What We Know So Far From the Mueller Report

Attorney General William P. Barr gave a news conference about the special counsel’s report Thursday in Washington. Credit Tom Brenner for The New York Times
Attorney General William P. Barr gave a news conference about the special counsel’s report Thursday in Washington. Credit Tom Brenner for The New York Times

Our reporters have been reading the 448-page, redacted report of the special counsel, Robert Mueller, since the Justice Department released it this morning.

Here's the report itself.  We've also collected and analyzed excerpts.

Here are our major findings and our analysis so far, prepared by a team led by our chief White House correspondent, Peter Baker.

1.  Mr. Mueller examined about 10 actions by President Trump to determine whether he sought to obstruct justice but could not reach a conclusion. He found a concerted effort by Russia to interfere in the 2016 election, but Mr. Mueller established no criminal conspiracy between Mr. Trump’s campaign and Russia.

Among the incidents that the special counsel examined was Mr. Trump’s decision to fire James B. Comey, the F.B.I. director, in May 2017, and an attempt by the president a month later to have his White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, fire Mr. Mueller.

He also looked at the president’s efforts to hide details of a Trump Tower meeting with Russians during the election and to pressure Jeff Sessions, then the attorney general, to reverse his decision to recuse himself from supervising the investigation.

2. The report detailed dramatic conflicts within the White House. When Mr. Trump learned of Mr. Mueller’s appointment, he slumped in his chair and said: “Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my presidency. I’m fucked”.

The tension between Mr. Trump and Mr. McGahn flared repeatedly. In June 2017, Mr. Trump called him from Camp David twice and told him to have Mr. Mueller fired for alleged conflicts of interest. Mr. McGahn refused and prepared to submit his resignation. He refused to deny a later report that he had told  Reince Priebus, then the White House chief of staff, that the president had asked him to “do crazy shit”.

Mr. Trump referred to Mr. McGahn as a “lying bastard” and said that if he did not deny the report, “then maybe I’ll have to get rid of him”. Mr. McGahn left office later that year.

3. Attorney General William Barr pre-empted the release of the report in a morning news conference, at times sounding like a defense lawyer. He made no criticism of the president and instead offered an understanding interpretation of actions that Mr. Trump’s critics have said amounted to obstruction of justice.ç

He explained actions seen as impeding the investigation as a result of being understandably “frustrated and angered by his sincere belief that the investigation was undermining his presidency, propelled by his political opponents and fueled by illegal leaks”.

Mr. Barr said he gave the president’s lawyers access to Mr. Mueller’s report “earlier this week”, before it was released, and that he “disagreed with some of the special counsel’s legal theories” regarding obstruction — but even accepting them found no basis for a criminal charge.

Watch Mr. Barr's news conference, and read our profile of the attorney general.

4. There are 14 spinoff inquiries from Mr. Mueller's investigation disclosed in the report.

Twelve were redacted in the released version, because of concerns that if details were released publicly, they could harm continuing investigations.

The two that remained were potential wire fraud and federal employment law violations involving Michael Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer, and charges against Gregory Craig, the former White House counsel under President Barack Obama, who was accused of lying to investigators and concealing work for a pro-Russian government in Ukraine.

5. Mr. Barr said that collusion with WikiLeaks, which published Democratic emails  stolen by the Russian government, would not have been criminal.

Using legalistic language, Mr. Barr reasoned that since WikiLeaks did not participate in Russia’s underlying hacking of the emails, its actions were no crime. Thus, any Trump campaign collusion with WikiLeaks, had it occurred, could not be an illegal conspiracy.

6. Mr. Trump claimed vindication at a White House event for wounded service members.

“They’re having a good day”, he said of the troops. “I’m having a good day too. It’s called ‘no collusion, no obstruction.’ There never was, by the way, and there never will be”. To cheers, he added, “This should never happen to another president again, this hoax”.

Earlier, he tweeted a photo resembling a “Game of Thrones” poster that depicted him staring into a cloud, saying “No Collusion. No Obstruction. For the haters and radical left Democrats: Game Over”.

7. Democrats lashed out at Mr. Barr.

Lawmakers and presidential candidates assailed the attorney general for trying to frame the results of the report before lawmakers or the public had a chance to read it for themselves.

“It is clear Congress and the American people must hear from Special Counsel Robert Mueller in person to better understand his findings”, Representative Jerrold Nadler, Democrat of New York and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said on Twitter. “We are now requesting Mueller to appear before @HouseJudiciary as soon as possible”.

Peter Baker is the chief White House correspondent and has covered the last four presidents for The Times and The Washington Post. He also is the author of five books, most recently Impeachment: An American History. Katie Benner, Nicholas Fandos, Michael S. Schmidt, Eileen Sullivan, Michael Tackett and Noah Weiland contributed reporting.

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