Mueller report
[7][8][9] The report states that Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election was illegal and occurred "in sweeping and systematic fashion",[10][11][12] and was welcomed by the Trump campaign as it expected to benefit from such efforts.
[47] On April 18, Barr held a 90-minute press conference where he and senior Justice Department officials defended Trump[3][48][49] and their decision not to charge him with obstruction,[50] immediately prior to the public release of the Mueller report.
[51] Following the release of the Mueller report, Barr's letter was widely criticized as an intentionally misleading effort to shape public perceptions in favor of Trump,[45] with commentators identifying significant factual discrepancies.
[58][59] Papadopolous had received this suggestion in April 2016, well before it was publicly reported that Russia had damaging information about Clinton (the Democratic National Committee had in June 2016 announced that a Russian hack occurred).
[...] First, on multiple occasions, members and surrogates of the Trump Campaign promoted – typically by linking, retweeting, or similar methods of reposting – pro-Trump or anti-Clinton content published by the IRA through IRA-controlled social media accounts.
[96]George Croner of the Foreign Policy Research Institute has also expressed his concerns with what he describes as a "curiously flaccid" approach taken by Mueller in dealing with what the public would normally interpret as "coordination".
[111] The report outlines Michael Flynn's, Trump's first National Security Advisor, contact with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, shortly after the Obama Administration imposed sanctions against Russia on December 29, 2016.
[187][191] The Special Counsel found Manafort to be correct, as the "dirt" was information regarding the Ziff brothers doing tax evasion and money laundering in Russia and "donated the illegal profits to the DNC or the Clinton Campaign".
[41] On March 24, 2019, Attorney General Barr sent Congress a four-page letter that purportedly described the special counsel's conclusions regarding Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and obstruction of justice.
[77] Barr continued: "Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and I have concluded that the evidence developed during the Special Counsel's investigation is not sufficient to establish that the President committed an obstruction-of-justice offense".
[238][239] On March 28, 2019, according to anonymous Justice Department officials, Mueller, in a call to Barr, reportedly expressed concerns about public misunderstandings of the obstruction investigation due to media coverage.
[256][257] Barr described the four kinds of redactions in the released report: "harm to ongoing matter" (HOM) in white, "personal privacy" (PP) in green, "investigative technique" (IT) in yellow, and "grand jury" material in red.
Ryan Goodman, a professor at the New York University School of Law and co-editor of Just Security, observed that in 1989 Barr also wrote a letter which he stated contained "the principal conclusions" of a controversial legal opinion he worked on as head of the OLC.
He tweeted: As has been incorrectly reported by the Fake News Media, I never told then White House Counsel Don McGahn to fire Robert Mueller, even though I had the legal right to do so.
[351] The White House responded by dismissing the reports, claiming that it was part of a routine request to grant Australian authorities access to Department of Justice resources to facilitate an investigation that had been open for several months.
"[381][382][383] Barr explained why the Mueller report did not determine whether Trump committed obstruction of justice: "the Deputy attorney General, Rod Rosenstein, and I felt it was necessary for us, as the heads of the department, to reach that decision.
Regarding obstruction of justice, the official said: "All the attorney general was deciding was whether this was a prosecutable offense, and we don't bring criminal charges at the department unless we believe we can prove them beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury".
It takes character like Mr. Mattis's to avoid the damage, because Mr. Trump eats your soul in small bites.On May 8, 2019, in an interview with CBS This Morning, James Comey called Attorney General William Barr's four-page-letter to Congress summarizing the report "misleading" and "inadequate".
They were inconsistent with our goal of communicating to all FBI employees that they should respect the attorney general's role, refrain from disclosing information about criminal investigations, avoid disparaging uncharged persons, and above all, not take unnecessary steps that could influence an election.
[413] House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer released a joint statement saying "Special Counsel Mueller's report paints a disturbing picture of a president who has been weaving a web of deceit, lies, and improper behavior and acting as if the law doesn't apply to him".
[420] Romney later expounded on his comments in a press release by saying "It is good news that there was insufficient evidence to charge the President of the United States with having conspired with a foreign adversary or with having obstructed justice.
[441] Fordham University law professor Jed Shugerman opined in the New York Times that: "The report's very high standard for legal conclusions for criminal charges was explicitly proof 'beyond a reasonable doubt'.
The Mueller report explained that the ability to conclude using the criminal proof beyond a reasonable doubt standard was "materially impaired" by lies by individuals associated with the Trump campaign and deletion of emails, among other factors.
[460] After the hearings, it was revealed that the House Judiciary Committee is "actively considering articles of impeachment and is seeking access to redacted materials from the Mueller report in order to decide whether to move forward with the process.
[483] On May 8, Assistant Attorney General Stephen Boyd wrote Nadler that Barr would ask Trump to invoke executive privilege to withhold the full report if the Judiciary Committee proceeded to vote on a contempt charge.
[484][485] Boyd wrote in the letter to Nadler saying "We are disappointed that you have rejected the Department of Justice's request to delay the vote of the Committee on the Judiciary on a contempt finding against the Attorney General this morning ...
"[486] Also on May 8, Barr wrote a letter to Trump to "request that you make protective assertion of executive privilege with respect to Department of Justice documents recently subpoenaed by the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives.
Representative Charlie Crist: "Reports have emerged recently, general, that members of the special counsel's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your March 24 letter.
[521][522] On October 6, 2020 President Trump, referencing the Mueller report, tweeted "I have fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents pertaining to the single greatest political CRIME in American History, the Russia Hoax.
[525][526] In summary, per Buzzfeed: "Although Wikileaks published emails stolen from the DNC in July and October 2016 and Stone – a close associate to Donald Trump – appeared to know in advance the materials were coming, investigators 'did not have sufficient evidence' to prove active participation in the hacks or knowledge that the electronic thefts were continuing.
