting out the overall theme: that Trump’s claims of “total exoneration” and “no collusion, no obstruction” were badly misplaced. Here’s part of his exchange with Mueller:

NADLER: … Director Mueller, the President has repeatedly claimed that your report found there was no obstruction and that it completely and totally exonerated him, but that is not what your report said, is it?

MUELLER: Correct. That is not what the report said.

NADLER: . . . [Y]ou wrote, quote, “If we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the president clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state. Based on the facts and the applicable legal standards, however, we are unable to reach that judgment,” close quote. Now does that say there was no obstruction?

MUELLER: No.

Democrats moved on to examine specific instances of potential obstruction. Rep. Steve Cohen, for example, questioned Mueller regarding Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s recusal from the Russia probe.

COHEN: Wasn’t Attorney General Sessions following the rules and professional advice of the Department of Justice ethics folks when he recused himself from the investigation?

MUELLER: Yes.

COHEN: And yet, the president repeatedly expressed his displeasure at Sessions’s decision to follow those ethics rules, to recuse himself from oversight of that investigation. Is that not correct?

MUELLER: That’s accurate, based on what is written in the report.

….

COHEN: In fact, your investigation found that at some point after your appointment, quote, “the president called Sessions at his home and asked if he would un-recuse himself.” Is that not true?

MUELLER: It’s true.

Democrats also pushed Mueller to clarify the legal reasoning behind the report. The former special counsel assented in response to a question from Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell as to whether an unsuccessful attempt to obstruct justice could still be a crime. Rep. Ted Lieu asked Mueller to explain the role played by the Office of Legal Counsel memo forbidding indictment of the president. Mueller briefly seemed to say that he “did not indict Donald Trump ... because of the OLC opinion”—suggesting that the OLC opinion played a greater role than he had previously stated—though he then walked that back in his opening remarks before the House Intelligence Committee. Meanwhile, other Democrats tried to push Mueller into spelling out how he saw the interaction between his report and the possibility of impeachment, though Mueller seemed skittish around the word. Rep. Veronica Escobar got the farthest:

ESCOBAR: Director Mueller, at your May 29, 2019 press conference, you explained that, quote, “the [OLC] opinion says that the Constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting President of wrongdoing”, end quote. That process other than the criminal justice system for accusing a President of wrongdoing, is that impeachment?

MUELLER: I’m not going to comment on that.

ESCOBAR:  In your report, you also wrote that you did not want to quote “potentially preempt constitutional processes for addressing presidential misconduct,” end quote. For the non-lawyers in the room, what did you mean by “potentially preempt constitutional processes”?

MUELLER: I’m not going to try to explain that.

ESCOBAR: That actually is coming from page one, Volume II—in the footnote is the reference to this. What are those constitutional processes?

MUELLER: I think I heard you mention at least one.

On the Intelligence Committee, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney quizzed Mueller on the written responses to questions by Trump:

MALONEY: What did you think of the President's written responses, Mr. Mueller?

MUELLER: Certainly not as useful as the interview would be.

In an exchange with Rep. Val Demings, Mueller—after initially resisting the question—even stated that he had not found the president’s written answers credible:

DEMINGS: Could you say, Director Mueller, that the president was credible?

MUELLER: I can’t answer that question.

DEMINGS: Director Mueller, isn’t it fair to say that the president’s written answers were not only inadequate and incomplete because he didn’t answer many of your questions, but where he did his answers showed that he wasn’t always being truthful?

MUELLER: I would say generally.

Others on the Intelligence Committee teased out Mueller’s personal concerns about election interference and the response of the president’s campaign. Asked by Rep. Peter Welch whether he “share[d] [Welch’s] concern” that election interference had become “the new normal,” Mueller responded, “I hope this is not the new normal, but I fear it is.” In an exchange with Rep. Mike Quigley, Mueller directly criticized the president’s conduct regarding Trump’s use of information provided by WikiLeaks during the 2016 campaign:

QUIGLEY: Would it be fair to describe [WikiLeaks] as ... a hostile intelligence service?

MUELLER: Yes.

QUIGLEY: If we could put up slide six. “This just came out. WikiLeaks. I love WikiLeaks.'' Donald Trump, Oct. 10, 2016. “This WikiLeaks stuff is unbelievable. It tells you the inner heart. You've got to read it.” Donald Trump, Oct. 12, 2016. “This WikiLeaks is like a treasure trove.” Donald Trump, October 21, 2016. “Boy, I love reading those WikiLeaks.” Donald Trump, Nov. 4, 2016. Would any of those quotes disturb you, Mr. Director?

...

MUELLER: Well, it's probably—problematic is an understatement in terms of what it displays in terms of giving some, I don't know, hope or some boost to what is and should be illegal activity.

The Democratic questioning culminated with Mueller’s interview with Schiff. In an initial exchange, Mueller told the chairman that his investigation was “not a witch hunt.” But the real force of Schiff’s questioning—and the remarks with which he opened the Intelligence Committee’s hearing—was on the counterintelligence dangers and ethical failures highlighted by the report.

SCHIFF: From your testimony today I'd gather that you believe that knowingly accepting foreign assistance during a presidential campaign is an unethical thing to do.

...

MUELLER: And a crime, given certain circumstances.

SCHIFF: To the degree that it undermines our democracy and our institutions, we can also agree that it's also unpatriotic.

MUELLER: True

SCHIFF: And wrong.

MUELLER: True.

This, along with Mueller’s exchange with Quigley regarding WikiLeaks, was one of the few instances during the hearings in which Mueller seemed to pass moral, as well as prosecutorial, judgment. But Schiff also moved toward a discussion of the counterintelligence risks of such moral failings.

SCHIFF: The need to act in an ethical manner is not just a moral one. When people act unethically it also exposes them to compromise, particularly in dealing with foreign powers, is that true?

MUELLER: True.

SCHIFF: Because when someone acts unethically in connection with a foreign partner, that foreign partner can later expose their wrongdoing and extort them.

MUELLER: True.

Schiff went on to point to Michael Flynn (editor's note -needs to be "made whole") and Michael Cohen as examples of Trump associates opening themselves up to “counterintelligence nightmares” through lies and financial dealings—to which Mueller assented. (Earlier, in response to a question about Michael Flynn, he commented to Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi that “there are many elements of the FBI looking at different aspects” of the possible national security risks raised by lies that open officials up to blackmail.)

While Democrats were trying to tell the story set out in the report and push Mueller to go ever-so-slightly further in his analysis of the president’s conduct than he did in that document, Republicans had a different goal: to discredit Mueller’s investigation and sometimes the man himself. This generally took the form of hammering certain common themes outside the text of the report, including the text messages between FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page and the reliability of the information contained in the Steele dossier. Mueller usually refused to engage these theories on the grounds that they had been or are being addressed by other investigative bodies, that they involved internal deliberations, or simply that they were outside of the scope of his investigation. He began his testimony by pointing to a Justice Department letter asserting executive privilege over matters outside the report, specifically noting the Steele dossier.

Though this didn’t stop Republicans from pushing Mueller on such points, it did prevent them from developing any kind of significant record related to the issues.

One notable feature of the day was that the Republicans essentially accepted the assertions of the Mueller report as factual. By and large, they did not seek to contest the facts Mueller reported, but rather attacked alleged bias and the legal significance of the facts in the document. One of the functions of the report was to establish a common set of facts, and today’s hearing—in its own peculiar way—suggests that it has done that, at least to a point. The Republican members’ questions did not seem to doubt that McGahn was telling the truth and that Trump was lying. They accepted that Trump had asked Corey Lewandowski to get Sessions to unrecuse. While they fought on other matters, they didn’t contest the factual ground that Mueller has staked out.

Republican members certainly scored some points on the former special counsel. Rep. Louie Gohmert managed to get him to say that he and Jim Comey are “friends,” after Mueller had first insisted they were merely “business associates.” Early in the Judiciary Committee hearing, questioning from Ranking Member Doug Collins appeared to confuse Mueller as to whether the report treated “collusion” and “conspiracy” as synonymous, leading Mueller to appear to contradict his own report before backtracking. And Mueller was confronted a number of times with the partisan preferences of his prosecutorial team, before he finally said—in an exchange with Rep. Kelly Armstrong—that he had never asked people about their political views before hiring them: “What I care about is the capability of the individual to do the job and do the job quickly and seriously and with integrity.”

Other Republicans launched more targeted criticisms of Mueller’s handling of the probe, focusing on decisions that were purportedly inconsistent with either standing Justice Department practices or Mueller’s decisions in other contexts. Rep. John Ratcliffe was only one of several Republicans to focus on Mueller’s declaration that he could not exonerate the president:

RATCLIFFE: Can you give me an example other than Donald Trump, where the Justice Department determined that an investigated person was not exonerated because their innocence was not conclusively determined?

MUELLER: I cannot, but this is a unique situation.

RATCLIFFE: ... Nowhere does it say that you were to conclusively determine Donald Trump’s innocence, or that the Special Counsel report should determine whether or not to exonerate him. ... Respectfully, Director, it was not the special counsel’s job to conclusively determine Donald Trump’s innocence or to exonerate him. Because the bedrock principle of our justice system is a presumption of innocence.

But a great deal of the Republican questioning was devoted to asking Mueller to account for conspiracy theories. For example, several members asked about Mueller’s decision not to pursue criminal charges against Joseph Mifsud for allegedly lying to the FBI. The issue came up most pointedly in an exchange with Rep. Jim Jordan, who drew a sharp, accusatory contrast between the various false statements cases Mueller brought with the absence of charges against Mifsud—all against the backdrop of the completely unfounded suggestion that Mifsud is a front for Western, not Russian, intelligence interests (for a deep dive on this conspiracy theory and on Mifsud himself, see this recent Washington Post story):

JORDAN: Mifsud is the guy who starts it all, and when the FBI interviews him, he lies three times and yet you don’t charge him with a crime…. And I’m curious as to why.

MUELLER: Well, I can’t get into it and it’s obvious I think that we can’t get into charging decisions.

JORDAN: . . . [W]hen the Special Counsel’s Office interviewed Mifsud, did he lie to you guys too?

MUELLER: Can’t get into that.

JORDAN: Did you interview Mifsud?

MUELLER: Can’t get into that.

JORDAN: Is Mifsud Western intelligence or Russian intelligence?

MUELLER: Can’t get into that.

JORDAN: A lot of things you can’t get into. What’s interesting, you can charge 13 Russians no one’s ever heard of ...  you can charge all kinds of people who are around the president with false statements but the guy who launches everything, the guy who puts this whole story in motion, you can’t charge him. I think that’s amazing.

Not every Republican member committed the entirety of his or her time to conspiracy theories. Rep. Martha Roby engaged in respectfully adversarial questioning concerning Mueller’s interactions with Attorney General Barr surrounding the release of the report in its redacted form, focusing on concerns Mueller might have had regarding Barr’s representatives of its contents prior to its release. Roby closed by pointedly asking Mueller whether he had leaked his Mar. 27 letter to Barr in an effort to correct Barr’s narrative; though Mueller ultimately refused to discuss the internal deliberations surrounding the report’s release, there was nothing illegitimate about the line of inquiry.

Exactly one Republican focused on substance. Rep. Will Hurd questioned Mueller on his views of some of the policy issues raised by the Russian disinformation campaign, ultimately leading Mueller to suggest—in agreement with Hurd—that such capabilities are not limited to Russia and would almost certainly be attempted again in regard to future U.S. elections.

HURD: Our committee issued a report saying that Russian active measures are growing with frequency and intensity and including their expanded use of groups such as the [Internet Research Agency]. And these groups pose a significant threat to the United States and our allies in upcoming elections. Would you agree with that?

MUELLER: Yes. In fact, one of the other areas that we have to look at [is that] . . . many more countries are developing the capability to replicate what the Russians have done.

. . .

HURD: [D]id you think this was a single attempt by the Russians to get involved in our election, or did you find evidence to suggest they'll try to do this again?

MUELLER: It wasn't a single attempt. They’re doing it as we sit here. And they expect to do it during the next campaign.

All in all, Mueller’s low-key performance probably didn’t give either the majority or the minority what they might have hoped for. But the incomplete nature of his testimony was, in a way, the point. At the hearings’ end, Schiff closed by noting the many things Mueller had not done: He had not told Congress whether he would have indicted the president in the absence of the OLC memo; he had not said whether the president should be impeached; he had not spoken to the findings of any counterintelligence investigation or of any investigation into corrupt financial dealings within the administration. In each instance, Schiff said, Mueller had acted properly; the responsibility was not the former special counsel’s, but that of Congress. Schiff’s remarks were a kind of mustering call for the House, an acknowledgement to Mueller that the former special counsel’s role was over and that he had successfully passed the baton to the legislative branch.

Whether the legislature is actually in a position to take the baton is an open question.

Schiff did not stake out specific next steps, but there is an obvious follow-up move for Congress in the wake of the Mueller hearings: calling fact witnesses and hearing from them directly. Where Mueller declined to answer questions or referred to his report to answer them, or declined to make judgments, that forces Congress—having heard from him directly that he won’t tell members how to render judgments or assess witnesses or assess presidential conduct—to hear from those witnesses themselves and render those judgments themselves.

That may now be happening. Shortly after the hearings ended, the Wall Street Journal reported that the House Judiciary Committee was preparing to file a lawsuit to enforce a subpoena for testimony from McGahn. Apparently the committee and the White House have been unable to agree whether his appearance would be public or private. Both parties clearly understand how significant McGahn’s public testimony could be.

The process of building a legislative record, having begun, may be acquiring a little momentum.

#Resist

[Athos_131]

House panel asks court to enforce Mueller-related subpoenas, a step toward possible impeachment

The House Judiciary Committee on Friday asked a federal judge to enforce congressional subpoenas seeking grand jury information related to the special counsel investigation, taking steps in the direction of possible impeachment of President Trump.

Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) told reporters the legal request signaled that the panel is pursuing an impeachment investigation, although neither the committee nor the full House has formally voted for launching proceedings.

“Because Department of Justice policies will not allow prosecution of a sitting president, the United States House of Representatives is the only institution of the federal government that can now hold President Trump accountable for these actions,” the petition said. “To do so, the House must have access to all the relevant facts and consider whether to exercise its full Article I powers, including a constitutional power of the utmost gravity — approval of articles of impeachment.”

Nadler and his fellow Judiciary Democrats repeatedly emphasized that its filing was just a first step in a process that could eventually lead to articles of impeachment, but refused to say whether it would be the ultimate outcome.

“We are considering the malfeasances of the president, we’re considering what remedies we can do, including the possibility of articles of impeachment,” Nadler said.

The committee asked Judge Beryl A. Howell to force the Justice Department to turn over grand jury information related to the nearly two-year investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether Trump obstructed the probe. Howell is chief judge for the U.S. District Court for District of Columbia.

Nadler first shared his plans during a CNN interview, two days after appearances by former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III before his panel and the House Intelligence Committee that did not yield any blockbuster revelations and failed to generate the kind of momentum toward impeachment some Democrats were seeking. Nadler firmly disputed that critique of Mueller’s performance.

“Some have argued that because he was reluctant and seemed older than some remembered him, his work is somehow diminished,” said Nadler, who argued the hearing produced a “great change” on the issue of impeachment, but said Democrats need to continue building a public case about Trump’s transgressions.

“The evidence has got to be so solid and out there that impeaching the president wouldn’t tear the country apart,” said Nadler, whose committee has jurisdiction over impeachment proceedings.

The party remains divided over whether to impeach Trump while Republicans made clear they think the investigations should end.

As of Friday, 101 Democrats had voiced support for launching an impeachment inquiry, even as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has continued to counsel a more deliberate approach.

“We will proceed when we have what we need to proceed, not one day sooner,” she told reporters at her weekly news conference.

Pelosi was also dismissive of suggestions that she is trying to “run out the clock” with her reluctance to start impeachment proceedings, saying, “Let’s get sophisticated about this.”

Rep. Douglas A. Collins (R-Ga.), the top Republican on the committee, immediately criticized Nadler’s decision.

“Democrats want to convince their base they’re still wedded to impeachment even after this week’s hearing, but a baseless legal claim is an odd way to show that,” he said.

A Judiciary Committee spokeswoman said Pelosi had signed off on the language in the filings, and Nadler said the committee “could not have brought these lawsuits without the help and support of Speaker Pelosi.” Behind the scenes, multiple lawmakers and senior aides say the relationship between the speaker’s office and Nadler’s committee has soured amid the impeachment disagreement.

The lawmakers and officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak frankly.

During the Friday news conference, Nadler said he also would go to court next week in a bid to enforce subpoenas for testimony from former White House counsel Donald McGahn. The Justice Department has resisted turning over those confidential files — despite a subpoena — and McGahn also ignored a compulsory measure to testify at the instruction of the White House.

Nadler said favorable court orders on those matters would “open the floodgates” for enforcement of other subpoenas he considers key to ongoing investigations of Trump that have been stymied by the White House’s refusal to cooperate. The panel has struggled for months to hold high-profile hearings and to produce major revelations in part because of White House stonewalling.

At the news conference, Nadler’s colleagues offered a range of assessments on the extent to which the court filings — which the panel authorized weeks ago — signaled a new phase of an investigation that could lead to impeachment. Some suggested the committee remained on the same course that had been previously charted while others characterized the court action as a watershed moment.

“We’re crossing a threshold with this filing, and we’re now officially entering into an examination of whether or not to recommend the articles of impeachment,” said Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Tex.).

Nadler said the committee was “in effect” now conducting an impeachment inquiry, but stressed that it differs from that because other outcomes are possible — including not impeaching at all.

For months, Nadler and his committee members have pressured Pelosi to begin an impeachment inquiry, arguing a formal vote would bolster their case in court. She has refused to budget without public support. On Friday, the committee offered a different argument to try to boost its chances in the courts.

“We don’t need it,” said one Judiciary Committee lawyer about a vote to begin an impeachment inquiry, directly contradicting what Judiciary panel members repeatedly have argued. “We don’t think it would impact us any different[ly].”

Nadler, who has privately argued for impeachment but who has not publicly supported it, said impeachment would be necessary if the Trump administration defies any court orders enforcing House subpoenas.

“No administration has ever defied a court order,” he said. “There would have to be an impeachment, without question.”

He also said he disagrees with some colleagues who have suggested time is running out on impeachment, given elections are next year, and that an inquiry would need to be launched by next month to stand a chance of being successful.

“In effect, the Mueller report only came out this week,” Nadler said, arguing that most Americans had not read the redacted 448-page report made public in April.

#Resist

[Athos_131]

#Resist

[Lois]

To sum up the entire Mueller Report:

1. Russia interfered with our elections with a comprehensive and sophisticated psy-ops campaign to help Trump win.

2. Trump welcomed their help.

3. Members of the Trump campaign worked with Russia to use this help effectively.

4. When the Russian interference was being investigated, Trump tried to shut it down, therby commiting the crime of obstruction of justice.

[Athos_131]

#Resist

[Athos_131]

When General Flynn has been made whole in every way, I will be partially satisfied

#Resist

[Athos_131]

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[Athos_131]

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[Athos_131]

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[Athos_131]

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[Athos_131]

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[Athos_131]

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[Athos_131]

Now we're in rarified air.  Blatant Obstruction of Justice.

#Resist