Barr also said that Mueller’s team drew no conclusions about whether Trump illegally obstructed justice. Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein determined that the special counsel’s investigators lacked sufficient evidence to establish that Trump committed that offense, but added that Mueller’s team stopped short of exonerating Trump.
“While this report does not conclude that the president committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him,” Barr quoted Mueller as writing.
The findings delivered a significant political victory for the president, one he almost immediately began to trumpet. “No Collusion, No Obstruction, Complete and Total EXONERATION. KEEP AMERICA GREAT!,” Trump tweeted an hour after the release of the findings.
Barr delivered the summary of the special counsel’s finding to Congress on Sunday afternoon, just days after the conclusion of a sprawling investigation into Russia’s attempts to sabotage the 2016 election and whether Trump or any of his associates conspired with Moscow’s interference.
But congressional Democrats have demanded more, and the release of the key findings could be just the beginning of a lengthy constitutional battle between Congress and the Justice Department about whether Mueller’s full report will be made public. Democrats have also called for the attorney general to turn over all of the special counsel’s investigative files.
Shortly after the release of the Mueller findings, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said on Twitter that he plans to call Barr to testify about what he said were “very concerning discrepancies and final decision making at the Justice Department,” seemingly referring to the attorney general’s conclusion that the president did not obstruct justice.
Ultimately, a half-dozen former Trump aides were indicted or convicted of crimes, most for conspiracy or lying to investigators. Twenty-five Russian intelligence operatives and experts in social media manipulation were charged in 2018 in two extraordinarily detailed indictments released by the special counsel. The inquiry concluded without charging any Americans for conspiring with the Russian campaign.
How many minds it changes is another matter. Opinions have hardened over time, with many Americans already convinced they knew the answers before Mueller submitted his conclusions. Some believe that the special counsel’s previous indictments, twinned with voluminous news media reporting, have already shown a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Some believe that the investigation is, as Trump has long described it, a “witch hunt.”
Still, the release of Mueller’s findings could force a decision by Democrats on a simmering issue they have said would wait until the investigation’s end: whether to begin impeachment proceedings against the president. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said it would not be “worth it” to try to impeach Trump, but suggested she could change her mind if an overwhelming bipartisan consensus emerged.
For months, the president and his lawyers have waged as much of a public-relations campaign as a legal one — trying to discredit the Mueller investigation to keep public opinion from swaying lawmakers to move against Trump.
Mueller was still given a wide mandate — to investigate not only Russian election interference but “any matters that may arise directly from that investigation.” Mueller has farmed out numerous aspects of his inquiry to several US attorneys’ offices, and those investigations continue.
“It’s important,” Rosenstein said, “for government officials to refrain from making allegations of wrongdoing when they’re not backed by charges that we are prepared to prove in court.”
© 2019 New York Times News Service