. robert mueller testifies, here are lester holt and savannah guthrie. >> good morning everybody, an extraordinary moment of american politics. e public testimony of robert mu special counsel led the two years investigation into donald trump and russia interference in the 2016 campaign. >> mueller arrived on capitol hill a few moment ago. it has been four months since he submitted his reportis today the first time he'll face publict questions about wha he uncovers.

mueller will testify under oatht for at lea five hours >>day. president trump repeatedly called the mueller investigation a witch hunt. today robert mueller, the lifelong republican and now a private citizen wil have his say and the consequences could be enormous. >> we'll be followinghis all throughout the day and standing by to help us is our team correspondents and analysts. i am going to start out with kasie hunt on the hill for us. >> a hisric day, t years in the making savannah. we'll see robert mueller in a few short mutes here sit down with the house judiciary committee that's going to begin at 8:30. that's the larger of the two committees. there are 41 members on theig intellce committee. each one is going to get about five minutes to speak. this is going to focus on

alged obstruction, volume two of the mueller report. you will see all of those instances laid out and the report during the course of the hearing then we'll have a little bit of a break and the intelligence will take over. there is only 22 members and they'll get five minutes. that's when you wil hear about the russian collusion conspiracy questions that are laid out in the first volume of the mueller report. toat's what they are tasked to dig in. that's going to take us about 5 hours of total testimony here. the person that's sitting with him, we had last minute developments, robert mueller's number two in the t course ofs investigation. he's a former deputy council to robert mueller. in the judiciary hearing he'll act as mueller's lawyer. he's counsel and he's going to

sit next to mueller. he's not going to be sworn in for that hearing. the intelligence committee will be a sworn witness. this is something that has concerns some democrats. presidt trump tweeting this morning about robert mueller being able to get help from one of his lawyers. again, savannah, the political question at stakes could not be higher here. this is really a critical test for democrats who are looking to imach this president, this may be their final moment to lay out for the american public why this is something that should be on the table. savannah. >> that testimony is expected to get underway in about 12 minutes from now. >> we expect mr. mueller to refer a lot of this report. this is the version of it, various form of media. the whole thing i a best seller. a lot of folks have not read it.

448pa s. 951 blacked out redactions. volume two covers ten instances of possibleon obstructif justice by president trump including ordering the fire of mueller himself. pete williams will be with us r all of today's testimony. >> the mueller invesltgation resu in seven convictions including five men who worked for trump on the campaign or the white house. among them, paul manafort and michael cohen, former trump's lawyer and michael flynn, national security adviser and roger stonen goes o trial in november and two groups of russians were charged with meddling in they campaign b stealing and publicizing democratic e-mails and planning phony social media. the report says this, russia

perceived it would benefit from the trump presidency. the investigation did not establish that members of the campaign conspire or coordinated with the russians. as for the presidentms hif, the report sites 10 possible acts of on obstructions. the couil team never got the point deciding whether any of that amounts to a crime because a long standin presidentld not be indicted. cou miler said though if the teamnf had coence that the president clearly did not commit obstruction of justiceth report would said so. >> thank you, pete. >> t halie jackson, the president may tune in himself. >> he left it open to interpretations. if you are a m betting or woman, i think you will be

confident of is engeof thadet'nts psi happerenim where we are right now. he's up and tweeting about all of this this morning. it is the greatest hit of his talking point, no collusion and no collusion or obstruction. with aaron zebley will beear with robert mueller for both of the hearing toda here is what we understand what the preslient is fee right now,si the prent is capaciirrit and robert mueller is the dominating headline into the trump administration. t we ared the president is not overly furious as we have seen him inast instances when mueller is front and centered. folks are feeling battered heard. they have been here before and kind of here we go again at

attitu attitude. but if you have seen from the public, the president is frustrated by mueller's team. he had nothing on his public schedule which morning which is in ndication he'll bethu tuned on everything going down. we'll get a chance to see the president in person andk potentially him some questions here at the white house before he heads to a fundraiser in west virginia lester and savannah. >> we are under eight minutes away from the schedule starting. here is our chuck todd and andrea mitchell and our analyst, former acting general of the obama administration, he wrote a new york times op-ed identifying of what he calls the three questions that robert needs to answer. what may we expect to hear a lot

about, let me turn to paragraphs a, b and c, what questions may be played through? >> thisti investi is enormouslyca techni the questions that have to come 442, h are not page subparagraph a, number 2 but rather the simple one. when the mueller report was given to the attorney general, trump said this found no obstruction and no collusion and totally exonerates the president. the first three questions would have to be mr. mueller, you wrote this rert, did you find this report, did you find no obstruction or no collusion? did you totally exonerate the president. as pete williams just said the actual report said simply the opposite. if he could exonerated the president, weul wo

>> the testimony is not happening in a vacuum, it is happening on capitol hill. it is happening among democts who are themselves divided over whether or not impeachments proceedingould be started against the president. nancy the pressure of pelosi facing right now? >> this feels like in some way the mueller report, it was out and now we are going to hear it verbalized and they'll put it over the package and focus on the president's campaign. there is a part of me wonders is that what today will feel like. i think that's the challenge because i think today underscores just how much the house democrats have struggled to do accountability on this white house. a lot of this is because the white house is stone walled and prevented and blos subpoenas or not yabided b them.

they have not hadt any sor of big moment where they feel oh, this is why democrats are inng charge of coress and this is the accountability you promise to bring. this is their biggest moment yet presenting accountability on this president. if they don't deliver, it could become a political divide. > is this an opportunity for democrats to regain the narrative. if you think back four months ago, william barr, put uphat brief summary on a saturday evening and th tone has not anged of what he said in that brief summary. >> actually william barr in that mome e isctly right. he created the narrative and donald trump through social dia through his media feed ran this, witch hunt, all of the rest of this. this may well be democrats' last chce. they're not like yet on again

and the delays and altercation and l the impediments including this last minute letter to robert mueller, guard rails that no one thinks it is required. he may well feel he has to abide by it and being someone who is so much a man of the system of the institutions. and so they have obstructed in every possible way not criminally obstructed but just in terms of stopping the white hous and stopping the house' democrats from making their case. if they're ever going to make their case politically or legally towards article impeachments, it is today. >> one of the reasons we are here because people have not read the muellerreport. they're trying to figure out how doe you get peopl consume this mueller report? the current fbi director admitted he did not read the report. one of the greatest travesty of washington is the lack of

urgency of this report. >> yesterday of chris wray, that was the moment. if the fbi director have not read the full report. >> the first 30 or 40 pages ine here be we get to the political de are about the depths of the russian efforts undermining the elections. >> it is readable. >> it is not hard to read. >> it reads like a spine novel. it is where robert mueller in nine minutes started and ended his verbal, he never took questions. it is not so much of the struction which is hard to prove intent. you are a lawyer and you know better than i as a career prosecutor how hard that case may be. the fact the matter of the russian interference is clear. there is nome cri of collusion as we know so the president misdirected that by saying no

collusion and completely exonerated. did you prove no collusion in your report? he could say we never addressed coll >> as you well know there is a differenceetween what a prosecutor is looking to indict may have to esbeblish proof nd reasonable doubt. i did not entertain thaes qution because i am not allowed to indict a sitting president. the political question before this committee is whether the conduct that robert mueller is going to testify to is a etlitical problem. it is somng that may warrant impeachment which is a separate issue than whether it is truth beyond ana reasoble doubt in the courtroom. >> absolutely. do you want this person sittier the mueller report found while they could not find the criminal standards for conspiracy which is beyond a reasonable doubt. it never said there was no attempts to conspire or anything

like that. on a lower level of prism. that's what's so frustrating. the lack of urgency around this and the fact that democrats saw this as as political problem as opposed to a kind of rule of law or governance problem. if you ask ourself, would you accepted a ceo of any public company that does anything likes th >> i got 30 seconds. >> nancy pelosi who is a shrewd politician is looking at public opinion polls. people do not support impeachment proceedings and that's what she's looking at. >> this is short term/long-term. >> i think it is the iraq war vote for democrats and the moment you think politics look one way and the five yea politics could be a 180. that's what i think democrats are not thinking enough about. >> we are looking athis hearing room in washington, d.c.

in a few moment we'll start fiver hrs of testimony from robert mueller, former fbi director. he'll take the witness stand in just a few. i want toause and let some other stations join us. >> good morning, 8:30 on the eastern time zone, as we come on the air, you are seeing in the hearing room in washington, d.c. where robert mueller will be sworn into testimony before the ouse commission and judiciary committee. i am joining with lester holt and our chrman, jerry nadler. he's sitting down and getting ready to start this oaring. fair t say a reluctant witness this morning. >> he is. emat leads to a bigger challenge for drats in particular.

they want him to narrate the story. narrate, give us the audio version of your book and tell us a story and don't bore us. >> is it the story or the sound oote they are looking for? >> i think they'ng for him to help confirm the itory. will be different ways that goes. >> there is mueller. >> he's not the most dynamic story. >> we have not heard a lot of his voice. he came out several weeks ago and gave a brief statement that ame report speaks for itself. his voice is not fiar to a lot of americans. we'll hear several hours of it neil, on this issue he's being forced to testify here today. he came out when he made his nine-minute statement, please don't call me. my report is myim testy, you are barking up the wrong tree. he's going to sit down and answer the questions before him.

he's not reachin out to make this good for democrats or republicans. >> mueller t saidhe entire time has been not in the public eye, he's been in the public eye a couple of times to correct t record. >> on the date of the trump tower meeting -- >> perhaps we have a protesher inside troom. o question wants him early. >> that happens on this type ofl profg hearing on capitol hill. there is always an outburst. they have not belnled in. >> i have to say the chief defendant sit ting i the front row. jim jordan is on judiciary. he's a defender and a frequent fox news. >> freedom caucus the house ofo republicans are dead set against mit. >>r. mueller is not taking his

seat yet but he'll be i sworn here shortly. he'll give an opening remark. >> judiciary committee willome to order. we welcome everyone to today's hearing on oversight of the report on thvestigation into russia interference of the 2016 presidential election. will now recognize myself for a brief opening statement. director mueller, thank you for being here. i want to say just a few words about our themes today, responsibility, integrity and accountability. your career is a model of responsibility. you are a decorated marine officer. you awarded the purple heart and ithe bronze star vietnam. you served the senior role at the department of justice and the immediate after math of ner 9/11, you served as director of the fbi. two years ago you returned to

publicervice to lead the investigation into russia interference of the 2016 elections. you conducted that investigation with remarkable integrity. for 22 months, you never commted in public about your work even y when were subjected and grossly, unfair attacks. your indictment spoke for you in astonishing details. over the course of your investation, you obtained criminal indictments against 37 people. youed secur his department campaign manager and his personal lawyer and adviser among others. in the paul manafort's case. you recovered as much as $42 million. taxpayers approaches zero. and in yourreport, accountability as well.

in volume one, you find that the russian government attacked our 2016 elections quote, "in a sweeping and systematic fashion," the attack is designed to benefit the trump campaign. volume two, wk us through ten incidents of possible obstruction. president attempted to exert undo influence over your investigation. the president's behavior included, public attacks on the investigation and non efforts to control it and efforts in both public and private to encourage witnesses not cooperate. among the most shocking of thesi innts, president trump ordered his white house council to have you firednd a happen. t he ordered his formeampaign manager to convince to recuse attorney general to step attemp

witnesses from cooperating with your investigation.gh the depary barred you from indicting the president from this conduct. you made clear that he's n. exonerated any other person who acted in this way would have been charged with crimes. in this natn and not even the president is above the law. which brings me to this committee's work, responsibility, integrity and accountability, these are the marks by which we serve on this committee will be measured as well. director mueller, we have a responsibility to aresshe evidence that you have uncovered. you recognize as much when you say quote "the constitution requires the process other than the criminal justice system tor foly accuse a sitting president of wrong doing," that process begins with thek w of this committee. we'll follow your example director mueller, we'll act with

tegrity. we'll follow the facts with a lead. we'll consider all of appropriate remedies we'll make our recommendations to the house when our work c conclud concludes. we'll do this work because there must be accountability of the ennduct describing your reportp pees athank you director mueller, w lo forward to your testimony. it is now my pleasure to recognize the ranking member, mr. collins for his opening statement. >> thank youmar. chair andthank here. for two years leading up to the ueller report and the three told what to expect and what to lubelieve. coon we are told was in plain sight even when the special counsel did notd fin it. general barr provided to every american, we read no american conspired interference.

we are here s to askerious questions about mr. mueller's work and we'll do that. today marks the end of mr. mueller's investigation that closed in april. the burden of proof remains ely trhighem. we are told this investigation began as an inquiry whether russia meddle into our 2016s. election mr. muller, uconn colludedddi t >> mr. mueller concluded he did not. his family or advisers did not. the report concludes no one in the president's campaign colluded or collaborated or

conspire with the president. the president asses his guilt ile he knew the extent of his pr idency. the president's attitude towards the investigation was negative. the prident didot use authority to close the investigation. he asked his lawyer and disqualify mr. mueller from the job, but he did not shut down the investigation. the president knew he was innocent. those are the facts of the mueller report.ia ru meddle into the 26 elections. nothing we hear today will change those facts. one element of the story remains, the beginningf the fbi investigation. i look forward to mr. mueller's testimony of what he found during his review and in addition inspector general continues to review how gossips could be used against a private

citizen, a president. those results will be released n and we'lld to learn from them to ensure government and law enforcement power will never agn used in a private citizen or a political candidate. the origins and conclusion of the mueller investigation is the same thin what it means to be an american. everybody has their voice. every american enjoys the presumption of innocence and guarantee of due process. if we car anything away today, it must be wencase our electio elections. finally, we must agree that the opportunity calls here is too high. the s months we havent investigating failed to contribute to the growing job market, instead we have gotten stuck and paralyzed this committee in this house.

here i a side note. every week i leave my family and kids, the most important thing to me to comeo thi place because i believe this place is a place where we can do things and help people. six and a half years ago, i came here to work, we accomplished a lot in those first six o years a bipartisan bases with many of my friends across the isle sitting here today. this year because of the majority's dislikes of this president and this investigation caused us to accomplish nothing but talk about the problems of our country while our border is on fire and crisis and everhing else is stopped. this hearing is long overdue. we had proofs formonths. what we need today is to let that truth bring us confidence and i hope mr. chaiwian, closure that, i yield back. >> thank you mr. collins. i will now introduce today's witness. robert mueller served as director of fbi since 2001 to

2013. he served as special counsel of the department of justice sis overeing the investigation into russia interference of the 2016 elect he received his ba from university. mr. mueller is accompanied by aaron zebley on the investigation. we welcome our our witness and we thank you for participating in today's hearing. if you will please rise, i will begin to swear you in. >> would you raise you right hand please? doou swear of the testimony you are about to give is tru to the best of yourno kedge and belief, so help you go let the record show it is affirmative and thank you and be seated. yourl written statement wil

entered in the record and its entirety. i ask that you summarize your testimony in five minutes. director mueller, you may begin. >> good morning chairman nadler. and member collins and members of the committee. as you know in may of 2017, the acting attorney general asked me to serve as special counsel. i under took that role because i believe that it was of paramount interest to the nation to determine whether a foreign adversary had interfered in the presidentialti el. as the acting attorney general said at the time, thein apent was necessary in order for the american people to have full confidence in the outcome. my staff and i carried out this assignment with that critical objective in mind to work

quietly and thoroughly and with cetegrity so the public would have full confiden in the outcome. the order pointed me as special counsel and directed our office tote investi russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. this included investigating any lengths or coordinations between the russian government and individuals associated with the trump campaign. it also included investigating efforts to interfere with our obstruct or investigation. throughout the investigation, i continllresswohingof theeamse ha assembled. to do thoroughly asa our investigation to be complete but not to lastay longer than it was necessary. second, the investigation needed to be

absolute fanintegrity. our team would not leak or take other actions that could compromise the integrity of our work. all decisions were made based on the facts and the law. during the course of our investation we crghae 30 defend committing federal crimes including 12 officers of the russian military. 7 defendants c have beenvicted or pled guilty. other charges we brought remained pending today. for those matters, i stretch that the indictment contain cons - -isai presumed innocence unle proven guilty. the report says set forth the results of our work and the

reason of our charging and decisions. the attorney general later made the report largely public. as you know i made a few limited remarks about o report when we closed the special counsel's office in may of this year. there were certain points of emphasis. our investigation found the russian interference in our election in sweeping a systematic fashion. second, the investigation did not establish that memrs of the trump campaign conspire with russian government in its election interference activities. we did not address collusion which was no a legal term rather we focused on whether the evidence was sufficient to charge any member of the campaign taking part in a conspiracy and it was not.

third, our investigation of efforts to obstruct the investigation and lie to investigators wof critical importance. obstruction strengthen the cor of our justice to find the truth and wrongdoers accountable. volume two, we investigated a o seriesactions by the president towards the investigation. based ontm justice depart policies and principles of fairness, we decided not to make omdetermination as to whether the president ctted a crime. that was our decision then and remains our decision day. let me say further word about md appearance t. it is unusual for a prosecutor to testify about arinal investigation, given my role as a prosecutor, there are reasons why my testimony will

necessarily be limited. first, public testimony could affect several ongoing some of these matters, court rules or judicial orders limit the disclosure of informationo t protect the fairness of the csthg ocdi ngeeprdi justis.ce department , policies would be inappropriate for me to comment in any way tuld affect an ongoing matter. second, the justice department has asserted privileges concerning decisions. ongoing matters of the justice deliberations within our office. these are justice department privileges that i will respect. the departmt has released a letter discussing the restrictions on my testimony. i therefore wotil n questions o areas that i know of public

interest. for example, i am unable to address initial opening of the fbi russia investigation which occurred months before myin appotment or the so-called steele dossier, these are matters subjected of ongoing reviews by the department, any questions directed to the fbi or one ofhe justice department. as i explain when welo cse the special council's office in may. our report finds analysis and decisionthat we made. we conducted an extensive investigation over two years.ti in w the report, we stated the results of our investigation with pr we scrutinize every word. i do not intend to summarize or

ur worke the results of in a different way. on may 29th, the report is my testimony and i will stay within at text. as i stated in may i will not comment on the actions of the attorney general or of congress. i was appointed as a prosecutor. intend to adhere to that role and to the department's standards that governance. i am joined by deputy special counsel mr. aaron zebley. mr. zebley was responsible for the day-to-day oversight of the investigations conducted by our office. now i also want to again say thank you to theat rneys, the fbi agents and analysts and helped usal staff who conduct this investigation in a

fair and independent manner. these individuals who spent nearly two years working on this matter were of the highest te y.gr ye course of m career, i have seen a number of challenges who are democracy, the russian government efforts to interfere in our election is among the most serious. as i said on may 29th, this deserves the attention ofer eve aman. thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you, we'll proceed under thee f minutes rule of question. >> the president repeatedly claim your report found of no obstruction and complete exonerated him. that's not what your report

says, is it? >> krcorrect. that's not what the report says. >> volume two on the screen, you wrote "if we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the president clearly didt not commi obstruction of justice, we would so state, based on theac f we are unable to read that judgment," does that say there is no obstruction? no. >> you are unable to conclude the president did not commit obstruction of justice, is that correct? >> at the out set determined that we -- when it came to the president's culpability we needed to go forward only after tang to account of the olc opinion that indicated that the president, a sitting presidentt can' indicted.

>> so the report did not conclude that he did not commit obstruction of justice. >> that's correct. >> what about total exoneration, did you actually totally exonerated the president? >> no. your report states that it did not exonerate the president. >> it does. >> your investigation actually found quote "mstiple act by the president that were capable of exerting law enforcement investigation including the russia interference," is that correct correct? >> correct. >> can you explain what that findings mean so the american people can understand it? >> the finding indicates that the president was not excalpated

for the acts that he committed. >> you were talking about incidents where the president used his official power to exert undo influences over your investigation, is that right? >> that's correct. >> on page 7, volume two, you wrote "the president became aware that his own conductas being investigated in an obstruction of justice inquiry, the president engaged in -- and efforts in both public and private to encourage witnesses not to cooperate with the investigation," so president trump effort to exert undoi undoing -- after he's aware that he's being investigated? >> i stick with the language that you have in front of you. >> wch is?

>> on page 7, volume 2. >> is it correct that uconn collud you concluded that --ps. >> canou repete the question? >> is it correct that y you concluded, if the president committed the crime, you could not state that in your report here today? >> i would say --the statement would be you would not indict because under oln, opinio a sitting president can't be indicted. >> you could not state that because of a oac opinion. >> yes, with some guide. >> under doj, the president could be prosecuted for obstruction of justice crimes after he leaves office, correct? >> true. >> did anyit senior whe house

officials refused to be investigated by y team? >> i don't believe so. i have to look at it but i am not certain if that's the case. >> did the president requested to be interviewed by you and your team? >> yes. >> is it true that you tried to secure an interview with the president? >> yes. >> is it truehat you and your team advise the president's lawyer that an interview with the president is vital to our investigation? >> yes. >> is it true that you also stated that it is in the interest of t presidency and the public for an interview to take place? >> yes. >> the president refused to sit for an interview by you and your team? >> true. im tod you also ask provide written answers to questions en the tossible episodes of obstruction of justice crimes involving him? >> yes. >> did he provide any answers?

>>. >> i would to check on that. >> director mueller we are grateful you are here explaininv your itigation and findings. your work is vitally important to this committee and the american people because no ohe is above taw. now i recognize the gentleman from georgia. >> we are moving of the five-minute rule. i have several questions. i want t lay out some foundation. in your press conference, your testimony inour office would not go beyond your report. i would not provide information beyond that which is already public in any appearance in congress, do you standby that statement? >> yes. >> in may of 2019, have you conducted an additional

interviews or new information in your role as special unsel? >> in the wake of the report? >> since the closing of the office in may of 2019? >> and the qstion was? >> have you conducted any new interviews or new witnesses? >> no. >> you can confirm you are no longer special counsel? >> i am no longer special counsel. >> was your investigation stopped or hindered? >> >> were you or your team prided any questions by members of congress ahead of the hearing today? >> no. >> your report included 19s lawyer and 40 fbi agenerats and analys>>. 40 fbi agents and 19 lawyers and forensic and analysts? >> yes. >> is it true that you issued 2800 subpoenas, and executed 500 warrants and 50 pin registers.

>> that went a little fast for me. >> in your report, you did a lot of work, correct? >> yes, that i agree. >> a lot of warroeants. >> all right, a lot of search warrants. >> you are very thorough. >> yes. >> you listed it out in your report, correct? >> yes. >> is it true that the evidence gathered durg your investigation given the questions that you just answered, is it true the investigation gathered establish the president did not involved in the investigation? >> we found insufficie cuil nce of president's wld be a yes? >> pardon? >> those close to him voinvolve in the computer hacking or the

president otherwise unlawful relationship -- >> will leave the answer to our report. >> so it is a yes. >> is it true your investigation did not establish mrs of the trump campaign conspired ord coordinath the election. >> thank you. >> yes. >> thank you. although your report states collusion is not so specific offense and you said that this morning, a term of our criminal law conspiracy is in the ctext essentially anonymous terms. >> you have to repeat that for >> colluon is not a specific sime. offense or a term of in the federal law, conspiracy is. >> yes. >> in tcollusion and conspiracy

essential essentially. >> on page one of your report as you wrote, collusion is son mouse with conspiracy. >> you said on your may 29th conference that you choose your words carefully. are you testifying something different than what your report states >> no what i am asking is you can give me the citation, i can look at theitation and evaluate whether it is. >> let me clarify. you stated in the repo. i stated your report back to you and you said that collusion conspiracy wer not synonmous terms. >> as definedd --ai now you you chose your words carefully,

are ucoyou contradicting your report right now. >> not when i read it. >> so yourill change y answer to yes then. >> if you look at the language. >> i am reading your report sir. it is a yes or no. >> page 180, volume 1. >> this is from your report. >> i will leave it with the report. >> the report says. hopefully outr of you own report we could put to bed collusion of conspiracy. did you look at other countries investigated in our interference. what other countries? >> i discuss other matters. that i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. >> director mueller as you heard from the chairman we are mostly going to talk about obstruction of justice today but the investigation of russia's attack that started your investigation

is why evidence of possible on str obstruction is seriousha to w extent the government interfere in the 2016 election. >> could you repeat that? >> at the particular of what it came to the computer crimes and the government was indicated. >> the russian government interfered in the presidential election and sweeping in systematic fashion. >> you describe in your report that the trump campaign chairman, manafort, shared with a russian operative, kilimnik, who win votesn i western states. is that correct? >> yes. correct. >> they also discussed the status of the trump campaign for winning democratic votes in mid

western states months before that meeting, manafort caused internal data to be shared with kilimnik and the sharing continued with some periods of time after the tmeeting, ist accurate? >> accurate. >> our investigation found cnafort briefed kilimnik on the state of the trumppaign and manafort planned to win the election. it also includes discussns of battleground states which manafort identified as michigan and wisnsin and pennsylvania. >> that's correct. >> did your investigation determined who requested the pollindata to be shared with kilimnik? >> well, i would direct you to the report. that's what we have in the rert in regards to that particular. >> we don't have the redacted version. that may be a reason why we should get that for volume one. how could theov russian gnment

use this campaign data to further sweeping and systematic interference of the 2016? >> that's aittle bit of o our -- pass. >> fair enough. >> did your investigation find that the russian government would benefit from one of the candidate's winning? >> yes. >> which candidate would that be? >> well, it would be trump. >> now the trump campaign was not rueluctant to take russian' hel henv. >> was thetigation determination, what was the investigation determination regarding the frequency of which the trump campaign made contact with theussian government? >> well, i would have to refer to the report on that. >> we went through and counted

126 contacts between russians or their agents and campaign officials and associates. did that sound about right? >> i can't say i understand the statistic and believe it. i understand the statistics. >> i appreciate you being here on theoueport. from testimony and report, i think the american people have learned several things first, the russians wanted trump to n. second, the russians went on a luenced and i campaign. the russians hacked the dnc and they got the democratic game plan for the election. russian campaign chairman met with russian agents and repeated gave them internal data, polling and messaging in

the battleground states. so while the russians were buying ads and creating propaganda to influence the outcome of the elections, they were armed with inside information that they had stolen to hacking from the dnc and they had been given by the trump campaign chairman mr. manafort, my colleagues will probe the efforts under taken to keep this information from becing blic. i think it is important for the american people to undavstand the gry of the under line problem that your report uncovered. with that mr. chairman, i would yield back. >> good morning director, if you will let me summarize your opening statement. you said on the issue of conspiracy, the special counsel determined the investigation did not establish that members of the trump campaign conspired or

coordinated with the elections. si that fair? >> yes, >> now explaining the special counsel did not make a traditional prosecution decisi, the report on the bottom of page 2, volume 2, reads as follows. the evidence wed obtaine of the president's actions and intent prests difficult issues prevent us from determining no criminal conduct occur while this report did not conclude that the president committed the crime but it did not also exonate him. >> i read that correctly? >> yes. >> you said the special counsel team operated under and followed by justice departmentic polies and principles, which doj policies or principles set forth a legal standard that a person is not exonerated when a

criminal conduct is not determined? >> can you repeat the last part of t question? >>t whadoes that language come from director? >> i am sorry, go ahead. >> can you give me an example other than donald trp where the justice department determined the investigative person was not exonerated because their innocence was not conclusively determined? >> i can't but this is unique. >> time is short, i got five minutes. let's leave it that you can't find it. it does not exist. thepecial counsel's job nowhere does it say that you were to conclusively determine donald trump's innocence, it is not in any of the documents and it is not in your appointment

order or special counsel's regulations or the justicer manuel o the principle of prosecution. nowhere did thoseords appear together because respectfully, it was not the special counsel's job to exonerate m.hi the bedrock principle of our ijustice system then presumptio innocence. aneryone is entitled tod i ininthud prosecutors never, ever need to conclusively determine it. now director, the spe al counsel applied this inverted burden of proof that i can't find and you said does not exist anywhere in the department policies and you used it write a report. thein first l of your report, the very first line of youray report ss and as you read this morning authorizes the special counsel to provide the attorney

general with a confidential report explaining theec prosion decisions reached by the special counsel. that's the first word of your record, correct? >> right. >> here is the problem, director, thenspecial cou did not do that. on volume 1, you did. on volumeuc 2, with obson of justice, the specialns cou made neither a prosecution decisi deci, on, you made no decision you told us this morning and in your report that you told us no information. it clearly says, write a confidential r decisions reached. nowhere in here does it say write a report about decisions that were not reached. you wrote 180 pages, 180 pages about desions that were not w not charged or decided and respectfully byat doing th

you managed tola vio every principle in the mt sacred of traditions of prosecutors not offering extra analysis of potential crimes that are not charge americans need to know this as they listen to the democrats and socialists on the other side of the isle as theyco dramati readings from this report.wo volume t of this report was not authorized under the law to written. written to a legal standard that does not exist at the justice department and itten in violation of every doj. i agree with the chairman this morning when he said donald trump is not above the law. he's not. but he damn sure b should note below the law which is where volume two of this report puts in. thank you mr. chairman. >> director mueller, good morning. your exchange with the general lady from california demonstrates what is at stakes.

the trump campaign manafort was passing sensitive infmation t a russian operative. there were so many other ways russia subverted our democracy. volume o1, i can't think of a serious need toig invee. i am going to ask you questions of obstruction of justice as it lates to volume 2. page 12 of volume 2. you state we determined there were sufficient factuals and legal bases to further e potential obstruction of justice involving the president. is that correct? >> yes. >> page 12, volume 2. >> which portion of that page? >> that is we determine that there was a sufficient factual and legal bases to further investigate potential obstruction of justice issues involving the president, is that

correc >> yes. >> your report also describes 10 separate incidents possible of obst jction oftice that were investigated by you and your team, is that correct? >> yes. >> the table of contents is a good guide of some of the octobe it reigns the president's efforts and the president's further effort to have the attorney general to take over the investigation. the president's orders mcgahn to deny that the president tried to fire the special counsel and many others, is that correct? >> yes. >> i direct you now to what you wrote, directormueller, the president's pattern of kconduct as a whole she lights on the nature of the president's act and inferences that could be

drawn of his intent. >> when you talk about the president's pattern of conduct that concludes 10 possible acts ofon obstructihat you investigated, is that correct? >> that would conclude the 10 possible acts of obstruction. >> i direct you to t report of how it is characterized. >> for each of those ten potential instances of obstruction of justice, you analyzed three elements. >> obstruction act, and corrupt intent, is that correct? >> yes. >> you wrote on page 178, mevolu 2 of corrupt intent. actions by the president to end a criminal investigation into his own conduct to protect against personal embarrassme or legal liability could cons substitute a core example of corruptly motivated conduct, is

that correct? >> yes. >> to the scragn n, with the evidence you did find, is it volume 2 that6 of the evidence does indicate a thorough fbi investigation would uncover feedbacks o uncover facts of the campaign that the president could have understood to be crimes that would give rise to legal and personal and legal concerns. >> yes, i rely on the language of the report. >> is that relevant to potential obstruction of justice? >> yes. >> you further elaboraten page 157, obstruction of justice could be motivated by desire to protect non-criminal person of inrests or to avoid personal embarrassment, is that correct? >> i have on the screen. >> can you repeat the question now that i have the language on

the screen? >> is it correct as you further elaborate obstruction of justice can be motivated by a desire to protect non-criminal personal interests to protect against investigations where under lying criminal liability -- >> can you read the last question? >> the last question on the screen is asking you if that's correct? >> yes. >> okay. does the conviction of obstruction of justice res ts potentially of a lot of years of time in jail? >> yes. >> again, can you repeat the question just to make sure that i have it accurate? >> does obstruction of justice warrants a lot of time in jail if you were convicted? >> yes.

>> thank you very much mr. chairman. >> let me begin by rding the special atcounsel's reguln by which you were appointed. at thecl conion of the special counsel's work, he or she shall provide the attorney general of a report explaining the prosecution or decisions reached by the special counsel. is that correct? >> yes. >> okay, now a regulation uses the word shall provide, does it an the individual is in fact obligated to provide what's being demanded by the regularatiregular tion of statue meaning it did not have any wiggle room. >> i have to read the statue. >> i just read it to you. >> i am trying to find that

citation congressman. >> director could you speak directly into the microphone, pleasek >> yes, thanu. >> volume two -- >> i am sorry. >> volume two, page one says we determine not the make a traditional judgment, right at the beginning.w, noince you decided under it has olc opinion that you could not prosecute a sitting president meaning president trump, why are we having all of this investigationes of prent trump if the other side is talking about when you knew that you were not going to prosecute him? >> you don't know where the investigation is going to lie says 's opinion itself that you continue the investigat n even though you are not going to indict the president. >> okay. well, if you are not going to indict the presidentn theu

just continue fishing and that's my observation. my time is limited.ca i am sure you indict other people but not the sitting president, right? >> that's true. >> there are 182 pages of raw evidence including hundreds of references to 302 which were interviewed by the fbi for individuals that never been cross examined and did not comply of the special counsel's regulation to explain thes decisionreached, correct? >> where are you reading from on that? >> i am reading from my question. >> could you repeat it? >> 182 pages of raw materials, hundreds ofeferences of 302s were never been crossed examined and did not comply of there

lation to explain the prosecution decisions reached? >> this is one of those areas which i decline to discuss. >> okay. i would direct you to the report itself. >> okay. >> we i looked at 182 pages of it. let me switch gear. now while i recognize that the independent counsel'swhtatue h can a star operated is different from the special counsel statue, he and a number of occasions in his report stated that the president clinton's action may have risen to impeach and recognizing that it is up tohe house of representatives to determine what conduct is impeachable. you ver used the term raising

to impeachable ndkcot. is it true that there is nothing in volume two of the report that says that the president may have reached in an impeachable nduct? >> seriously kept cter of our investigation, our mandate and our mandate does not go to other ways of aressing conduct. our mandate goes to what developing new report into the attorney general. >> with all due respect, it seems to me that there very af couple o statements that you made that said that this is not for me to decide, the t implication iss is for this committee to decide. ucw you did use the word impeachable condlike started, there was no statue to prevent you from using theord impeachable conduct and i go

back to what mr. ratliff says and that's even the president is haoven until guilty. >> thank you mr. c. >> first i would like to read a statement that mr. nadler said about your career, it is a model of rectitude and i thank you. >> based on your investigation, how did president trump react to your appointment? >> i sent you the report where that is stated. >> when sessions told t president that a special counsel had been appointed, the presiden slumped back in his chair and said quote "this is terrible, this is the end of my presidency, i am ked." >> did the attorney general

session told you about that talk? >> i am not certain of the person who originally said that quote. >> sessions apparently said it ned o of his aides had in his notes, too. he was not pleased of the c specialnsel because of your outstanding reputation. the attorney jones recused hemself from t investigation because of his role of the 2016 campaign, is that not correct? >> recusal means he could not be involved in the investigation? >> yes. >> you know mr. sessions and mr. rosenstein became in charge of it, is that correct? >> yes. >> was attorney sessions following the rules and professional advise of the department of justice when he

recuse himself from the department? >> yes. >> the president repeatedly express hisdispleasure of the recusal? >>esbased on what is written on the report. t . the president'e reaction of cusal noted in the report, mr. bannon recalled that the president was made and screamed at mcgahn of hns weak sessioas. did you recall that in the report? >> yes, that's in the report. >> attorneys jsessions was not involved in the investigation, the president tried to get the attorney general unrecused himself after you were appointed hat ial counsel, was correct? >> yes. >> the president called the sessions at home and asked that he would unrecuse himself, was that true? >>t is true. >> was not the first time the

president asked him to unrecuse himself, was it? >> yes. i know of two occasions. >> sessions recalled the president pulled h aside to speak alone and set for him to do this unrecuse act, correct? >> correct. >> a few days after flynn lying forge as and cooperate with the investigation, trump asked to speak to sessions alone the oval office and asked sessions to unrecuse himself, true? >> refer to the report on that. >> did you know at any point that the president expressed anger on sessions? >> i have to pass on that. >> the presidenter said, you w supposed to protect me and words to that effect.

>> correct. >> is the attorney general supposed to be attorney general of the united states of america or for the president? >> the united states of america. >> yr wrote you report that the president repeatedly sought sessions to unrecuse himself? >>n rely o the report. >> i am not going to speculate, if he obviously took over attoey general,e would have greater latitude in his aions and enables him to do things otherwise he could not. >>n page 113, you said the -- i want to thank you mr. mueller, it is clear from your repor and e evidence that the president wanted former attorney general

sessions to violate the jdetice rtment ethic rules by taking over the investigation and interfering in it to himself and his campaign. your findings is so important because in america no body is above the law. >> thank you, i yield back. >> director, my demrat colleagues were disappointed in your report. they were expecting you to say somethinalong the line of here is why president trump deserves to be impeached butmuch as ken r did wrote about president clintonbout 20 years ago. the strategy had to change. the american peopl just did not read it. and this hearing today is their ast best hope to build up some sort of ground swell across america to impeach president trump. that's what this is all about today. now a few questions.

on page 103, of volume 2, of your report when discussing the june 2016 trump tower meeting, you referenced quote, "the firm that produce steel reporting," the name of that firm was fusion gps, is that correct? >> you are on page 103? >> s, 103, volume 2. when you arealking about the firm that produced the steel reporting, the name of the firm that produced that wasusion gps, was that correct? >> i am not familiar -- i am not familiar with that. >> it is not a trick question. now fusion gps produced the opposition research document widely kno ashe steele dossier and the owner of fusion gps is someone named glenn simpson. >> this isutside of my

purview. >> glenn simpson was never mentioned in the 448-page mueller report. >> as i said it is outside of my purview and handled by others. >> he was not. >> 448ages and the owner of fusion gps did the steele dossier started all this, he's not mentioned in there. let me move on. at the same time fusion gps was wog to collect opposition research on donald trumpnrom fore sources on behalf of the clinton campaign and the democratic national committee, o was representing a russianased company which had been sanctioned by the u.s. government, are you aware of that? >> yes, it is outsidef my purview. >> one of the key players and i will go to something different. one of the key pla trs in june 2016 trump tower meeting was nathalia.

she had beenng worki with glenn simpson and fusion gps since at least early 2014, are you aware ofthat? >> that's outside my purview. >> you did not mention that or her connections to glenn simpson at fusion gp y inr report at all. let me move on. now nbc news as reported the following quote "russian lawyer, veselnitskaya, she brought information, you did not include that in the report. >> it is a matter being handled by others at the department of

juste. >> our report spending 14 pages discussing the 2016 trump tower, it would be fair to say that you spent significant resources investigating that meeting? >> i refer you to the report. >> okay. and president trump was not at the meeting? >> no. >> you were aware of that? in contrast ofof the reaction the tru campaign, we know the clinton campaign did pay to ther dirt with foreign government, your report did fno mention a thing about fusiongps connection with russia. can you see from neglecting to mention fusion gps and glenn simpson involvement to focus on a brief meeting at the trump tower that produced nothi to ignoring the clinton's campaign

own ties to fusion gps while some view your report as a one sided attack on the president? i will tell you it is still outside of my purview. >> note finally, things left out f the report tends to be favorable to thepresident. >> my time has expired.nk >> thayou, director mueller. your investigation found that president trump directed white house counsel dan mcgahn to fire you, is that correct? >> true. >> and the president claims that he wanted to fire you because you had close confct of interest, is that correct? >> true. >> you had no conflict of interest that requires your

removal? >> correct. >> dan mcgahn advised the president that asserted conflict were in his words -- >> i refer to the report. >> on page 85 of volume 2 speaks to that. direct dire you had no c-- >> around may 23rd, 2017, the presidentquote, "mcgahn to complain to deputy rosenstein about this conflict, telling the president that it would look like still trying to meddle in the investigation and knocking out mueller would be another

fact used to be claimed of obstruction of stice. >> generally so. >> directed the mueller, the white house counsel told the president th if he tried to remove that could be another bases to a ledge that the president was obstructing justice, correct? >> that's correct, yes. >> now i would like to review what happened after the president was warned about obstructing justice. on tuesday -- >> congressman, do you have a tation? >> yes. volume 2, page 81 and 82. >> i would like to review what happened after the president was warned about obstructing justice. on tue jaye 13, 2017, the president dictated a statementg statin had quote, "no intentions of firing you,"

correct? >> correct. >> the following day june 14th, the media reported for the first time that you were iestigating e president for obstruction of justice, correct? >> correct. >> and then after learning for the first t timet he was under investigation the very next day, the president quote "issued a series of tweets acknowledging the kpexistence of obstruction the investigation and criticizing it," is that correct? >> generally so. >> two days later, the president called mcgahn at home from camp david on a saturday to talk about you, is that correct? >> correct. >> what was significant abo that first weekend phone call that mcgahn took from president trump? >> i am going to ask you to rely on what we wrote about those? >> well, you wrote in your

report that on page 85, volume 2 that on saturday june 17th, 2017, the president called mcgahn at home to have the removed.counsel now did the president call don mcgahn more than once that day? >> well >> i think it was two calls. >> on page 85 of your report, otu wrote qu "on the first call, mcgahn recalled that the president said something like "you got too this," correct? >> correct. >> don mcgahn called rodse tein to fire him, is that correct? >> there was a continuou vof

involvement of don mcgahn responding to the president. >> he did not want to put himself in the middle of that. he did not want to have a role in asking the attorney general to fire the special counsel, correct?ef >> i will r to the report and the way it is characterized in the report. , page 285.a he did not want to have a role in firing the attorney general. so at this point, i will yield back. >> thank you mr. chairman. mr. mueller, first, let me ask you a unanimous consent mr. chairman to submit this article of robert mueller unmasked the record. >>. >> now, mr. mueller who wrote the ne-minute comment you read

at your may 29th press conference? >> i am not going to get into okat. >> . so that's what i thought. you didn't write it. >> about comey where when comey called, you drop evething you were doing and you had dinner with your wife and daughter and comey called and you dropped everything and go. at least bob mueller will be standing on the tracks with me. you and james comeyad been good friends or were good friends for many years, correct? associates.usiness we both started off in the justice department. >> you were good friends, you can work together and not be friends but you and comey were friends. >> we were friends. >> that's my question. thank you for getting to t answer. before you were pointed as special counsel, had youja talko s comey in the proceeding six months? >> no.

when you were appointed as special counsel, was president trump firing of comey something you investigated of obstruction of justice? deliberationsrnal of the justice deputy. department. >> it goes to yourcredibility. it is relevant and it is always material. that goes for you, too. you are a witness before us. when you talk to pe sident trump y when you were appointed as special counsel, you were talking about fbi director position again. did he mention theirg of james comey? >> no, i did not as a candidate. >> did he mention the fing ing james comey in your discussion with him? >> i don't remember. >> if he did, you could been a fact witness as to the

president's mment and state of mind on firing james comey. >> i suppose that's possible. >> so most prosecutors want to make sure there is no appearance of propriety. >> you hired a bunch of people that did not like the president. >> you did not know before he was hired? >> i am sorry? >>ou didn't know before he was hired for your team?w >> kno what? >> peter struk hated trump. you did not know that?di >> when i find out, i asked swiftly to have him removed. >> whenid you learn of the

ongoing affair that he had was lisa page? >> a ut the sametime. >> did i order anybody to investigate the deletion of of their texts off of their government phones? >> once we found that peter strzok was -- may ini fi? >> well, you did not answer my question. did you order an investigation in decliniciletion of reformatt their phones? >> regardless of collusion or conspiracy, youot did n find evidence of any agreement among the trump campaign officials, or collusion, correct? >> correct. >> yotedn the report that an element of any of those obstructions you referenced

requires a corrupt state of mind? >> corrupt intent. >> right. if somebody knows they did not conspire with anybody from russia to affect the election and they see the big justice departmentit wath thatpl person coming after them and a special counsel appointed who hires dozens or more people that hate that person, and he knows he's innocent. he's not corruptly acting in order to see the justices done. what he's doing is not obstruction justice. he's pursuing justice and the fact that you ran it out two yearsea m you perpetuated injusti injustice. >> the gentleman's time is expired. >> i take your. question

>> the gentleman from florida. >> director mueller i would like to get back to your findings covering junef 2017, there was a bomb shell article that reported the president of the united states was personally under investigation for obstruction of justice and you said in your report, news of the obstruction investigat prompted the president to call mcgahn and seek to have the special counsel removed.ro you w about multiple calls from the president to white house counsel mcgahn. mcgahn recalls that the president was more direct, call rod, tell rod that mller has conflicts and can't be the special counsel. mcgahn recalled the president and telling him mueller has to go. call me back when you do it. director mueller, did mcgahn

understand what the pdent ordered him to do? >> in the report it says mcgahn understood the president to be saying that the special counsel had to be removed. on page 86, mechancgahn considee president's request fto be an inflection point. resign.decided he had to he took action to prepare the resign, is that correct? >> i will direct you to the >> that day he went to the white house and quoting the report you said he then drove to the office to pack his belongings and submit his resignation letter. >> that's directly from tr report. >> before he siesgns,t' he chie

did you recall what mcgahn told him? >>hatever he said will appear on the report. >> it says on page 87, previously called him, mcgahn said the president asked him to crazy expletive. in other words, crazy stuff. the white house's counsel thought that the president's elrequest is complety out of bound. he said the president asked him to do something crazy. it was wrong. he was prepare to resign over it. now, these are extraordinary troubling events but you found white house counsel mcgahn to be a credible witness, is that correct? >> correct. >> director mueller, the mpot imant question i have for you today is why. director mueller, why did the president of the united states want you fired?

>> i can't answer that question. >> well, on page 89 in your report on volument 2, substal evidence indicates that the president's attempts to remove the special counsel were linked to the scial counsel's oversight of investigations that involves the president's conduct and most immediately to report that the president was being investigated for potential obstruction of justice. closed quote. >> director mueller, you found evidence as you lay out in your report that the president wanted to fire you because you were instigating him for obstruction of justice, is that correct? >> that's what it says on the report. i standby on t report. >> director mueller, that should not happen in america.

no president should be able to escapenvtigations by abusing his power. that's what you testify to in your report. the president ordered you fired. the white house counswa knew it wrong. the president knew it was wrong. in your report says he should not make those calls to mcgahn but the president did it anyway. anyone else who interfered with the criminal investigation like yours, would be arrted and indicted on charges of obstruction of justice. director mueller, you determined that you were barred from indicting a sitngpresident, we already talked about that today. that is exactly why this committee must hold the president accountable. i yield back.

>> the gentleman yields back, the gentle lady from alabama. >> director mueller you said in onse to two different lines ofio questng that you refer of thdiscsioni wod rer youo t rortis in the way it was characterized in the report. importantly the president never said fire mueller or in the investigati investigation, one does not necessitate the other. mcgahn did not sign, he stuck around a year and a half. it was not until april 18th that the attorney gener releas the report to congress and the public. when you submitted your report to the attorney general, did yor deli a redacted version of the report so he would be able to relee it to congress and the public without delay, pursuant to his announcement of his intentn to do so during his confirmation hearing? >> i am notn going to engage i

d discussions of what happened after the production of the report? >> have thera attorney gene asked you to provide the redaction of the report? >> we worked on the redaction together. >> i am not going to get into details. >> is it your belief that an the reportversion of could be released to the public or congress? >> that's not in my purview. >> why did you not take similar action so congress can view this material? >> we had a process that we were operating on with the attorney general's office. >> you aare you aware of any aty generals going to court to release the material? >> i am not aware of that being done. >> the attorney general released special counsel report with

minimal redaction to the public. did you wte the report with the expectation that it would be released publicly? >> no, we did not have the expectation. we write the report understanding that it was demanded by a statuendould go to the attorney general for further review. >> and pursuant to the special counsel regulation, whos the only party resulting from the special counsel investigation? >> with regard to the president or generally? >> generally. >> attorney general. >> attorney general barr, he made it clear to intend to release the report to the public. did you remember o how much your report had been written at that point? >> do not. >> were there significant change tines and substance that the report would be madeav

lable to congress? >> i can't get into that. >> william barr, senator kamala harris asked mr. barr if he looked at all the under lininge ence that the special team gathered, he stated he did not. >> did you review all the line evidence gathered in your investigation. >> it came through the special counsel's office. yes. >> did any member of your tm read all the under lines gathered? >> substantial amount of work was done. >> my point is there was no one member of the te that looked everything. >> that's what i am trying to get out. >> an investigation is comprehensive as yours, it is normal that differen members of the team would have different sets of documents and if anyone would review all of the under line. >> how many of the approximately 500 interviews conducted b the special conference did you

attend personally? >> very few. >> on 2019, march 27, you wrote a letter to the general complaining of letter of your report. it did not fully capture the context and nature of substan of this office's work and conclusions. we communicated that concern in the morninar of 20th. there is critical aspect of our investigation, who wrote that letter? >> well, i can't get io who wrote it? >> but you signed it? >> what i will say is the letter stands for itself. >> why did y write a formal letter since you called the attorney general to express those concerns? >> i can't get into that. >> did you authorize the letter to the media or was it leaked? >> i have no knowledge on either. >> you went nearly two years without a leak, why was this

letter leaked? >> well, i can't get into it. >> was this letter written and leaked for the express purpose of changing theve narrati of the conclusion of your report and was anything in attorney general barr's letter referred to principle conclusion inaccurate? can he answe the question, please? >> you may answer the estion. >> was anything in attorney general barr's letter reached inooioioon cuscl into it. >> the gentl lady in california. >> thank you, mr. chair. > as you know we are focusing on five obstruction opepisodes today. i would like to ask you of the second of those obstruction episodes. it begins on page 113, have yum

2. the new york times reported the president ordered mcgahno have the department of justice fire you. is that correct? >> correct. >> that story is related to the events you testified here today. the president calls to mcgahn to have you remove, is that correct? >> after the news broke did the president go on tv and deny the story? >> did not know. >> the president said "fake news, fake news, typical new york times, end story." >> correct. >> you found evidence. did the president's personal lawyer do something the following day in response to that news report? >> i refer to coverage of this in the report. >> on page14 1the president's

personal counsel called mcgahn's attorney and said the president wanted mcgahn to put out a statement denying that he had been asked to fire the special counsel. did mcgahn do what the president asked? >> iheefer you to t report. >> communicating through his personal attorney, mcgahn refused baa refus refused because he said "the times story is accurate that the president wanted the special counsel removed." is that right? >> i believe it is but i refer you to the report. >> he told the president that he's not going to lie. is thatgh ri >> true. >> did the president drop the issue? >> i refer to the write up of this in the report? >> next the president told ther make a falsedenial i, is that

correct? >> that's correct. >> on page 113, the president directed po right turter to tel to create a record to make it clear p that thesident never directed mcgahn to fire you, is that correct? >> that's as it is stad in the report. >> you founduote,the president wanted mcgahn to write a letter for our file, correct? >> correct. >> the president is asking his white house's counsel don mcgahn to create a record that can believed to be untrue while you were in the midst of th investigating president for obstruction of justice. >> generallykrerrect. >> mr. mcgahn was an important witness, was he? >> yes. >> didel the president t porter to threaten mcgahn if he did not

create the denel? >> i advis you to the report. >> the president said if he dt s ite a letter then maybe i will have to get rid of him. >> yes. >> did porter deliver that threat? >> i again ref you to the ayscussion found on page 115. >> ok but the presidentd still di not give up, did he? so the president told mcgahn directly to deny that the president told him to have you fired, can y tell me exactly what happened? >> i can't beyond what's on the report. >> on page 116, it says the president met him in the oval office. "the president began the oval office meeting by telling mcgahn the new york sometimtimes storyt look good and mechanic gain needed neemcga need to

correct it." >> it is in the report. >> mr. mueller, thank you for your invegation uncoverering this undisturbing evidence. it is clear to me if anyone else ordered a witness to create a false record and cover up acts that are subject of a law enforcement investigation, that person would be facing criminal charges. >> i yield back my time. >> gentle lady yields back, gentleman from ohio. >> in that interview with mr. n nipson denies and falsely stated. he omitted three times he lied to the fbi and you did not charge him wit the ime. why not? >> did you say 193?

>> volume 193. he lied three times, why didn't you charge him with the crime? >> i can't get into internal deliberations with t regards who or what would or would not be -- >> let's remember this, let's remember this - in 2016, the fbi did something that probably they haven't done before -- they spied on two american citizens associated with a presidential campaign. george papadapoulos and page. as part of the reason they were able t get the report. with mr. papadapoulos, they used human resources. from the moment george joined the trump campaign, all these peop around the world starting to swirl around you. meeting in rome, london, all kind of places. the fbi even sent a lady posing

as somebody else, even dispatched her to london to spy on mr. papadapoulos. in one of these meetings he's talk oog to a foreign diplomats , russians have dirt on clintons. that diplomat then contacts the fbi, the fbi opened an investigation based on the fact. you pointed this out on page 1 of the report. the opening investigation, based on thapiece of information, diplomat tells papadapoulos, tells russians haveirt on clinton. what i'm wondering is, who told papadapoulos, how did he find out? >> i can't get into it. >> yes, you can. page 192. you told us. joph nipson. joseph nipson's the guy who told

papadapoulos who lives in rome .d london this is the guy who told george he's 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.e you charg rick gates for false statements. you charge paul manafort with false statements. you charge michael flynn with false statements. but the guy who put the country thugh this whole saga starts it off three years we lived this now, he lies, anduy you g don't charge him. i'm curious as to why? >> well, i can't get into it and it'sbvious we can't get into charging decisions. >> when the fbi interviewed in february, the fbi interviews him in february, when the special counsel interviewed nipson, did he lie to you guys, too. >> can't get into that. >> did you interview nipson? can't get into that.

>> western intelligence ol eastern sxwejones. >> can't get into that. >> lot of things you can't get into. >> you can charge them, you can charge all kind of people around the esident withalse statements, but t guy who laches everything -- the guy who puts this who story in motion you can't charge him. i think that's amazing i'm not certain i agree with your characterization. >> i'm reading from your report. nipson told papadapoulos, he tells the diplomat. here we are three years later, july 2019, the country has been put through this and the central figure who launches it all lies to it and you don't hunt him down and interview him again and you don't charge him with a crime. here's the good news -- the president was falsely accused of

conspiracy. the fbi does a ten-month investigati investigation. james comey said they had nothing. you did 22-month, you find no conspiracy. the democrats want to keep investigating investigating. they want to keep going. maybe a better course of action, maybe a better course of action is to figure out how the false accusations started. maybe go back and figure out why joseph nipson was lyi to the fbi. here's the good news -- here's the good news -- that's exactly what bill barr is doing and thank goodness for that. that's exactly what attorney general are doing. they're going to figure out why wee three-year -- >> time for the gentleman has expired. >> in a moment, we'll take a very brief utfive-min break. first, i ask everyone in the room to remain seated and quiet while the witness exits the room. i also want to announce to those in the audience you may not bet

guaran your seat if you leave the hearing room at this time. we're about an hour and 20 minutes into robert mueller's testimony before this the house committee, largely staying within the lines as we thought he would. but there were some moment and let't it to the panel here. the democrats were hoping that this would be a compelling movie version of 446-report that put er and his team together. have we seen that before? >> we haven't. the movie with the best actor the lead person hereas the fewest words spoken and the problem here is you're basically the narrative that democrats were hoping that bob mueller would telling, he's telling him, that's true. yes, that's correct. i wrote it down, narrative

nightmare for the democrats. i stick with the language i have in front of you. or whatever was said is in the report. he has no interest in helping to provide -- >> the democrats can't be surprised by this, they had to today.a his testimo he said, i won't say anything beyond the report pleas don't call me to come and testify. >> they should have been prepared. they were prepared. jerry nadler was the most effective in his opening questions and answers because he laid out the facts that the president said that he was tonerated. ist true? no. >> we have that exchange as he kind of took what the president's narrative h been. here itis. the report did not conclude that he didn't obstruction of

justice. is that correct? >> that is correct. >> whatbout totalexoneration, did you actually totally exonerate the president in. >> no. >> in fact, your report expressly states that it does not exonerate the president tin >> does. >> your report actually found quote multiple act by the president capable ofxerting undue influence including the russian influence and the obstruction investigation? is that correct? >>hat's correct. >> director mueller, can you explain what that finding means so the american understand it? >> well, the finding indicates that the president was not -- the president was not exculpated for the acts that he allegedly committed. >> that's one of the earlier

exchanges. >> that does frame it. the probleis, this witness suddenly is reluctant not only did he actually seek guidance from the justice department in thatetter which in the last 24 hours which couhe could not do. he's not a very assertive witness. he hasn't pushed back by republican's questioning. >> i think tf part oe issue is mueller and and another part of the issue is the questioning by the dems. i think it started off right with nadler a series of speeches. and yes, no questions. importantly, the next set of questions really have to be t attorney general barr said you could have reached a conclusion about whether or not obstruction was met here. >> i'm not going to get into

that. isn't that how he's going to respond. >> it's veryard given the fact that the attorney general can't. >> have republicans beeny effectivdermining mueller and the credibility of his investigation? >> my answer is no. these attacks have landed flat. this whole idea he hasn't investigated the origins in 2016 i don't know if that's really actually going t move the needle in any real way. >> to your point the democrats are asking yes, no questions. when they ask for the narrative, what happened with don mcgadget to get you fired? he said i refer you to the report. >> democrats would advertise this as the bringing to life of the mueller report. robert mueller doesn't appear to be d with that strategy. >> he's not pushing back agains threpublican attacks.

>> so, neal, you know better, unless robert mueller said that is n cohat,t'rrsec not the law has to say thatn rather tha refer to the report. >> i aee with you. >> should democrats treat mueller a bit with a t more skepticism? right now the decision was made, he's a marine and a patriot and this great american hero, but there's a lot of failures here, he failedo t fl, get fail to g president to sit down. why didn'tpoena the president? they don't want to treat him with -- part of it is a view among the democrats the report itself is so damming don't you have to attack the author of the report, when you see this, important to

have him answer the barr question which barr said he could. at's the job. let's get answer. >> remember, mueller remembered it from the outset he doesn't want this to go a day further. did you get everything you needed. >> i have to sayth , mr. mueller, if youelieve the of le most important aspec heis report is the sweeping aspect of t russian interference you're doing yourself a disservice by not being expounding on the importance andf urgency o this report. there's no urgency coming from mr. mueller. therefore, savannah, i don't h w how this leads to step two, impeachment. >> you covered director mueller for many, many years, pete, what's your taken how he e's

testifying this morning? >> well, i think despite robert mueller being the strictly the prosecutor h knows full well what role the democrats want him to play here. he's clearly reluctant to do it. the second point is, this is not the same robert mueller that we saw in his 88ef appearances be congress in the past. he last testified before congress six years ago when just as he was concludins his time a the fbi director, he turns 75 in few weeks. it's fair years have clearly taken a toll on the bob mueller we used to see, i think that's affected his about to answer the questions. i will say onething, interesting the republicans just asked once and didn't pursue this whole idea of what has been one of the most controversial parts of this report, where it said that we're not saying that

donald trump obstructed justice because we decided we not even says we're not exonerating him either and he was asked about that today, since when is that the job of the prosecutor to say somebody wasn't exonerated? he was asked about that once. asked repeatedly by one o the members today and his only answer was this is a unique situation. >> he didn't really give a stirring defense of his decision to make a statement like that. that the president was not exonerated, which is more than just a simple declaration we're not going to>> i want to go to . where does impeachment go, what's the buzz you're hearing already about this hearing? >> reporter: well, i thinkou captured it well in your

conversation about it. i was just sitting in the room anhi if anytng, the fact that robert mueller the person is -- seems like a smaller figure perhaps than we anticipated he would be after so much buildup, so much drama over the last two years, it's even more evident in the room, his answers snd very quiet. the emotion and the forcefulness is coming from members o the congress, many of whom it feels like they're yelling at him inm so ways. so, from that perspective i think the initial sense it's t harder make a case when you don't have such compelling, forceful testimonyel from mur. now, nadler's initial question and answer was very -- and you said that already -- very important because it yield a very straightforward headline when the president talks as he does repeatedly claims no collusion, no obstruction, total

exoneration. here you have a very straightforward representatiuta. that's something that democrats are already planning on seizing on.so i al think to pete's point right there about the question about his role to no particular time exonerate the president, robert mueller seemed to have something else to say there but he was cut off by mr. ratcliffe, republican. mueller didn't interject himself into that exchange. they're abt to get started again. it's very clear, though as he was forceful he's doing exactly what he tasaid, sying within the framework of that report. >> absolutely. he did not reach out to answer that question whene was asked about controversial decision to say, i wrote exonerate, but nor

didt the nex questioner who was a democrat reach out and say, let me give you ahance to respond to these allegations against you. >>, savannah they had this planned. on the democratic side, all the way through the last of how want to narrate this report. i agree no one has shown the ability -- >> we'll have to ask our lit gator on our set. you have your plan and then you have to be presence in the moment and seize the opportunity. >> you have to be dynamic, you can't be reading your prescripted answers. >> attorney general william barr can make announcements about the correctness or incorrectness, then why can't robert mueller. >> he's the attorney geulral wo be the response. >> let's quickly check in with hallie jackson right now.

is the president watching or not? >> he's watching coverage, retweeting commentators and news anchor. calling this a disaster for democrats. thid prest's engaged. seizing on these moments where the mueller said no conspiracy. let's listen in. thank you, mr. chairman. mr. mueller, congressman addressed his request to mcgahn to fire you. representative bass talked about the request to deny the fact that the president made that request, i wantedic to p up where they left off. where the president's personal lawyer, in fact,as there w evidence that the president's personal lawyer was alarmed at the prospect of meeting with mr.

mcgahn to discuss mcgahn's denial of the "the new york times" report ofcorrect? >> correct. >> in fact, the president's counsel was so alarmed by thect prospef the president's meeting with mcgahn that he called mr. mcgahn's counsel and said that mcgahnould not resign noen matter what ha in the oval office that day, correct? >> correct. >> so, it's accurate to say that the president knew that he was asking mcgahn to deny facts that mcgahn, quote, had repeatedly te said were accunquote, isn't that correct? >> eccorrt. >> your investigation also found, quote, by the time of the oval office meeting with the president the president was aware, one, that mcgahn did not think the sto was false. two, did not want to issue a statement or create a written record denying in fact mcgahn

believed to be true. the president nevertheless persisted and asked mcgahn to repudiate facts that mcgahn had repeatedly said were accurate, isn't that correct? i i believe that's on 119. >> true. >> force mcgahn to say something that mcgahn did not believe to betrue. >> that's accurate. i want to referen you to a slide and it's on page 120. and it says, substantial evidence indicates that and repeatedly urging mcgn to dispute that he was ordered to have the special counsel terminated, the president acted for the purse of influencing mcgahn's account in order to deflect or correct. president trump told don mcgahn, quote, mueller has t go, close quote, correct? >> correct.

>> your report found on89, volume 2, substantial evidence by june he knew his conduct was under investigation by a federal prosecutor who can present any crime to a grand jury? true? >> true. >> the third element of the crime of obstruction ous jce is corrupt intent, true? >> true. >> corrupt intent exists if the president acted to obstruct the proceeding or protecting his own interests? that's generally correct. the only thing i would say we're going through the three elements of the proof of otruction of justice charges. when the fact of the matter is, we got -- excuse me just one second. >> mr. mueller, let me move on, upon learning about theen appointmof special counsel,

donald trump stated to the attorney general, oh, my god, oh, this i tend of my presidency. is that correct? >> correct. >> is it fair to that president trump viewed the special counsel investigation adverse to his conduct? >> true. >> where do you have that quote? >> page 90, volume 2. there's evidence that the president knew he should not have made those calls to mchn, closed quote. >> yes, that's accurate. >> the investigation found substantial evidence that the president trump repeatedly urged don mcgahn toave the special counsel terminated, correct? >> correct. >> when the president orderedck don ma began to fire the special counsel and then lied about it, one, the president

obstructed an official act and did so with corrupt intent? this is the united stat of america, no one is above the law. no one, the presidentust be held accountable one way or the other. >> let me just say, if i might, don't subscribe necessarily to your, the way you analyze that. >> thank you. >> tnk you, mr. chairman. mr. mueller. >> hi. >> i want to start by thank iin you for your service. you earned a bronze star, purple heart and other accommodations. you served as an assistant attorney here.

assistant attorney general for doj's criminal division and fbi dinkctor. so thayou. i appreciate that. having reviewed your biography, it puzzles me you handled your duties in this case the way you did. the report contradicts what you taught young attorneys at the department of justice, including every defendant is treated fairly. the prosecutor by listening the ten factualon situatiand not reaching a conclusion, you unfairly shifted the burden of proof to the president proving hice innonce. denying him legal forum to do so

you noted eight times in your report that you under the regulations to either prosecute or decline charges. despite this, you disregarded that duty. as a formerro pcutor i'm also troubled by your legal analysis. you discuss tenatterns involving alleged obstruction and then you failed to separately apply the elements of the applicable statutes. i read the case law, and i have to tell you,ust looking at the flynn matter, for example, the four statutes that you cited for possible obstruction, when i look at those concerning the flynn matter, 1503 is an applicable, not a grand jury and director comey wasn't an officer of the court. zes act 1505, crimina that would obstruct or impede

administtive proceedings. the deptment of justice criminal resource manual said that thebi investigation i not a pending proceeding. thats, force to tamper with a witness, general flynn at the time was not a witness and certainly director comey was not a witness. 1512 c2 talks about tampering with a record, as joe biden described thetu sta as being debated on the senate floor, he called this is a statu criminalizing document shredding. there's nothing in your report that alleges that the president destroyed anyevidence. so, what i have to ask you and what think people are working around in this hearing etis, l me lay a little foundation, the applicable rule, the prosecutor?

>> generally accurate. >> and the regulations concerning your job as special counsel states that your jobto with a confidential report describing the prosecution. you declined prosecuting president trump or any associated with his mpaign zz there was insufficient evidence. is that fair? >> fair. >> was there sufficient evidence to convict president trump or anyone else with obstruction of justice? >> we did not make that calculation. howld c yououlcation? opinion. indicates that we cannot indict a sitting president. one of the tools that a prosecutor would use is not there. >> okay, but let me stop you, you made the decision on the russianen interferce. you couldn't have indicted the

president on that and you made the decision on that. but when it came to obstructith you rew a bunch of stuff up against the wall to see what would stick -- >> i would not agree to that characterization at all. what we did is to provide the attorney general in the formal thmo our understandings of the case. were declined and that one case where the president can't be charged with a crime. >> okay, but the -- could youre charge thedent with a crime after he left office? >> yes. >> you believe that he committed -- you believe you could charge the president with obstruction of justice? >> yes. >> the prosecutor cannot bring a charge against a sitting president nonetheless can nvestigation to see if there are any other

persons who might be drawn into e conspiracy. >> time of the gentleman is expired. the gentleman from rhode island. direct, as you know, we're specifically focusing on five separate obstruction episodes here today. i'd like you to ask you about the third episode. entighted the president's effort to curtail thepe sal counsel's investigation. by curtail, you mean limit, correct? >> correct. >> my colleagues have walked you through being. fired corey lewandoski, the president's fmer campaign manager, did he have any formal position in this trump administration? >> i don't believe so >> your report describes an incident in the oval office involving lewandoski on june 19, 2017, is that correct. >> i'm sorry, what's the

criation. >> page 91. >> of the second volume? >> yes. >> meeng in the oval office between mr. lewandowski and the president. two days after the president called don mcgahn at home to fire you. is that correct. >> correct. >> after he refused to follow the order to fire you, the president came up with a new plan, to go around government aides to try and limit your investigation, what did the president tell mr. wandowski to do? did you and your team see this handwritten message? >> i'm not going to getnto what we may or may not have include zmrd directed sessions to give a public speech that he planned to meet with the special

prosecutor to explain this is a very unfair unless the prosecutor moved forward with meddling of future elections. >> yes,t is. >> mr. lewandowski a privates citizen wa instructed to deliver a message from the president to the attorney general to limit your investigation, correct? >>correct. >> at this time, sessions was still recuse from oversight of your investigation, correct? >> i'm sorry, can you repeat. >> the attorney general was recused -- >> yes. >> okay,f the attorney general had followed through with the presideness prs, mr. mueller, it would have effectively ended your investigation, correct? >> true. >> page 97, i quote, taken

together the president's directivsthat session was being instructed to tell the specialns cou to end the exi existing investigating of the president. >> generally true. >> an unsuccessful attempt to obstruct is still a crime, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> mr. lun dow skye tried to meet with the attorney general, true? >> true. >> not a public log of the meeting the president raised the issue again with mr. lewandowski. so, immediately following the meeting with the presidentsk lewandowski mr. dearborn to deliver the staff and he

refused to deliver it because he didn't feel comfortable, correct. >> correct. >> two days after the white house counsel don mcgahn refused to carry out the president's order to fire you, he directed a private citizen to tell the attorney general of the united states to limit your investigation into future elections, effectively ending your investigation into the 2016 trump campaign, is that correct? >> i'm not going to adopt your characterization. the facts laid out in the report are accurate. >> you write on page 99, 97, substantial evidence indicates that the president's effort to have sessions limit the scope of the special counsel's investigation to future elections interference was intended to prevent further investigative scrutiny of the present andis campaign conduct, is that correct? >> generally. >> mr. mueller, you have seen the letter, 1,000 former

republican and democratic prosecutors have rd your report, anyone else other than the president would have been charged with obstruction of justice. do yougree with that conclusion? >> the prosecutors -- >> thank you, mr. chairman. over here. mr. mueller, you guys, your team wrote in the report, quote, top of page 2, volume 1,lso on page 173, you said that you come to the conclusion, quote, that investigation didn't establish f that members o the trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the russian government with election interference activity, is that accurate? >> that's accurate. >> i'm curious, when did you personally come to that conclusion? > can you remind me which paragraph you're referring to -- >> page 2, volum 1.

>>ragrapokh ayar, you looking - >> investigation did not establish -- >> of course, i see it. >> my question is, when did you personally reach that conclusion? >> we were ongoing for two years. >> ongoing. you wte itt some point during that two-year period. at some point you hado come to the conclusion that i don't think there's not a conspiracy going on, there was no conspiracy between this president nd i'm talking about the rest of the team, i'm talking about this president and the russian and developing a criminal case, you get pieces of information, witnesses and the like, as you make your case, and when you make a decision on a particular case depends on a number of factors. i can't say specifically that we reached a decision on a particular defendant at a particular point in time. >> but it was some time well

before you wrote the reportfa enough? you wrote the report dealing with a whole myriads of issues. with regard to the president, i do t find anythinghere, fair enough? >> i'm not certain i do agree with that. there are various aspects of a development of an -- >> , that's my point. various aspects that happen, somewhere along the pike you come to the conclusion there's no there there for this defendant. >> i can't speak -- >> you can't say when. fair enough. >> i'm asking the sworn witness. mr. demueller, evie suggest on may 10th, six days before the attorney general appointed you special counsel, mr. rosenstein called and mentioned you the

appointment of special counsel. you had a discussion of that, is that true? >> may 10, 2017. >> i don't have any -- i don't have any knowledge of that occurring. >> you don't have any knowledge or you don't recall. >> i don't have any knowledge. are you questioning that? >> well, i just find it intriguing. there's evidence that suggest that phone call called and that's what was said. evidence on may 12th, 2017, you met with mr. rosenstein in , personid you discuss the appointment of a special counsel. >> don't allow you -- me to give you the answer. >> it has to do with special counseand whether you

discussed that with mr. rosenstein. on may 13th, four days you were pointed special counsel you met with former attorney general sessions and rosenstein and you spoke about the special counsel, do you remember that. >> offhand, no. >> on may 16th the day you were before appointed special counsel and et with the president rod rosenstein, do you remember having that meeting. >> yes. >> and did you discuss at any time iha meeting mr. comey's termination? >> no. >> did you discuss at any time in that meeting the potential appointment of a special counsel, notri necessa you but in general terms? >> i can't get into discussions on that. >> how many times did you speak with mr. rosenstein before you got appointed? >> i don't know.

>> how many times did you speak with mr. comeyny about a investigation investigations prior to may 17th? >> zero. >> zero. >> zero. >> my time has expired. >> the time of the gentleman hai exd. director mueller going back to the president's obstructi via corey lewandowski it was referenced that 1,000 fmer prosecutors served under republican and democratic administrations, with 12,000 years of federal service, wrote a lditer reg the president's conduct. are you familiarith that letter. >> yes. >> some of the individuals that signed that letter, are people youorked th, correct? >> quite possibly, right. >> people you respect? yes. >> all of this conduct trying to control and impede the conduct

by the president by leveraging his authority over others similar to the conduct charged against public oicials and people in powerful positions, are they wrong? >> they have a different >>se. ou want to sign that letter, director mueller. >> they have a diffe dnt case. >>ector mueller, thank you for your service. beuse i have a seat on the intelligence committee, i have questions later on. i yield to my colleague from california, mr. lieu. >> thank you for your long service for our country. i'd like to now turn to the elements of obstruction of justice as applied to the president's attempts to curtail your inversigation. fi element of obstruction of justice requires an obstructive

act, correct. >> correct. >> page 97 of volume 2 of your report. you wrote there on page 97, quote, sessions was being instructed to tell the special counsel end the existing investigation into the president unquote. that's the report? >> correct. >> that would be evidence of an obstructive act because it would naturally obstruct your investigation, correct? >> correct. >> let's turn now toon the s element of the crime of obstruction of justice. again, i'mec going to d you to page 97, same page of volume 2. you wrote quote, by the time the president's initial one-on-one meeting withew ldowski existence of a grand jury investigation supervised b t special counsel that was in the

report. >> crect. >> a grand jury investigation is an official proceeding, correct. >> well, yes. >> i'd like to now to turn the final element of obstruction of justice. on thasame page, page 97, intent section on that page. would you be willing to read the first sentence. >> and that was starting with -- >> ub stan shl >> indicates that the president. >> i'll read the fst sentence. substantial evidence indicates that the president's effort to have sessionimit the scope of the special counsel's investigation to future election interference was to prevent further investigative scrutiny of the president's and his campaign's conduct, unquote. that's in the report. >> yes, that's in the report to indicate what's happened in the

paragraphs that we have been discuss zmrg to recap, we have heard today that the president ordered former white house counsel don mcgahn to fire you, the president ordered don mcgahn to then cover thatnd up a create a false paper trail, the president ordered corey lewandowski the tell jeff sessions to limit your investigation so that, he, stop investigating e president. i believe a reasonable person looking at these facts could conclude that allshree element of the crime of obstruction of justice have been met. i'd like to ask you, the reason again that you did not indict donald trump is because of opinion that you can't indict sitting president, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> the fact that the orders by the president were not carried out is that's not a defense to obstruction of justice, because the statute itself is quite broad. if you have endeavor or attempt

to obstruct of justice that's also on instruction of justice. tsed on evidence we have heard today, reasonable person could conclude that at least truction of of o justice by the president occurred. we're going to hear about two addition crimes. the witness tamperings of paul many afort -- >> i'm gng through the eleme elements with you doesn't mean i subscribe what you're trying tp ove through those element and the time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from california thank you, mr. chairman. mueller, over here. anks for joining us today. you had discussions with rod rosenstein about your appointment as special counsel, correct? >> if you say so, i n have reason to dispute that.

>> you met with the president on the 16th with rod rosenstein present. on the 17th you formally appointed as special counsel, were you meeting with the president on 16th with knowledge er t you were u consideration as special counsel. >> i don't believe i was under consideration for counsel. had served two terms as fbi director. >> the answer is no? >> the answer is no. >> described your office as a team of -- addfoional ination coming to light there's a growing concern that political bias caused facts to be omitted from your report to cast the president unfairly. john dowd, the president's lawyer leaves a message with michael flynn's lawyer, edited version in your report makes it appear he was asking for

confidential information. except that the judge in the flynn case ordered the entire transcript released. question is, why did you edit the transcript to hide that part of the message? >> i am not certain i would agree with your t.aracterization -- >> you omitted i youmitted the portion without giving up any confidential information. >> i'm going to go further in terms of discussing. >> well, let's go on. you discued paul manafort, quote, russian ukrainian political consultant and a longtime eloyee of paul m manafort, we learned from news articles that he was actually a u.s. state department intelligence source, nowhere in

the report is he so identified. >> i don't necessarily credit what you're saying occurred. >> were you awear that he was -- >> i'm not going to go into the ins and outs ine the coursf our investigation. >> pardon. >> did you interview constantine? >> i can't go into our vestigation moves. >> that's the basis of your report. again, the problem we're having is, we have to rely on your report for an accurate reflection of the evidence and we're starting to findut that's true. your report famously links russian internet troll farms with the .interference yet, no evidence toro pce this claim. why did you suggest russia was

responsible for the troll farms while in court you haven't been able to produce any evidence to support that? >> i'm not going to get further into that than i already have. >> you have left the impression through your report it was the m russian govert behind the troll farms. when you called upon to provide actual ed in courtou fail to do so? >> well, again, dispute your characterization of what occurred in that oceeding. >> in fact, the judge considered holding prosecuto in criminal contempt, only after your press conference the next day after you me the distinction between the russian government and the russian troll farms. did that have anything to d with holding your office in c contem contwapt? >> what the question. >> did your may 29th press

conference did have any to do with the previous day the judge threatened to hold your prosecutors in contempt for misrepresenting evidence? >> no. >> now, the fundamental problem is, we got the take your word, your team faithfully accurate, complellly described a of the underlying evidence in the mueller report and we're finding more and more instance where this isn't the case. it's starting to look like desperately tried and failed to make a legal case against the president you made a political case instead. >> i don't think yie rd a report that's as thorough, as fair, as consistent as the report that we have in front of us. >> why -- >> time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from maryland is recognize zbld director mueller, fourth episode of obstruction of

justice. in the form of witness tampering. urging witnesses not to cooperate with law enforcement. witness tampering is a felony punishable by 20 years in ison. you found the president engaged in efforts, quote, to encourage witnesses not to cooperateith the investigation, is that right? >> that's correct. >> you have a citation. now, one of the witnesses was michael cohen, the president's personal personal lawyer, who ultimately pled guilty to campaign violations based on secret hush money payments to women the president knew and also to lying to congress about the $1 billion trump tower deal. after the fbi searched cohen's e home, the pdent called him up personally, he said, to check in and told him to, quote, hang in therend stay strong. is that right. do you remember finding that? >> if it's in the report as

stated, yes, iis right. >> yes, actually in the report are a series of calls made by other friends of the president. one reached out to say that he was with the boston mar-a-lago and the president said he loves you. his name is rected. another redacted friend called to say "the boss loves you." an a third redacted friend called to say "everyone knows the boss has your back." do you remember that? >> generally, yes. >> and cohen said following the repeat of these messag, i'm quoting here page 147, volume 2, he believed he had the support of the white house ife continued to toe the party line. and he determined to stay on message and be part of the team. that's page 147. do you remember generally finding that? >> generally, yes. >> well, and robert costello, a lawyer close to the president's legal team, e-md cohen to say, quote, you are loved, they

are in our corner, sleep well tonight, and you have friends in high places. and that's up on the screen, page 147. you remember reporng that? i see that. >> okay. now, when the news first broke that cohen had arrged payoffs to stormy daniels, cohen faithfully stuck to this party line. he said that publicly that neither the trump organization nor the trump campaign was a party to the transaction and ither reimbursed him. trump's personal attorney at that point quick l texte cohen to say, quote, client says "thank you for what you do." mr. mueller, who isal the cap "c" client thanking cohen for what he does. >> i can't speak to that. >> okay. the assumption, the context suggests very strongly that it's president trump. >> i can't speak to that. >> okay. cohen later broke and pled guilty to campaign finance offenses and admitted fully they were made, quote, at there

diion of candidate trump. do you remember that? >> yes. >> after cohen's guilty plea, the president suddenly changed his tune toward mr. cohen, didn't he? >> i would say, i rely on what's in the report. >> well, he made the suggestion that cohen famy members had committed crimes. he targeted cohen's father-in-law and repeatedly suggested that he had comestted crimright? >> generally accurate. >> on page 154, you give a powerful summary of these changing dynamics and you said, i'm happy to have you read it or i'm happy to do it, if not. >> i have it in front of me. >> would you like to read it? >> i lduld. >> i wou be happy to have you read it. >> the evidence concerning this sequence of events 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 turn to attacks and intimidation to deter the provision of information or to undermine cohen's credibility

once cohen began cooperating.el >> i bve that's accurate. >> and in my view, if anyone else in america engaged in these eetions, they would have b charged with witness tampering. we must enforce the principle in congress that you emphasized to well in the very last sentence of you report, which is that in america, no person is so high as to be above the law. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> the gentlemen yields >> thank you, mr. chairman. just recently, mr. mueller, yous said mr. lewsking you questions. and mr. lew's question, i quote, the reason you didn't indict the president is because of the olc opinion. and you answered, that is correct. but that is not what you said in the report and it's not what you told attorney general barr. and in fact, in a joint statement that you released with doj on may 29th, after your press conference, your officeed issu a joint statement with

the department of justice that e id, the attorney general hast ev special counsel repeatedly affirmed that he was not saying that but for the olc opinion, he would have found the president obstructed justice. the special counsel's report, in his statement today, made clear that the office concluded it would not reach a determination one way or the other, whether the president committed a crime. there is no conflict between bese statements. so your j moint statement with doj that you issued on may 29th, as you siter h today? >> i would have to look at it more closely before i said i agree with it. >> well, so -- you know, my conclusion is that what you told mr. lew really contradicts what you said in the report. and specifically, what you said apparently repeatedly to attorney general barr, a then

you issued a joint statement on may 29th, saying that the attorney general has previously stated that the special counsel repeatedly affirm that he was not saying but for the olc po re, that he would have found the president obstructed justice. so i would just say there's a conflict. i do have some more questions. mr. mueller, there's been a lot of talk today about firing the special counsel and cure iling thinvestigation. were you ever fired, mr. mueller? from the -- >> was i ever what? >> were you ever fired as special counsel, mr. mueller? >> not that i -- no. >> no. were you allowed to complete your investigation unencumbered? >> yes. >> and in fact, you resigned as special counsel when you closed up the office in le may 19, that correct? >> that's correct. >> thankyou. mr. mueller, on april 18th, the attorney general held a press conference in w conjunctionh the public release of your

report. did attorney general barr say anything accurate, either in his press conference or his march 24th letter to congress summarizing the principle conclusions of your report? >> well, what you are not mentioning is the letter we sent on march 27th to mr. barr that raised some issues. and that letter speaks for itsel itself. >> but then i don'tee s how you could -- that could be, since ag barr's letter detailed the principle conclusions of your report and you have said before that there wasn't anything inaccurate. in fact, you had thi joint statement. but let me go on to another question. mr. mueller, rather than purely relying on the evidenc provided by witnesses and documents, i

think you relied a lot on media. i would like to know how many times you cited the "washington post" in your report. >> how many time i what? >> cited "the washingtonost" in your report. >> i do not have knowledge of that figure, but i -- well, that's -- i don't have knowledge of that figure. >> i counted about 60 times. how many times did you cite "the new york times"? >> again, i have no idea. >> i counted about 75 times. how many times did you cite fox news? >> i -- as with the other two, i have no idea. >> about 25 times. i've got to say, it looks like volume 2 isostly regurgitated press stories. honestly, there's almost nothing in volume 2ld that i cout already hear or know simply by having a $50 cable news subscription. however, your investigation cost the american taxpayers $25 million. mr. mueller, you cited media

reports nearly 200 timesou in report. then in a footnote, a small footte, number page 15 of volume 2 of your report, you wrote, i quote, this section summarizes andites various news stories, not for the truth of the information contained in the stories, but rather to place candidate trump's response to those stories in context. since nobody but lawyers reads footnotes,re aou concerned that the american public took the embedded news stories -- >> time of the gentle lady has expired. the gentleladyrom washington. >> can mr. mueller answer the question? >> no. no, we're running short on time. i said the gentlelady from washington. >> thank you. director mueller, let's turn to the fifth f the obstruction episodes in your report. and that is the evidence of whether president trump engaged in witness tampering with trump campaign chairman paul manafort, whose foreign ties werel critica to your investigation into russia's interference in our

elections. and this starts at volume 2, page 123. your office got indictments against manafort and trump deputy campaigag man rick gates in two different jurisdictions, correct? >> correct. >> and your office found that after grand jury indicted them, manafort told gates not to plead guilty to any charges, because, quote,d he ha talked to the president, the president's personal counsel, and they were of us.o take care is that correct? >> that's accurate. >> and according to your report, one day after manafort's felony on on eight charges, quote, the phasident said flipping was not fair and almost ought to be outlawed. is that correct? >> i'm aware of that. >> in this context, director mueller, what doest meano flip? >> have somebody cooperate in a criminal investigation. >> anden how essal is that cooperation to any efforts to combat crime? >> i'm not going to go beyond that characterizing that effort. >> thank you. in your report, you concluded that president trump and his personal counsel, rudy giuliani,

quote, made reated statements suggesting that a pardon was a possibility for manafort while also making it clear that the president did not want manafort to flip and cooperate with the government, end quote. is that correct? >> correct. earlier, you stated witness tampering can be shown where someone, with an improper motive encourages another pnoson to cooperate with law enforcement. is that correct? >> correct. >> now, on page 123 of v2,ume you also discuss the president's motive. and you say that as court proceedings f moveward against manafort, president trump, quote, discussed withwh aides her and in what way manafort might be cooperating and whether arnafort knew any information that would be hul to the president. is that correct? >> and that was a quote from? >> from page 123, volume 2. >> i have it, yes. >> and when someone tries to stop another person from working with law enforcement and they do it because they're worried aboun

what that peould say, it se tem r,his ea a classiccl definition of witness tampering. mr. manafort did eventually decide to cooperate with your office and he entered into a plea agrment, but then he broke that agreement. can you describe what he did that caused you to tell the court that the agreement was off? >> i would refer you to the court proceedings on that issue. >> so in page -- on page 127 of volume 2, you toldhe court that mr. manafort lied about a number of matters that were material to the investigation and you said thatmanafort's lawyers also, quote, regularly briefed the president's lawyers on topics discussed and the informatiothat manafort had provided in interviews with the special counsel's office. does that sound right? >> and the source of that is -- >>t's page 127, volume 2. that's a direct quote. >> if it's from the report, yes, i support it. >> and two day after you told the court that manafort broke his plea agreement by lying repeatedly, did mr. trump tell the press that mr. manafort was, quote, ver brave because he did

not flip? >> if it's in the report, i support it, as it is set forth. >> thank you. director mueller, in your report, you make a very serious conclu about the evidence regarding the president's involvement with the manafort criminal proceedings. let me read to you fromour report. evidence concerning the president's conduct toward manafort indicates that the president intended to encourage manafort to not cooperate with the government. it is clear that the president clboth publi and privately discouraged mr. manafort's cooperation or flipping while also dangling the promise of a pardon, if he stayed loyal and did not share what he knew about the president. anyone else who did these things would prosecuted for them. we must ensure that no one is abe the law. and i thank you for being here, director mueller. i yield back. >> gentlemen from pennsylvania. >> thank you, mr. chaian. mr. eller. mr. mueller, i'm over here, i'm sorry. mr. mueller, are you familiar with the now-expired independent

counsel statute? it's a statute under which ken starr was appointed. >> that ken starr did what? i'm sorry. >> are you familiar with the independent counsel statute. >> are youhe talking about t one we're operating under now or the previous -- >> under which ken starr was appointed. >> i'm not that famili with that, but i would be happy to take your question. >> well, the clinton administration allowed the independent counsel statute to expire after ken starr's investigation. the final report requirement was a major reason whyta the ste was allowed to expire. even president clinton's ag, janet reno, expressed concerns aboutin the f report requirement. and i'll quote ag reno. she said, on one hand, theer aman people have an interest in knowing the outcome of an investigation of their highest officials. or on the other hand, the report requirement cuts against many of the noheast basic traditions and practices of american law pforcement. under our system, sume innocence and we value privacy.

we believe that information obtained during a criminal investigtion should, in m if s, be made public only there is an indictment and prosecution, not in a lengthy and detailedd report fileter a decision has been made not to prosecute. the final report provides a forum fo unfairlyiring a target's dirty laundry, and it also creates yet anotheriv incentfor an independent counsel to over-investigate in order to justify his or her tenure and toci avoid criti that the independent counsel may have left a stone unturned. again, mr. mueller, those are ag reno's words. didn't you the exactly what ag reno feared? didn't you publish a lengthy report, unfairly airing the target's dirty laundry without recommending charges? >> i disagree with that. >> did any of your witnesses ave the chance to be cross-examined? >> can i finish my answer?

>> very quickly. >> i operate under the current statute, not the original matute, so i a most familiar with the current statute, not older statutes. >> did any of the h witnessese a chance to be cross-examined? >> did any of the witnesses of our investigation? >> yes. >> i'm not going to answer that. >> did you allow the people mentioned in your report to challenge how they were characterized?ot >> i'm n going to get into -- >> okay. >> given that ag barr stated multiple times during his confirmation hearing that he would make as much of a report public as possible, write your report knowing that it would likely be shared with the public? >> no. >> did knowing that the report could and likely would be made public alter thete cons in which you included? >> i can't speak to that. >> despite the expectations that your report would be released to the public, you left outt significan exculpatory evidence, in other words,av evidence forable to the president, correct? >> actually, i would disagree with you. i think we strove to put into the report exculpatory --

>> -- got into that with you, where you said there was evidence you left >>out. well, you make a choice as to what goes into a -- >> isn't it true, mr. mueller, at on page one, of volume 2, quoting , when you're the statute, that you had an obligation to either prosecute or not prosecute? >> well, generally, that is the case. although most cases are not done in the context of the enpresid >> and in this case, you made a decision not to prosecute, correct? >> no, we made a decision not to decide wheer to prosecute or not. >> so essentially, what your report did was everything that ag reno warned against. >> i can't agree with that characterization. >> well, what you did was youed compil a nearly 450 -- you compiled nearly 450 pages of the very worst information you gathered against the target of your investigation, what happens to be the president of the united states, and you did this

knowing that you were not going to recommend charges and that the report would be made public. >> not true. >> mr. mueller, as a former officer in the united states jag corps, i prosecuted nearly 100 terrorists in a baghdad courtroom. i cross-examined the butcher of fallujah in defense of our navy s.e.a.l.s. as aci lian, i was elected a magisterial district judge in s pennsylvaniai'm very well versed in the american legal system. the drafting and the publication of some of the information in this report without an indictment, without prosecution, frankly flies in the face o american justice. and i find those facts and this entire process un-american. i yield the remainder of my time to my colleague, jimjordan. >> mr. -- director mueller, the third fisa renewal happens a month after you're named special counsel. what role did your office play in the third fisa renewal of carter page? >> not going to talk to that. >> time of the gentremen is expi the gentle lady from florida. >> director mueller, a couple of

my colleagues, right here, wanted to talk to you or ask you about lies, so let's talk about lies.ac rding to your report, page nine, volume one, witnessed lied to your office and to ngress. those lies materially impaired the investigation of russia interference, according to your other than the individuals who pled guilty to cri os based their lying to you and your team, did other witnesses lie to you? >> i think there are probably a spectrum of witnesses in terms of those who are not telling the full truth and those who are outright liars. >> thank you very much. outright liars. it is fair to say then, thatwe there limits on what evidence was available to your investigation of both russia election interference and obst ction of justice? >> that's true and it's usually the case. >> and that lies by trump campaign officialsnind admiration officials impeded your investigation. i would generallygree with

that. >> thank you so much, director mueller. you will be hearing more from me in the next hearing,yield the balance of my time to mr. kariya thank you. >> mr. mueller, first of all, let me welcome you. thank you for your service to our country.yo re a hero, a vietnam war ed war vet, we won't forget your service to our country. , sir.nk y >> i may begin -- because of time limits, we have gone in depth on only five possible episodes of obstruction.th e are so much more. and i would want the focus on another section of obstruction, which is the president's conduct concerning michael flynn, the president's national security adviser. in early 27, the white house counsel and the president were informed that mr. flynn had lied to government authorities about his communications with the russian ambassador during the trump campaign and transition. is this correct? >> correct.

>> if a hostile nation knows that a u.s. official has lied public, that can b used to blackmail that government official, correct? >> i'm not going to speak to that. i don't disagree with it, necessarily, but i'm not going to speak to anymore to that issue. >> thank you very much sir. flynn resigned on february 16th, 2016, d the veryext day when the president was having lunch with new jersey governor chris christie, did the president say, open quotes, now that we fired flynn, the russia thing closed quote? is that correct? >> correct. >> and is it true that christie responded by saying, open , quotes way, and this russia thing is far from over, closed quote? >> that's the way we have it in the report. >> thank you. and after the president met wit christie, lateat same day, the president arranged to meet with then fbi director james

comey, alone in the oval office, correct? >> correct, particularly if you have the citation to the -- >> page 39, 40, volume 2.ou >> thank yery much. >> and according to comey, the president told him, i hope -- open que, i hope you can see your way to clear, toth letting thing go, to letting flynn he's a good guy and i hope you can let it go, closed quote. page 40, volume 2. >> accurate. >> what did comey understand the president to be asking? >> i'm notoing to get into what was in mr. comey's mind. >> comey understood this to be a direction because of the president's position and the one-to-one es of the meeting, page 40, volume 2. >> well, i understand -- it's in the report and i support it, as to being in the report. >> thank you, sir. even though the president publicly denied telling comey to

drop the investigation, you found, open quote, substantial evidence croborating comey's account over the president's. is this correct? >> this is correct. >> the president fired comey on may 9th. is that correct, sir? >> i believe that'she accurate date. >> that's page 77, volume 2. you found substantial evidence that the catalyst for the president's firing of comey was comey's, openquote, unwillingness to publicly state that the president was not personally under >> i'm not going to delve more into the details of what happened. if it's in the report, i'm supportive, because it's already been reviewed appropriately and appears in the report. >> and that's page 75, volume 2. >> thank you. and in fact, the very next day, the president told the russian foreign minister, open s quote, i j fired the head of the fbi. he was crazy, a real nut job,

face great pressure because of russia. that's taken off. i'm not under investigation, closed quote. is that correct? >> that's what was written in the report, >> time of the gentlemen is expired. >> thank you, sir. >> the gentlemen from virginia. >> thank you, mr. mr. mueller, we've heard a lot about what you're not going to talk about today, so let'smealk about sothing that you should be able to talk about, taw itself. the underlying obstruction statute and your creative legal analysis of the stutes in volume 2. particularly, your interpretation of 18usc 1512c. section 1512c is an obstruction of justice created for auditing financial companies. as you write on page 154 of volume 2,his provision was added as a floor amendment in the senate and explained asa closing certain loophole with respect to document shredding. and to read the statute, whoever corruptly alters, mutilates, or

concealed a record document or other object with the intent to do so with the intent to imp r the object's integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding or otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding or attempts to do so shall be fined under the statute for 20 years or both. your analysis of the proposes to give clause c-2 in isolation, reading it as a a freestanding encompassing provision, prohibiting any act if done with an improper motive. and secondly, yourly anas of the statute to apply -- proposes to apply this sweeping prohibition to lawful acts taken by public officials,in exercis their discretionary powers. if those acts influence a proceeding. so mr. mueller, i wld ask you, in analyzing theobstruction, you state that you recognized that the department of justice and the courts have not definitively resolved these

issues, correct? >> correct. >> you would agree that not everyone in the justice department agreed with your legal theory of the obstruction of justice statutes, correct? >> well, i'm noto going t be involved in the discussion on that at this juncture. >> in fact, the attorney general himself disagrees with your interpretation of the law, correct? >> i'll leave that to the attorney general to identify. >> and you would agree that prosecutors sometimes incoectly apply the law, correct? >> i would have to agree with that one. >> and members of your legal team, in fact, have had nvictions overturned, because they were based on an incorrect legal theory, correct? >> i don't know to what you were -- in trying cases, not every one of those cases. >> one of yourop prosecutors, andrew wiseman, obtained a conviction against arthur anderson, lower court, which was subsequently erturned in a unanimous supreme court decision that rejected the legal theory advanced by wiseman, correct? >> well, i'm n going to get into -- >> let me read from that -- >> may i just finish? may i just finish my answer? to say that i'm notoing to get involved in a discussion on

that. ly refer you to that citatione that you gav me at the outset for the lengthyiscussion on what we talk about. it was already put into report. and unaniusly reversing mr. wiseman, when he said, indeed, it's striking how little culpability the instructions required. the jury told that even if a petition honestlily said it was lawful, e jury could convict. the destructions deluded the caning of pt>>or lhet s mlyeuc just say - >> let me move on. i have limited time.co i'm erned about the implications of your theory for overcriminalizing conduct by public officials and private citizen ace like. so to emphasize how broad your theory of liability is, i want to ask you about aew examples. on october 11th, 2015, during the fbi investigation into hillary clinton's use of a

atprive email it posed a national security problem and he later said, i can tell you that this is not a tuation in whi america's national security was endangered. assuming for a moment that his comments did influence the investigation, couldn'tob presidena be charged under your interpretation with obstruction of justice? >> well, again, would refer you to the report. let me say about andrew wiseman, he's one of the more talented attorneys that we have onboard. he has run a number of -- >> i have very limited time. in august 2015, a very senior doj official called fbi deputy director andrew mccabe expressing concern that fbi e still openly pursuing the clinton probe. the doj official was apparently very pissed off, que/unquote. cabe questioned this official, asking me, are you telling me i need to shut down an investigatio to which the official replied of course not. this seems to be a clear example of somebody in the executive

anch attempting to alter an fbi investigation. so couldn't that person be charged with obstrucon as long as a prosecutor could come up with a potentially corrupt motive? >> i refer you to our lengthy dissertation on exactly those issues that appears in the -- at the end of the report. >> mr. mueller, i would argue that it says above the supreme court, equ justice -- >> time of the gentlemen has expired. our intent was -- our intent was to conclude this hearing in three hours. given the break, that woul bring us to 11:40. we will be asking our remaining democratic members to voluntarily limit their time so we can complete our work as close to that time frame as possible. i recognize the gentle lady from pennsylvania. >> thank you, director mueller. i want to askou some questions about the president's statements regarding advanced knowledge of the wileaks dumps. so the president refused to sit down with your investigators for an in-person ecinterview, corr >> correct. >> so the only answers we have

to questions from the president are contained in appendix "c" to your report. >> that's correct. >> so looking at appendix "c" on page 5, you asked the president over a dozen questions about whether he had knowledge that wikileaks possessed or might possess the e-mails that were stolen by the russians -- >> i apologize. >> sure. >> could you start it again? okay,sure. so we're looking at appendix "c," and appendix "c," page 5, you asked the president about a dozen questions about whether he had knowledge thatil wikks possessed the stolen e-mails that might be released in a way ful to his campaign or harmful to the clinton campaign. is that correct? you asked those questions? >> yeah. >> okay, in february of this year, mr. trump's personal attorney, michael cohen, testified toat congress under that, quote, mr. trump knew from roger stone in advance about the wikileaks drop of e-mails, end quote. that's a matter of public

record, isn't itwe >> , are you referring to the report or some other public record? >> this was testimony before congress, by mhe co do you know if he told -- >> i am not familiar with -- explicitly familiar with what he testified to befe congress. >> okay. let's look at an event describe1 on page of volume 2 of your report. now according to -- and we're going to put it up in a slide wing.to according deputy campaign manager rick gates, in the summer of 2016,e and candidate trump were on the way to an airport shortly after wikileaks released its first set s oflen e-mails, and gates told your investigators that candidate trump was on a phone call and when the cal ended, trump told gates that more releases of damaging information would be coming, end quote. du do you recall that from the report? >> i it's in the report, i support it. >> okay, and that's on page 18 of volume 2. now on page 7 of volume 2, your

report also stated, quote, in addition, some witnesses said that trump privately sought information about future wikileaks releases, end quote. is that correct? >> correct. >> in appendix "" where the president did answer some written questions, he said, quote, i do not recall discussing wikileaks with him r do i recall being aware of mr. stone having discussed wikileaks with individuals associated with my campaign, end quote. is that correct? >> if it's from the report, it is correct. >> okay. so is itay fair to she president denied ever discussing wikileaks with mr. stone and denied being aware that anyone associated withn his campaig discussed wikileaks with stone? >> i'm sorry. could you repeat that one? >> is it fair, then, that the president denied knowledge of himself or anyone else discussing wikileaks dumps with mr. stone? >> yes.ye >> okay. and with that, i would yield back. >> thank you, ma'am.

>> thank you, mr. chair. mr. mueller, over here. mr. mueller, did you, indeed, interfere for the fbi director job one day before you were appointed as special counsel? >> membership understanding is i was notpplying for the job. i was asked to give my input on what it would take to do the job, which triggered the interview you're talking about. >> so you don't recall on may 16 2017, that you interviewed egrewi pb?hesident r >> i fbintew dir iector job? but nots about the job, about me applying for the job. >> so your statement here today hat you didn't interview to apply for the fbi director job? >> that's correct. >> so did you tell the vice president that the fbi director position would be the one job that you would comeack for? >> i don't recall that one. >> you don't recall that? >> no. >> okay. >> given your 22 months of investigation, tens of millions dollars spent and millions ofdo

ments reviewed, did you obtain any evidence at all that any american voter changed their vote aa result of russian election interference. >> i'm not s going topeak to that. >> you can't speak to that, after 22 months of investigation, there's not any evidence in that document before us that any voter changed their vote because ofheir interference? and i'm asking you based on all of the documents that you reviewed. >> that was outside our purview. >> russian meddling was outside your purview? >> the impact of that meddling was undertaken by other en ages. >> okay. you stated in your opening statement that you would not get into the details of the steele e ssier. however, multiplmes in volume 2 on page 23, 27, and 28, you mentioned the unverified allegations. how long did it take you to reach the conclusion that it was unverified? >> i'm not going to speak to th . >> it's actually in your report, multiple times that it's unverified and you're telling me that you're not willing to tell us how you came to the conclusion that it was unverified? >> true. >> when did you become aware that the unveed steele

dossier was included in the fisa application to spy on carter page? >> i'm sorry, what was the question? >> when did you become aware that the unverified steele dossier was - intended was included in the fisa application to spy on carter page? >> i'm not going to speak to that. >> your team interviewed christopher steele. is that correct? >> not goingo get into that. i said at -- >> you can't tell this committee as to whether or not yo interviewed christopher steele in a 22-month investigation with 18 lawyers? >> as i said at the outset, that is one of those -- one of the investigations that is being handled by others in the department of >> but you're here testifying about this investigation today. and i am asking you directly, or any members of your team did you interview christopher steele in the course of your investigation. >> and i am not going to answer that question, sir. >> you y had twoears to investigate. not once did you consider it worthy to investigate how an unverified document that was paidor by a political opponent was used to obtain a warrant to

spy on the opposition political campaign? did you doti any investion -- >> i do not accept your characterization of what occurred. >> what would be your characterization? >> i'm not goingo speak anymore to it. >> so you're not going to speak anymore to it, but you're not going to agree with my characterization? is that correct? >> yes. >> thea fis application makes reference to source one who was christopher steele, the author of the steele dossier. the fis application says nothing sources one's reason for conducting the research into candidate one's russia, based on source's one previous reporting history with fbi, whereby source one provided reliable information to the fbi. the fbi believes source one's reporting herein to be credible. do you believe the fbi's representation that source one's reporting was credible to be accurate?ng >> i'm not goio answer that. >> so you're not going to respond to any of the questions regarding christopher steele or your interviews with him? >> well, as i said at the outset this morning, that was one of thth investigations i could not speak to. >> well, i don't understand how if you interviewed an individual

in the purview of this investigation that you're testifying to us today that you closed that investigation, how that's not within your purview to tell us about that investigation and who you interviewed. >> i have nothing to add. >> well, i can guaranteeer that the aman people want to know. and i'm very hopeful and glad that ag barr is looking into his and the inspector general is looking intothis, because you're unwilling to answer the questions of the american people as it relates to t vehe very ba of this investigation into the president and the very basis of this individual who you did interview, you're just refusing to answer those questions. > un't the president fire the fbi director at any time without reason under article i of the constitution? >> yes. >> article ii? >> yes. >> that's correct. can't he fire you as special counsel at any time without a reason. >> i believe that to be the case. well, hold on one second. you said without any reason. special counsel can be fired, but i'm not sure it extends to for whatever reason

is given. >> and you've testified that you weren't fired, you were able to complete your investigation in pull full. is that correct? >> i'm not going to add to what i've stated before. >> my time has expired. >> the gentlemen's time has expired. thetl gen lady from pennsylvania. texas. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thank you, mr. mueller, for being with us this afternoon -- close to the afternoonnow. director mueller, i would like to ask you about the president's answers relating to roger stone. roger stone was indicted for multiple federal crimes and the indictment alleges that mr. stone discussed future wikileaks email releases with the trump campaign. understanding there's a gag order on the stone case, i will keep my questions restrict to publicly available information. mr. stone -- >> let me just say at the i outsetn't mean to disrupt you, but i'm not -- i would like some demarcation of that which

is applicable to this, but also in such a way that it does not hinder the other prosecution that's taking place in d.c. >> i understand that. i'm only going to be talking about the questions that you easked in writing to th president. >> thank you, ma'am. >> that relate to mr. stone. >> thank you, ma'am. >> mr. stone's indictment relates, among other things, the following, quote. stone was contacted by senior trump officials to ituuiry about fu releases of organization one, organization one being wikileaks. quote,ictment continues, stone thereafter told the trump campaign about potential future releases of damaging material bi leaks. so in short, the indictment alleges that stone was asked by the trump campaign to get information about more wikileaks releases. and that n stone, ifact, did tell the trump campaign about potential futureesrele correct? >> yes, ma'am, but, sigh you're

quoting from the indictment, even though the indictment is a public document, i feel uncomfortable discussing anything having to do with the stone prosecution. >> the indictment is of record and we pulled it off of the -- >> i thauunderstand that. >> well, turning back to the president's answers to your questions hithen, on t very subject, the president denied ever discussing future wikileaks releases wh stone and denied knowing whether anyone else in his campaign had those discussions with stone. if you had learned that other witnesses putting aside the i presiden other witnesses had lied to your investigators in response to specific questions, whether he -- whether in writing or in an interview, could they be charged with false statement crimes? >> well, i'm not going to speculate. i think you're asking for me to speculate given a set of circumstances. >> well, let's put it more specif. what if i had made a false statement to an investigator on

your team. could i go to jail for up to five years? >> yes. >> yes. >> although it's congress, so -- [ laughter ] >> well, that's the point, though, isn't it, that no one is above the law. >> that's true. >> not you, not the congress, andin certa not the president. and i think it's just troubling to have to hear some of these things, and that's why the american people deserve to learn the full facts of the misconduct described in your report, which any other person would have been charged with crimes. so thank you for being here and again,nhe point has bee underscored many times, but i'll repeat it. no one is above the law. thank you. >> thank you,ma'am. >> the gentleman from north .dakota is recognized >> mr. mueller, how many people on your staff did you fire during the course of the investigation? >> how many people -- >> did fire? >> i'mou not goi yng to discuss at th -- according to an

inspector general's report, attorney general number two was let go and peter strzok was let go. >> yes, and there may have been other people on other issues that were either transferred or fi fired. >> peter strzok testified that he was fired because you were concned about preserving the appearance of independence. do you agree with this testimony? >> say that again. id he was fired at least partially because you were worried about -- concerned about preserving the appearance of independence with the ial counsel's investigation, do you agree with that statement? >> the statement was by whom? >> peter strz, at this hearing. >> reporter: i am not familiar with that. >> did you fire him because you were worried about the appearance of independence of the investigation? >>no he was transferred as a result of instances involving texts. >> do you agree -- do you agree that your office did not only have an obligation to operate with independence but to orate with the appearance of independence as well. >> absolutely. we strove to do that over the two years. part of that was makin -certain

that >> andrew weismann is one of your top attorneys? >> yes. >> did weismann have a role ino selecting r members of your team? >> some role, but not a major role. >> andrew weismann attended hillary clinton's election night party. did you know that before and after he came on to the team? >>on't know when i found that. >> on january 30th, 2013, weismann wrote an email to deputy attorney general yates sting, i am so proud and in awe in regard to her disobeying a direct order from the president. did weismann disclose that before the team. >>on'mic nt i o gfot t interest? >> i'm not going to talk about that. >> are you aware that miss jeannie rhee represented hillary clinton regarding e-mails originating from her time as secretary of state. >> yes. >> did you know that before she came on the team? >> no. >> aaron zelby represented justin cooper who zdestroyed on of clinton's mobile devices. and you must be aware that s

of your lawyers donate e ed $6, directly to hillary clinton, i'n not ev talking about the $40,000 they donated to other democrats. just to the opponent of the rget of your investigation. >> can i speak to a second about the hiring practices? >> sure. >> we strove to hire those individuals who could do the job. i have been been in this business for almost 25 years. and inhose 25 years, i have not had occasion once to ask somebody once about their political affiliation. it is not done. what care about is the capability of the individual to do the job and to do the job quickly and seriously and with integrity. >> but that's what i'm saying, mr. mueller. this isn't just about you being able to vouch for your team. thiss aboutnowing that the day you accepted this role, you had to be aware that no matter what this report concluded, halt of country was going to be skeptical of your team's findings. and that's why we have recusal laws that define bias and rceive bias for this very reason. 28 united states code 518 specifically lists not just flil conflict of interest, but the

appearance of politicalontfl c that you vouch for your team. it i can't imagine a single prosecutor or judge that i have ever appeared front of would be comfortable with these circumstances, where over half of the prosecutorialm tea had a direct relationship to the opponent of the person being investigated. >> let me -- one other fact they put on the table, that is, we hired 19 lawyers over a period of time. of those 19 lawyers, 14 of them wereransferred from elsewhere in the department of justice. only 5 came from aoutside. half of them had a direct relationship political or personal with the opponent of the person you were investigating. and that's my point. i wonder if not a single word in this entire report was changed, but rather, the only difference was we switched hillary clinton and president trump. if peter strzok had texted thosg terrible thiabout hillary clinton instead of president trump, if a team of lawyers worked for, donated thousands of dollars to and went to trump's parties instead of clinton's, i don't think we'd be here trying

to prop up an obstruction allegation. my colleagues would have spent the last four months accusing your team of beingought and paid for by che trumppaign and we couldn't trust a single word of this report. they would still be accusing the president of conspiracy russia and they would be accusing your team of aiding and etting with that conspiracy. and with that, i yield back. >> the gentlemen yields back. the gentlemen from colorado. >> director mueller, thank you for your service to our country. i would like to talk to you about one of the other incidents ofuc obstrtion, and that's the evidence in your report showing the president directing his son and his communications director to issue a false public 2017 aboutn june of a meeting between his campaign and russian individuals at trump towern june of 2016. according to your report, mr. trump jr. was the only trump associate who participated in thatho meeting and w declined to be voluntarily interviewed by your office, is that correct? >> yes. >> did mr. trump junior or this has counsel ever communicate to your office any intent to invoke

his fifth amendment right against self-incrimination? >> i'm not going to answer that. >> you did pose written questions to the president about his knowledge about the kprour meeting. you included also asked him about wlornd he would direanswe false question. >> take your word. >> i can represent to you that appendix "c," specificallily c-13 states as much. according to page 100 of volume 2 of your report, your investigation found tt hope hicks, the president's communications director, in june of 2017, was shown e-mails tha set up the trump tower meeting and she told your office that she was, quote, shocked by the e-mails, because they looked, quote, really bad. true? >> do you have the citation? >> sure, it's page 100 of volume 2. while you're flipping to that ct page, dire mueller, i will tell you that those e-mails in question stated, according to

your report, that the prosecutor of russia had offered to provide the trump campaign with some official documatts and informn that would incriminate hillary and her dealings with russia as support. trump junior responded, if it's what you say, i love it, and he kushner, m andafort met with the russian attorneys and several other russian individuals on trump tower on june 9th, 2016, end quot correct? >> generally accurate. >> isn't it true that miss hicks to your office that shep went multiple times to the president to, quote, urge him that they should be fully transparent about the june 9th meeting, end quote, but the president each "no."aid correct? >> accurate. >> and the reason was because ol those e-ma which the president, quote, believed would not leak, correct? >> well, i'm not certain how it's characterized, but generally correct. >> did the president direct miss hicks to say, quote, only that

trump junior took a brief meeting and it was about russian adoption, end quote, because trump junior's statement to the "new york times" quote, said too much, according to page 100, volume 2. >> okay. >> correct? >> let me -- let me just check one thing. yes. >> andccording to miss hicks, the president still directed her to say the meeting was only about russian adoption, correct? >> yes.g despite know that to be untrue. thank you, director mueller. i yield back the balance of my time. >> mr. mueller, you've been asked over here on the far right, certain -- you've been asked a lot h of questionse today. to be frank, you've performed as most of us expected. you stuck closely to your report and you have declined to answer many of our questions on both sides. as the clor for the republican side -- i know you're glad to get to the close, i want to summarize the highlights of what we have heard and what we know. you spent two years and nearly

$30 million taxpayer dollars and unlimited resources to prepare a nearly 450-page report which you describe today as very thorough. millions of americans today mainta genuine concerns about your work in large part because of the infamous and widely publicized bias of yourin vestigating team members, which we now know included 14 democrats and zero republicans. campaign fince reports later showed -- >> can i -- >> excuse me. it's my time. hat team of democrat investigators you hired donated more than $60 million to the hillary clinton campaign and other democratic candidates. your team also include peter strzok and lisa page that had the lurid text messages that confirmed they openly mocked and hated donald trump and his supporters and they avowed to take him out. mr. radcliffe asked you earlier this morning, quote, 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 conclusivelde rmined, unquote. you answered, i cannot.

sir, that isun ecedented. the president believed from the very beginning that you and your special counsel team had serious conflicts. this is stated in the report and acknowledged by everybody. and yet, president trump cooperated fully with the investigation. he knew he haot done nng wrong and he encouraged all witnesses to cooperate with the investigation and produce more than1.4 million pages of information and allowed over 40 witnesses who were directly affiliated with the white house or his campaign. your report acknowledges on page 61, volume 2, that a volume of evidence exists of the president telling many people privately, quote, the president was concerned about the impact of the russian investigation on his ability to govern and to address important foreign relations issues and even matters of national security. and on page 174 ofolume your report also acknowledges that the supreme court has held, quote, the president's removal powers are at their zenneth with respect to principle officers. that is, officers who must be appointed by the president ande who rt to him directly. the president's exclusive and

ill limitable power of removal of those principle officers furthers the pr to ensure that the laws are faithfully executed, unquote. and that would even include the attorney general. look, in spite of all of that, nothing ever happened to stop or impede your special counsel's investigation. nobody was fired by the president. nothing was curtailed and the investigation continued unencumbered for 22 long months. as you finally concluded in volume i, the evidence, quote, did not establish that the president was involved in an underlying crime related to russian election interferen, unquote. and testifiehe evidence, quote,t establthat the president or those close to him were involved in any russian conspiracies or had an unlawful relationship with any russian official, unquote. over those 22 long months that your invesgation dragged along, the president became increasingly frustrated as many of the american people did with its effects on our country and his ability to govern. he vented about this to his lawyer and his close associates and he even shared his frustrations, as we all know, on twitter. but while the president's social media accounts might have influenced some in the media or

thion of some of the american people, none of those audiences were targeted or witnessein your investigation. the president never affected anybody's testimony, he never demanded to end the investigation or demanded that you terminated and he never misled congress, the doj, or the special counl. ose, sir, are undisputed facts. there will be a lot of discussion, i predict today and great frustration throughout the countrabout the fact that you wouldn't answer any questions here about the origins of this e,whole charad which was the infamous christoph steele dossier, now proven to be totally bogus, even though it is listed and splemand specificall referenced in your report. but as our hearing is concluding, we'll apparently get no comment from you on that. there is one reason you were called by the democrat majority. our presidents jus want litical cover. they desperately wanted you today to tell them they should impeach the president. but the one thing you have said very cly today is that your report is complete and thorough and you completely agree with and stand by its recommendatio

and all of its content. is that right? >> true. >> mr. mueller, one last important question. your report does not recommend impeachment, does it? >> i'm not going to talk about recommendations. >> it does not conclude that impeachment would be appropriate here? >> i'm not going to talk about that, about that issue. >> that's one of the many things you wouldn't talk about today, but i think we ca all draw our own conclusions. i do thank you for your service to the country and i'm glad this charade will come to an end scan and we get back to the important issues of this committee. that i yield back. >> the gentlemen yields back. i want to announce that our intent was to conclude this hearing at around 11:45.he all of tepublican members have now asked their questions, but we have a few remaining democratic members. they will be limiting their questions, so with dector mueller's indulgence, we expect to finish within 15 minutes. is gentlelady from georg recognized. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, to director mueller. your investigation of the attack

on our democracy aof obstruction ustice were extraordinarily productive. in under two years, you charged at least 37 people or entities with crimes. you convicted seven individuals, five of whom were top trump campaign or white house aides. charges remain pending against more than to dozen russian persons or entities and against others. now, let me startse with tho five trump campaign or administration aides that you convicted. would you agree with me that they are paul manafo president trump's campaign manager, rick gates, president trump's puty campaign manager, michael flynn, president trump's former national security adviser, michael tcohen, president's personal attorney. george papadopoulos, president trump's fmer campaign foreign policy adviser? correct? >> correct. >> and a sixth tru associate will face trial later this year, correct? and that person would be roger stone. correct? >>rr ect. >> thank you. >> i'm not certain what you said about stone, but he is in

another court stem, as i indicated before. >> exactly. he's still under investigation. a c manydon't wt to otherscrgdies as well, correct? >> correct. >> so, sir, i just want to thank you so much in my limited time today for your team, the work that you did, and your dedication. in less than two years, your team was able to uncover an incredible amount of information related to russia's attack on ourio elect and to obstruction of justice. and there is still more that we have to learn. despiteacing unfair attacks by the president and even here today, your h work been substantiative and fair. the work has laid the critical foundation for our investigation and for that i thank you. i thank you. and with that, yield back the balance of my time. >> the gentle lady yields thbac. gentlemen from arizona. >> thank you. director mueller, i'm disappointed that some have questioned your motives throughout this process. and i want to take a moment to

remind the american people of ho you are and your exemplary service to our country. you are a marine, you served in vietnam and earned a bronze star and purple art, correct? >> correct. >> which president appointed you to become the united states attorney for massachusetts? >> which senator? >> which president? >> oh, which president? i think that was president bush. ng accordio my notes, it was president ronald reagan had the honor to do so. >> my mistake! >> under whose administration did you serve as the assistant attorney general in charge of the doj's criminal division? >> under which president? >> yeah. >> that would be georgeush i. >> that is correct. president george h.w. bush. after that, you took a job at a prestigious law firm and after only a couple of years, you did something extraordinary. you left that lucrative position toreenter public service, prosecuting homicides here in

washington, d.c., is that correct? >> correct. when you were named director of the fbi, which president first appointed you? >> bush. >> andhe senateonfirmed you with a vote of 98-0, correct? >> surprisi w. >> and youe sworn in as director just one weekefore the september 11th attacks. >> true. >> you helped to protect this nation against another attack. you did such anan outng job that when your ten-year term expired, the senate unanimously outed to exthe end term for another two years, correct? >> true. >> when you we asked in 2017 to take the job as special counsel, the president had just firei director james comey. the justice department and the fbi were in turmoil. you must have known there would be an extraordinary challenge. why did you accept? >> i'm not going to get into that. that's a lite bit off track. it was a challenge, period. >> some people have attacked the political motivations of your

team, even suggested your investigation was a witch hunt. when you considered people to join your team, did you ever even once ask about their political affiliation? >> never once. >> in your entire career as a law enforcement official, have you ever made a hiring decision based upon a person's polical affiliation? >> no. if i might just interjec the capabilities that we have shown in the report that's been discussed here was a result of a team of agents and lawyers who were aolutely exemplary and were hired because of the value they could contribute to getting the job done and getting it done expeditiously. >> sir, you're a patriot. it's clear to me in reading your report and listening to your testimony today, you acted fairly and with restraint. there were circumstances that you could have filed charges against other people mentioned in the report, but you declined. not every prosecutor does that, certainly not one on a witch hunt. the attacks made against you and your team

your report is damning, and i believe you did uncover substantial evidence of high crimes and misdemeanor. let me alsols say something e that you were right about. the only remedy for this situation is for congress to take action. i yield back. >> the gentlemen yields back. the gentle lady from pennsylvania. >> good morning, director mueller. madeleine .de >> gotcha! sorry. >> thank you. thank you. i wanted to ask you about public confusion connected with attorney general barr'ease of your report. i q will beting your march 27th letter. sir, in that letter, and at ouveral other times, did y convey to the attorney general that the, quote, introductions and executive summaries of our two-volume report accurately summarized this office's work and conclusions, end quote? >> i would haveo say that the letter itself speaks for itself. >> and those were your words in

that letter? continuie ining with your letteu wrote to the attorney general that the summary letter that ten department sto congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of march 24th did not fully captur the context, nature, and substance of this office's work and conclusions, end quote. is that correct? >> again, i rely on the letter itself or its terms. >> thank you. >> what was itbout the report's context, nature, substance, that the attorney general's letter did not capture? >> i think we captured that in our march 27th responsive letter. >> and this is from the 27th letter. what were some of the specifics d i'm irecting to the letter itself. >> okay. you finished that letter by saying, there is now public confusion about critical aspects as a result of our investigation. could you tell us specifically some of the public confusion you identified? >> not generally. again, i would go back to ae letter the letter speaks for itself. >> a cndould

confusion ifor hhadeleased your summaries and executive introduction and summaries? >> i don't feel comfortable speculating on that. >> shifting to may 30th, the attorney general in an interview with cbs news said that you could ve reached -- quote, you could have reached a decision as to whether it was criminal activity, end quote, on the pare of tpresident. did the attorney general or his staff ever tell you that he thought that you should make a decision on whether the president engaged in criminal activity? >> i'm not going to speak to what the attorneneral was thinking or saying. >> if the attorney general has directed you or ordered you to make decisionn whether the president engaged in criminal yactivity, would have so done? >> i can'trns twethavacuum. >> director mueller, again win thank you for being here. i agree with your march 27th letter. there was public confusion and the president took full advantage of that confusion by

falsely claiming you report found no obstruction of justice. let us be clear. your report did not exonerate the president. instead, it provided substantial evidence of obstruction of justice, leaving congress to do its duty. we shall not shrink from that duty. iield back. >> the gentle lady yields back. >> mr. chairman. mr. chairman, i have a point of inquiry, over on your left. >> the gentlemen will say his point ofirinqu >> was the point of this hearing to get mr. mueller to recommend impeachment? > that is not a fair point of inquiry. the gentle lady from florida is recognized. >> mr. chairman, wait a minute. >> director mueller -- >> mr. chairman! >> the gentle lady from florida is recognized. >> thank you so much for coming here. you're a patriot. i want to refer you now to lume 2, page 158. you wrote that, quote, the president's efforts to influence the investigation were mostly unsuccessful, but that isus largely becathe persons who surrounded the president declined to carry out orders or

accede to his requests. is that right? >> that is accurate and that is what we found. >> and you're basically referring to senior advisers who disobeyed the president's ders, like white house counsel don mcgahn, former trump campaign manager, corey lewandowski, is that right? >> well, we have not specified the persons. >> well, in page 158, white house counsel don mhnga quote, did not tell the acting attorney general that the special counsel must be removed, but was instead prepared to resign over the president's orders. you also explained that anto attempt obstruct justice does not have to succeed to be a crime, right? >> true. >> simply attempting to obstruct justice can be a crime, correct? >> yes. >> so even though the president's aides refused to carry out his orders to interfere with your investigation, tt is not a defense to obstruction of justice by this president, is it? speculate. going to

>> so to reiterate, simply trying to obstruct justice can be a crime, correct? >> yes. >> and you say that the president's efforts to influence the investigation were, quote, mostly unsuccessful. and that's because not all of his efforts were unsuccessful, right? >> you're reading into what i -- thwhat we have written in report. >> i was going to ask you if you could just tell me which ones you had in minds "successful" when you wrote that sentence? >> i'm going to pass on that. >> yeah.di ctor mueller, today we have talked a lot about the separate acts by this president, but you also wrote in your report that, quote, the overall pattern of the president's conduct towards thes investigation can shed light on the nature of the president's acts and the inferencesan be drawn about his intent, correct? > accurate recitation from the report. >> right.

and on page 158 again, i think to important for everyone note that the president's conduct had a c significantnge when he realized that it was -- that the investigations were conducted to investigate his obstruction act. so in other words, when the american people areg decid whether the president committed obstruction of justice, they need to look at all of the president's conduct and overall pattern of behavior. is that correct? >> i don't disagree. >> thank you. dr. mueller -- director mueller, doctor, also. i'll designate that, too. i have certainly made up my mind about whether -- what we have reviewed today meets the elements of obstruction, including whether there was corrupt intent and what is clear is that anyone else, including some members of congress wouldar have been chd with crimes for these acts.

we would not have allowed this behavior from any of the previous 44%s. we should not allow it now or for the future to protect our democracy and, yes, we will continue to investigate, because as you clearly state at the eof our report, no one is above the law. i yield back my time. >> the gtl thgentle lady from texas. >> director mueller, you wrote in yort that u,yo quote, determined not to make a traditionalse protorial judgment, end quote. was that in part because of a opiniondy the department of justice office of legal counsel that a sitting president can't be charged with a crime? >> yes. >> director mueller, at your may 29th 2019, press conference, you explained that, quote, the opinion says that theon constituti 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 jtice system for accusing a president of wrongdoing, is that impeachment? >> i'm notomoing to cnt on that. >> 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, quote, potentially preempt constitutional processes? >> i'm not going to try to explainat. >> that actually is coming from page 1 of volume ii, in the i footnote the reference to this. what are those constitutional processes? >> i think i heard you mention at least one. >> impeament, correct? i'm not going to comment. >> okay. that is one of thetu coonal processes listed in the report in the footnote in

volu ii. your report documents the many ways the president sought to interfere with your investigation and you state in yourreport,n page 10, volume ii, that with a -- interfering with a congressial inquiry or investigation with corrupt intent can also constitute obstruion of justice. >> true. >> well, the president has told us that he intends toht figll the subpoenas. his continued efforts to interfere with investigations of his potentialmisconduct certainly reinforce the importance of the process the constitution requires to, que, formally cute a sitting president of wrongdoing, as you cited in the report. and this hearing has been very helpful to this committee, as it exercises its constitutional duty t determine whether to recommend articles of impeachment against the president. i agree with you, director mueller, that we all have a

vital role in holding this presid ht accountable for actions. more than that, i believe we in congress have a duty to demand accountability and safeguard one of our nation's highest principles, that no one is above the law. from everything that i have heard you say here today, it'sa clear th anyone else would have been prosecuted based on the evidence available in your report. it now falls on us to hold president trump accountable. thank you for being here. chairman, i yield back. >> m chairman, gentle lady yields back. >> personal privilege. >> i want to thank the airman. we did get in our time. we both did get in time. our sideiv got our f minutes in. also, mr. mueller, thank you for being here. and i join the chairman in thank you for being here. >> thank you. mr. muel we direct you for attending today's hearing. before we conclude, i ask everyone to please remain seated and quiet while the witness

exits the room. >>mu robert eller in the hot seat for aboutf three and a hal hours. and i think it is accurate to call it a hot seat. it got hted at moments. if democrats were looking for a pristine 10 to 15-second sound bite that made the point they want to make, it probably didn't happen. ith me.h guthrie but some points were eventually brought out over the difficult questioning. >> yeah. whra the dem were asked why, why would they put robert mueller on the witness stand, why did he come before congress when he's issd this report, they said, because you needed to ovve this report come alive, because the m will be better than the book, that it would capture and captivate american's attention and focus them on the issues here. and to our panel, i ask the

question, is it mission accomplished, if that was the goal? >> if that was the goal,t's a complete failure on that front. look, i think substance, democrats y t what thewanted. they got him to confirm that he didn't make a charge because of the justice department memo. he confirmed that you can still indict him on the charges after he leaves offi h. ande seemed to cfirm the idea that under any other circumstance, he likely would have filed some charges. so the got some substance of what they wanted him -- bute provided such, what do you cl it? uncomfortable clarity. as they were using him for clarity, he'd somehow fog it up. inow he woul do certain things. so look, on the ioptics, this w disaster. >> butye dir refuted the president's notion that -- >> that's what i mean, on substance, they got what they wanted, but if they were looking

for this dramatic momentd that woulcapture the imaginaon -- judiciaryer, house members do believe they should start impeachment. if that's what bob mueller thought needed to e done, didn't do anything today to help advance that cause, if he hibelieves that is where t should head. >> it's interesting,ll he reay only got fired up in defending weismann and torhe other member of the team in charges from politics. and in defending himself, as 25 years as a prosecutor, he never once asked anybody on his team what their political affiliation was. so that'she only team where he really pushed back hard against reesblicans, who were at tim really yelling at him and mischaracterizing the facts, frequently mischaracterizing the facts. >> there was nobody checking that, either. that's another problem here. >> why didn't the democrats then jump in? >> a lot of crazy stuff to be out there. >> they did not do any fact check in realtim ofblhat the epuans, in many cases were

positing, which was not accurate. but what mueller did do is, he sat there as the democrats tried to summarized, and in summarizing saying, were he noth the president,would have been indicted. but the attempted firing of mueller and the special counsel or interference with an investigation is enough for obstruction, it doesn't have to succee be obstruction. but that is them making the case, not the key witness. >> and neal katyal, we're sitting four places down, but i was following your tweets during this. and you seized on that exchange between congressman ted lou and robert mueller. i want to play that and get your thoughts on it. here it is. >> so to recap what we've heard, and we have heard tay that the president ordered former white house counsel don mcgahn to fire you. the president ordered don mcgahn to then cover that up and create a false paperan trail. now we hear that the president ordered corey lewandowski to tell jeff

sessions to limit your investigation so that he, you, would stop investigating the president. able reasonabl person looking at these facts could conclude that all three elements of the crime ofbs ouction of justice have been met and i would like to ask you again that the reason you did not indict donald trump is because of the olc opinion that states you cannot indict a sitting president, correct? >> that is correct. >> and he said it again few minutes ago, and just to be clear, what you're hearing therr is he wasdy to charge, except for that. >> the central democrat narrative throughout the hearing if you s been, look, just read the report, it outlines ten instances of crimes, thatould have been charged for anyone else, a thousand former federal prosecutors said so, and i took a long time, really an hour and a half before we got to representative lou, and actually that story telling to come out. but it came out, in theory, in a devastating way for the

president. sure, i agree with you that the democrats were not the story tellers today. they were writing a russianhe novel wyou need an instagram story or something like that. but at the end of the day, i ot thought they g that across. and even with someone who was so reluctant -- he was so afraid to even usehe word "impeachment." he was like he who shall not be named. can't even use the word. >> referred to the constitution, and then you're like, is there another remedy? >> like veronica escobar, he said, ienoned in my report. >> he was very hesit he was not reaching out to help any of these lawmakers in their questioning. he did not defend himself against some pretty serious allegations and an impugning of hitwo-year investigation, whether it be his lawyers, although he did defendome of s lawyers, but the tactic, the prosecutorial decisions. he did not take the bait. he did not defend them. u can question whether or not that was a good decision. >> the steele dossier. >> didn't go there. but at the same time, it wasn't

like he was reaching out to help the democrats. they would layut theseacts and he would say, that's not my -- i'm not agreeing with your characterization. >> and i think what you see is a true prosecutor. because that's what you do with the justice department. you don't go and try to defend your reputation or whatever. you let the work speak for itself. and if there's any motif of the fthree and a half hours o testimony, it's, i'm letting the work speak for itself. >> but neal, going back to the initial question savannah asked me, what was the pointf o today's hearing? >> is it to get to impeachment? >> i think it was to lay the case. and if you think about it substantively, as you were before, i think they have laid out the ce that if this were any other person, they wouldn't be not just a free person, theyja be in . and now the question is, would you really want the president of the united states to be this. person >> as we go to you, h peoplee seized upon, rightly so, this exchange between congressman lou and mueller, where he seems to say, or acknowledge that, you know, this olcpinion is the

eason that trump wasn't indicted. but in other parts of the testimony, he's asked, was there sufficient evidence to convict the president? and he said, we didn't make that calculation. so did the democrats get it as clea as they wanted to? this notion that but for this department of justice opinion that says you can't indict a sitting president, this president would be charged with a crime? >> this is one of the trickiest parts of the specialcounsel's report, because here's what they're saying, because of the justice department policy th sayshat a president can't be indicted, we marshaled all of these facts, but then weever decided whether any of those facts constituted a crime. so in other words, he's saying, here's what we didn't do. this is what the report says. we didn't say, here are the facts. they would constitute a crime, but we're not charging the president, because we can't. that's not what it says. what it, says is here are the facts. maybe they constitute a crime.

maybe they don't, but we're not even going to go b there,ecause we can't. and he said, we're doing it for several reasons, because ofhe t policy about indicting a president, because of a matter of fairness. you can't accuse someone of a crime, but therg not cha them, because you denied them the portunity to defend themselves in court, opportunity, witnesses and so forth. so for both constitutional reasons and fairness reasons,ep the rt says the office never concluded whether these actions constitute a criminalact. and that is a sort of tough thing to get your head around about the report that and the other part of it which came out today about the report also saying very controversially, but we're not going to say thdn president di commit a crime, because we don't have enough evidence to go either way on that. and that led to a question today about, well, you said on obstruction that there was no crime, but you didn't -- i'm sorry, on the cooination with e russian meddling, you said there wasn't a crime, but you didn't do that on obstruction.

and of course, the report says that on the question of collusion, there is notff suient evidence to even get to the first base, much less to make the whole trip around the bases to home plate. >> right. and also on that first issue of whether or not there was collusion, that concerns not just the president who's in these unique circumstances wherg he cannot be c with a crime, but also concerns other regular individuals who could. so, of course, in that ll situation, m and his team could analyze whether or not a crime was committed. and the did. let's listen to ranking member collins speaking right outside the hearing room. >> and now we jt have robert mueller take home. >> but the fact that robert mueller sa that he does not important the president, does that leave you a responsibility to keep investigating. >> it was very interesting how he wouldn't explain that, and w alson we actually talked to him about that, something unique history to never have a prosecutor to try to -- that was never the job to begin but what he also said is he

didn't have enough to find him guilty either. and -- >> you till believe the president exonerates the president? >> i think the report says exactly what the report says, there was no conspiracynd a no collusion and people can read that. >> do you think this changes the mind -- >> i think the process for impeachment was already going down. we saw that among the public, they're getting tired of this, they're seeing nothing new and know there was nothing there. i think that did not help this narrative. i think it might have hurt it. i think we can finalut a period here. and now instead of saying, maybe if we can actually have a period and get back te business that this committee is supposed to be doing, instead of talking about problems, actually involving them. i think that happened today. >> t ranking member, doug collins in the hallway. we should kind of reset where we are. that was the end. we've seen the judiciary hearing. now there's the intel hearing. they'll be in the samero . that starts -- i've lost track of time, probably about 20 minutes. i think it was a half-hour break is what we were looking at.th >> and by way, that's going

to be a different story. t we've beenalking about the president's behavior. this is the crime. the next set will be outlining r the crime thatsia committed. >> and i wonder how much learning has gone over the last three and a halfll hours, if we' see a different handling of this. >> first of all, it's a different committee, a muchco smaller ittee. 22 members, pretty much evenly divided, congressman adam schiff is the chai but also, this is what was assertedn ithe report. that russia systemically attacked our elections. and there have been multiple russians indicted. they have not been arrested, because they are beyond the reach of the law.be but they have indicted with specific crimes of both using social media, fake bots that went out and created rallies, created false persona throughout this campaign to try to influence the election in favor of donald trump and against hillary clinton, not to elect donald trump, to weanillary

clinton if she was, as the conventional wisdom was elected. the conventional wisdom in moscow and aroundry the cou is she was the favorite to win the election. so that this was a prudent plot by his military intelligence. and t operated through internet research agency int. petersburg, very cleverly through social media and also to, you know, influence the hackinge that was don and very systemically and strategically dumped by wikileaks at key moments. the podesta e-mails. two or three days before the debate. that is what's going to be outlined. >> can we briefly talk about the elephant in the room and that is his performance as a witneti. he was halng at times, he had trouble following the line of questioning. and reme, this is an individual we have built up as 10 feet tall for --

>> the democrats built him up to about 25 feet tall. he was a doctor -- they gave him a ph.d at the end. >> we're listening t the words and reacting to the words, but how much is his demeanor as a witness? how much is that going to inflhince where all of t goes? >> i think a lot. i think a great deal. he didn't push back effectively against the reblicans' false statements in many case and he seemed to contradict some of the democratic assertions, which were simply repeating his own report. he didn't seem to own his own report. >> neal, you talked about some of these points that democrats scored. to a certain extent, yes, they were able to create aco . for example, jerry nadler, chairman right at the top saying, does this report exonerate, and he says "no." so it creates a record. if you were litigating this case, you would be happy to have that in your transcript. but in terms of the tical question, and the reason why they said it's not just enough report. the we have to have robert mueller in the flesh, making this --

breathing life into this report and giving a compellin narrative, then this issue about performance does seem salient. >> but there's a way that it cr cut the othey, too. ometimes youor, actually want to have a reluctant, halting witness, ecause that isn't a fire breather, someone who's just trying to do their job. and i think that really came across today. mueller wasn't playing for one team or the oth team. he was measuring his words quite carefully. and when says and deviates from s report and says to representative lou and affectske reason you didn't indict donald trump is because of the memo, is that correct? yes. the reason. and mueller was careful throughout the day to not use certain words or not be accused of any sort of favoritism, but there he did do something. i sohink that demeanor, while initially, our take right now is, oh, it's not a made-for-tv moment, it might turn out long-term to be -- >> let's bring in barbara mcquade into the conversation, nbc news legal contributor and former attorney general in

michigan. and barbara, how would you handle mueller going forward, as a prosecutor, having seen how he would perform in this hearing, how wod you handle him in the next one? >> i think we have seen it, as he is reluctant to take sides, ut he will answer yes or no questions. i think the democrats did a good job of laying out the facts of the ca there are several episodes of coordination with russia that i think can come out and can be really bopowerful, talking a sharing of polling data with konstantin kilimnik, the trump tower meeting for obtaining dirt on hillary clinton. the coordination and communication with wikileaks about dumps of stolen e-mails. those are really shocking stories. and i think if the democrats just explain the facts in a narrative form and get robert mueller just to agree with what's in his report, that can go a long way. i think we are far too concerned about the opinion and legal

analysis of robert mueller, because after all, he was of ing at violation criminal statutes, which doesn't apply to a president. instead, we should be concerned about the facts, because those coulconstitute the kind of remedy that congress can impose, which is impeachment. >> i found it interesting that democrats tried, at least a couple of times twob get him to say his own words, read dectly from t report and he declined. i don't know if that was a sense of not wanting to provide -- a he knew what they were doing for. >> sound bite. >> he made this decision, hinis not go to be a television ad and he's not going to be that. and i think, ande i tak neal's point, it helps him with credibility. the fact is, we ar living in this 21st century new type of asymmetrical media warfare that we're in. you have a propaganda machine on the right. that's what it is. it's a full-fledged propaganda machine on the right, that the democrats haven't figured out how to combat very well. and i think they took the trump bait, meaning, they saidworke o

you're good at tv spectacle, we're going to make a tv spectacle. they need to go back to just being -- and this goes tthe larger sue, have they fumbled the entire accountable measure they were supposed to be on. >> one way of thinking about it, they've always thought about this in political terms, and instead, they could have thought of it as rule of law terms, as a president that's not complying with our basic foundational laws and come whatever the consequences may be to their political fortunes, the right ing to do iso have hearings. >> this is why i compared this to this iraq vote.ey the making political decisions right now, not thin tng about --he irony is, this could come back and aunt thempolitically, down the road if the conventional wisdom flips. >> so does this increase or decrease the pressure onsi nanc peloow to let them recast their hearings, their inquiry as an official impeachment inquiry, which might strengthen their hands. >> maybe we need to hold that thought until theng heari complete. we're only at halftime.

we'll hear on the first part of the report, which goes to thira ce question about whether russia meddled in our election. >> the actual crime. the actual attack, one might ur say, against o country and our democracy. let's go to hallie jackson who's covering it from the white house and has a statement from the president's personal lawyer. >> rorter: jay sekulow, who is telling our team just moments ago that this hearing so far, first half of it, as you know, we are in halftime, exposes what sekulow, the president's attorney outside the white hou ou rsiencies in the sepecialse c of this lengthy statement to assert that he believes that the american people know that this is now a case closed as it relates to the special counsel investigation. that is the first bit of reaction we're getting from ther ident's team. the performance of robert mueller and the substance of what mueller is talking about. the president, by the way, we know s watchingthis. we know he has been watching the coverage over on a d cable network.

he's been doing so from inside the residence, not in the west wing of the white house. he doesn't have any public events until later this afternoon. his aides have been talking about a couple of thgs. pointing to the idea that robert mueller elaborated on the idea that president trump did there was not sufficient evidence to find his campaign c conspired withhe russians. unsurprisingly, that has been an area that allies of the president have hoped to highlight, in essence. there have been a couple ofha folks who also pointed to the performance, to the line of questioning from both congressman jim jordan and louie gohmert as well, talking about the origins of the russia investigation. that has resonated in some conservative circles. there has also been a lot of discussion inside those circles about the performance of mueller himself, with some friends of the presidiet, some all publicly coming out and questioning how mueller has been doing. one person close to the president has tolds u that mueller appeared tired, questioning how he might be able to handle the next half of this hearing. this is something that allies of

the president have already keyed in on as well here, to the point that you two have been discussing. keep in mind, for president trump, this is really the culmination of what has been hanging over his white house for two plus years of his administration, almost since the day he took office. thisas been a shadow over this building here for president trump and people around him, there's a sense that they've been her and donethis. and that is the line that you are hearing fromho t ahank you so much. it's 12:30 in the east, 9:30 out west. and we are awaiting the second portion of this testimony by former fbi direct , former special counsel, robert mueller. he will go before the house intelligence committee in the same room. this is a big room on capitol hill that can accommodate all of the interest. it's a smaller committee and our expectation is that this portion of his testimony will cover the part of the report that has to do with russian interference hour election and the question whether or not presiden trump or any members of his

campaign conspired with, collude is sort of the colloquial termo that thrown around, but conspiracy was the legal issue that was analyzed by robert mueller and his staff. they concluded there was not sufficient evidence to prove blyond a reasonadoubt that any member of the trump campaign conspired with rsia. but dreenandrea, if you look ine report, what youill se and i assume what will come out, were many, manyontacts and attempts to get in contact with the trump campaign by the russians and the report states that the trump campaign was in some cases very recepte to that. >> doze skpns and dozens of atts by top off about paul manafort and others who were in touch with th russians. committee, this because up until a couple of years ago, this committee was always 50/50, bipartisan, really working togeer. and devin nunes during the transiti, who is then the chair, if you recall, the committee, went rogue, wentwh t

the ite house, was working with the trump eople, and m flynn, the national security who was indicted and pleaded guanty. dthat happehen o, s wthwine nunes, he had to temporarily recuse himself, but this divided and really became toxic with this committee. and there's a lot of after fects. this is not the intelligence committee that i've covered for decades. >> but in fairness, the republicans on this committee aren't like the repue icans on thdiciary. you've got people like will hurd, who himself is a forme cia officer, takes this very seriously. the members on this -- so i would actuly expect this to be more substantiative on both des of the aisle. and i'll remind you, when you read part i of the mueller report, which is what going to hear about, the co tpiracy aspect,he reason not to bring charges, in many of the cases because they thought the lea waw was weak, not they said the law needed to be modernized. and al, that was my takeaway

from reading itit. was to me a directive to , congresshey, you need to modern campaig the 21st century. >> i 100% agree with that. and it's a crime that congress hasn't in the wake of this. >> that was supposed to be the purpose of what it was all about. >> that the statutes weren't conduct that the they investigated. >> 21st century. >> but also, chuck, tlahere's ao in the report about how all of this obstructi made it hard ublithem to gethe the rep tioning seemed to question the whole notion of whether ther the internet research agency, was working with the government. they were plantingds those see during questioning. >> i don't think you're going to have that. i think you're going to have republicans on this committee agree that they were workingus with thean government. a different style of republican questioning. >> let me bring robert engle. what are the facts, as you know it, as they're laid out in this report? >> reporter: well, frankly, if you were listening to the first

half of the testimony, it will be verdifficult to know what the facts were. i think that what we heard for the last several hours was completely confusing. you were hearing it presented in very partisan ways. the special investigator, or former special investigator, seemed not to know always what his answers were, not to hear e question. the you were listening to this and hoping that you were going to get a dclear,matic narrative on how the russians interfered eth iioleensct a tri down o even stop that investigation, which is laid out quite clearly in mueller's written report, you certainly didn't get it in the last l hours. now, we may hear for specificallies aboy specifics pant what russia diddo, becau that seems to be less controversial, less political in a domestic sense in the united states, but if the pas performance is a judge of what we're going to see, i think we're going to leave the

american people even more confusing of about what happened in 2016 than they may have been earlier. what we do know, according to my own reporting, according tia numerous medreports, numerous intelligence agencies is that the russians, the russian government through key oligarchs did influence the u.s. elections. they sent out a massive media campaign to try to sway voters, in favor of president trump, to try to divide and confuse voters, particularly over emotional and racial issues in the united states ey hacked into democratic e-mails, stole those e-mails and weaponized them to try to hurt hillary clinton. so there is a dramatic narrative. there is a spy story. this is perhaps g theatest intelligence operation that russia has conducted nft last century, but youaven't heard it today. >> let's go over to kasie hunt.

she's on hill for us. i assume any moment we're going to see director mueller walk back into that room. what are youhearing? what are democrats on the hill saying about how the morning has gone so far? >> reporter: well, savannah, so far, it's hard to get a sense that this has changed the game up here on capitol hilin my meaningful way. although i will say that to what richard was just talking about, we still hav yet to get to the portion of the program where they walk very carefully through what the report lays out about russia's interference in our election. i mean, that's going to be the focus of this afternoon so if that becomes very clear through the course of intelligence committee questioning, i think there's still an open question about how this allla out in the end. but the reality is that democrats got the most compelling headlines out of this right off the bat and then there was a struggle back and forth to

get mr. mueller, the former special counsel to say anything beyond yoees or no. i mean, we know he had told the committee in advance that he wasn't going to read from the report. at question here for how politically this moves forward, whether or not democrats are willing to launch impeachment proceedings depends on how this is perceived by the american public and how in democrats' words they actually do watch this movie. and mr. mueller was a very reluctant cast member.ee didn't sto want to give democrats what they wanted on thatront so, so far, what we've heard in the hallways, i have spoken to several different members and have been speaking with aides on background as well, the sense is this is lihely to leave us w we started, a significant number of democrats supporting impeachment proceedings, but not necessarily a o bunch clear new compelling reasons for there to be a dramatic shift here. obviously, they're going to watch how the polling data ld

unfoand what happens this afternoon. but i think as we stand here at the noon hour, that's how things are initially shaping up. now, again, as you and your panel have been talking about, we're goingo hear from the intelligence committee here led by adam schiff, coming up in just a few minutes. mueller will sit down for that. it's a much smaller committee, only 22 members. and again, a very different focus heading into this afternoon, savannah. lester. >> all right, kasie, sit tight there. andrea? >> i wanted to say, the whole issue ofrussia's attacks on our election, which was linked to the president-elect and actually to the c didate donald trump and then to the president-elect donald trump by john brennan, y, you know, general clappe and all of the others and of course, the fbi director comey, that is what poisoned the whole reonship between the president, the incoming president and the intelligence community. and he's beenighting this ever since. defending vladimir putin, saying, well, he denies it. after all, we saw what happened in hels ki, we were allthere.

so this has really created a toxic situation between the president and the director of national intelligence, dan coats, whose job may well now be the line. so there's a bigger context here for the after-effect for the way donald trump used intell gathering, but with the unanimous decision of all the intelligence agencies thatke russia attacd the election and that's what led to this whole investigation. >> but when the intelligence officials came in and said, hey, look, it was russia, they meddled in our election, donald trump heard them saying to him, somehow, this casts into question the legitimacy of his election. whether it did or didn't, that appears that's how he heard it and that changed everythi. >> that's how he heard it. he's personalized everything. and in fairness, none of us can crawl inside his head and know whether he's acting this way because he's guilty of or he's vain and he doesn't like the idea he didn't do it on his own. and the fact of the matter is -- >> or could be neither of those.

>> -- is because theresident so regularly misleads ut in wha he says, wew don't kno and we can't crawl in his head and robert mueller never interviewed him, so robert mueller does not know. >> but chuck, we have one pretty good clue. which is that he fires comey and says the reason he's firing comey, initially, is because comey was unfair to hillary clinton. i mean, come on! then, only, in response to lester's questioning later on usd he say, oh, no, it was because of thea thing if you're . if you're up and up, you know your story it's your first story. not your second or your third. >> let me bring in mimi rocah. one of the things we haven't talked a lot about is the notion th mueller apparently thinks that the president could be indicted after he leaves office. how would that work? >> well, that was a very striking moment. i think it was atuepublican acly that asked the question and didn't quite get the answer that he expected when mueller

said he could bedi ined. i think the question actually was, could you indict the president, n a just president, which is pretty specific. the way it would work, and look, all of is issue about mueller staying very neutral and the report being very neutral and sort of coming down the middle, it's actually going to work to the benefit of any future prosecutor who does want to try to bring a prosecution. it will beyou know, basically inheritance of a file, a case file with facts, not the conclusion of someone saying, you should dict. if there is a future prosecutor that wants to take up that indictment, they can just do it in a way that is less political, less controversial. >> because it seems like mueller just essentially put that over the president's head today. >> well, he did. and it's important, and again, i think it's important that it

it.n't mueller volunteering it was sort of in response to a republican asking him in a skeptical way and mueller ow saying, you kn yes, i could. and he again kind of doubled down on it in response to another republican who said,we , bill barr said that the olc memo didn't have anything to do with why you didn't indict. and that's when mueller, i thought, doubled down the most on saying that the ol memo was the reason he didn't indict. but the neutrality,he lack o conclusion, if you will by mueller about whetherd he woul indict, his refusal to say it in the terms that we all are sort of yearning toear of it, i would not have indicted but for the olc memo, that will help a future prosecutor who does want to bring the icharges. >>s interesting to watch the things he bitesn and the things he doesn't bite on. certainly some inconsistencies. >> but in fairness to him, i don't believe he was ever asked,

point-blank, the "butfor" question. but for this olc opinion, would you have indicted the president? >> ted lou asked -- >> ted lou came close, but never asked it if that "but for" formulation that would have left absolute no doubt,right, mimi? did you hear it any other way? >> i think that's right. i think ted lou came the closest, but i think the democrats sort of knew that they weren't necessarily going to get the answer from mueller. and sohat's w actually came out o billn barr's statement that, in fact, you know, it wasn't the olc memo. and i think itame pretty clear, the gap between mueller and barr, again, without mueller explicitly saying it. and i think if people pore over the transcript, there's going to be a little something in there for everybody. because there are other places where he states that even did the analysis of whether or not they could charge him with obstruction because of that olc opinionev they didn't en make the

conclusion. so i guess everyboab can debate t it from here on how. >> i think you're going to be seeing in the hours to come if not already the clear delineation of the sarate universes that a lot of >>america -- you know what? the questions that house republicans ask will be what you heart in prime-time on one cable channel. and will you'll hear in a lot of commentary. what he did push back was a suggestion from several republicans that inappropriate to even continue the investigation because the prident could not be indictedde un those guidelines. >> and that's in the memo, as well, in the report. he said, notwithstanding this olc guidance, he said, the olc does envision thatou do an investigation to create and preserve a factual record either for impeachment, hep dsn't use that record, the constitutional process that might be relevant or for a subsequent prosecution afterun arn official is out of office.

>> neal, here's what i don't understand, why do democrats feel comfortab l withting mueller get away with basically saying, i'm not going to talk about my conversations with barr? what's the legislative branch supposed to do if they're not? >> it's poor oversight responsibility. even if you don't want to get into the actual details, at least ask the question. barr took office, d anything about your investigation change. did he do anything? >> should they force him to do this. he's under subpoena. saying,hey at least be should we take this in closed session? >> absolutely. you want to be deferenti, and of course mueller will be to all of that. but to force him to answer those simple questions -- >> that seemed to be totally >> they even asked him about the letter that his office sento attorney general barr after the initial conclusions that barr released,herein mueller complained because of the picture you provided, people have not having a clear

understanding of the nature and subsnce of our work. but asked today, well, what exactly bothered you about what barr did? he said, i don't want to talk about that. and to chuck's point. no one said, well, why not . >> sorry. there's probably a lot of things you don't want to talk about, but you're here under subpoena, mr. mueller. ea>> he said the letter sp for itself. >> but the all right didn't speak for itself. the letter did not identify the reasons that he felt that what barr said left people with misimpressions about the nature and substance -- >> he should have been asked whetr barr mischaracterized the conclusions of the report. >> we'll be back -- chairman schiff is already in his seat and e rest of the members and we're waiting for william barr to come back out for his second round of questioning. this should go a couple of hours and start montarily. let me bring in pete williams right now. pete, what are the big questions that we need to hear -- or maybe the answers - the questions and answers we need to hear in this next session? >> this is the session about the

russianmeddling, of course. and i think one thing that we may hear about is that there was an fbi intelligence investigation that predated mueller's appointment and many meerwes whatevefr happened to that? what did the fbi do? at can be learned from that, separate from the mueller report? and there's a question about whether he'll be able to go into that or not. now, of course, what the report says is that they found insuffient evidence, that either the president or members of his campaign or people who were working for him afterhe t inauguration were cooperating with the russians. and by the way, you all have talked a lot about whether there's been a sufficient connection that all of the russians that did both the computer hacking and the phony soci maledia wgoervee rnalment. the report seems to go out of its way to say that the hacking operatn was one thing and that

he phony media campaign w another. and that they weren't necessarily both connected directly to the russian government. all they say is that the oligarch who was in charge of the one was a close friend of putin, whereas the other was ca aied out byual members of the russian military. so they've said there's a the report thtobo say, one was private and one was definitely carried out by government. so that may be another line of estioning that members are here. just the other thingis why -- and this came out a arouble tolitt iitn be fthir r conclusion on p i, where you say the evidence wasn't sufficient, but you didn't do that on part ii? was there aifferencen the way you analyzed the two questions? >> and of course, it's mr. mueller we're waiting for here, as the next session appears to be getting close. >> one of the questions certainly would have to fbe, i

paul manafort did share critical polling data, which is never done, unprecedented, from a ig national campawith the russians about those midwestern states, the three states, michigan, wisconsin, and pennsylvania, as well as minnesota, the states that decided the elections, well, why don't we know more about this? and the result is that that re manafort withd his agreement and essentially didn't fully cooperate. and that is another area of obstruction. >> i was going tohat's whe the oolum tes y, of thesa report potentially come together. the notion that paul manafort, having been dangled a pardon, if you believe some of the inferences in the report by the president doide not t cooperate, therefore doesn't say and doesn't tell the prosecutors why it is he would have given this polling data, then i think that is whatwo brings those t strands together. >> i think barbara mcquade wants to weigh in here. barbara? >> yeah, i think the polling data is one of the most significant parts of robert mueller's findings with regard

to the russia cooperation. you know, he says, there were identified gaps in our investigation that was caused by peopleho lied to , who provided incomplete information, who deleted communication and used encrypted apps. this is one of the areas he was never able to get his arms around. and so in this way, it may be that some members of the trump campaign actually were successful in obstructing the investigation. i live in michigan. president trump won there 10,000 votes. and that was one of the swhtes e polling data was shared with russians. russians who we know were flooding the zone with propaganda. and even if people didn't vote for trump, they might havefr stayed home voting for hillary. >> robert muler now back in the room about to take his seat, same room that he spent three and a half hours in testifying before the judiciary committee. this is the intel committee, a smaller group, 22 members.d anhey will go two hours. and once again, the cameras surrounding robert mueller.

and one has to wonder if thee tone of thestioning is going to change on both sides. if there were huddles over this last 30 or 40 minutes to kind of rethinking strategy and how they would try to approach it. >> i think nunes and some of those republicans are going to be fairly tough, but thebe may not shouting at him. there was some criticism online that there very -- >> they were aggressive. >> -- and abusive. >> and if you're a democrat, i thnt occupant t -forv mentin.k poi yo au wantis one,th somewhere h. >> and this is where we fuld hearm the second person that has been sworn in here, his longtime chief of staff, firstn , aaron zebley. >> why didn't we hear -- >> because he was not sworn in. and here's -- >> you may hear -- >> -- calling the hearing into orde order.

>> at the outset and on behalf of my colleagues, i want to thank you special counsel muellefor a lifetimese of ice to the country. your report for ose who have t ken the time to study it is methodical and i devastating. where it tells the story of a foreign adversary's sweeping and systemic intervention in a close u.s. presidential election. that should be enough to deserve the attention of every american, as you well point out. but your report tells another story, as well. the story of the 2016 election is also a story about disloyalty greed, and about about lies. your investigation determined that the trump campaign, including donald trump himself knew that a foreign power was intervening in our election a welcomed it, built russian meddling into their strategy,

and used it. disloyalty to country. those are strong words bulb how else are we to describe a presidential campaign which did not inform the authorities of a foreign offer of dirt opnentwhh dotubcly oun ithen tir or turn it away, h, instead, invited it, encouraged it, and made full use of it? that disloyalty may not have been criminal, constrained by uncooperate eswises,he destruction of dusuments and the of encrypted communications, your team was not able to establish each of thele ents of the crime of conspiracy so not a provable crime in any event, but i think maybe something worse. a crime is the violation of law written by congress, but disloyalty to country violates the very oath of citizenship, our devotion to a core principle on which our nation wasou fed that we, the people and not some

foreign power that wishes us ill, we decide who governs us. his is also a story abo money, about greed and corruption, about the leadership of a campaign willing to compromise the nation's interests, not only to win, but to make money at the same time. about a cpaign chairman indebted to pro-russian interests who tried to use his position to clear his debts and make millio . about a national security adviser using his position to make money fm still other foreign interests, and about a candidate trying to make more money than all of them put together through a real estate project that to him was worth a fortune. hundreds of millions of dollars eaand the rzation of a lifelong ambition, a trump tower in the heart of moscow. a candidate who, in fact, viewed his whole campaign as the greatest infomcial in history.

donald trump and his senior staff were not alone in their desire to use the ection to make money. for russia, too, there was a powerful financial motive. putin wanted relief from u.s. economic sanctions imposed in the wake of russia's invasion of ukraine and over human rights violations. the secret trump tower meeting between the russians and senior campaign officls was about sanctions. the secret conversations between flynn and the russian ambassador were about nctions. trump and his team wanted more money for themselves and the russians wanted more money fort selves and for their oligarchs. but the story doesn't end here, eith either, for your report also tells a story about lies of lies. lies about a gleaming tower in moscow and lies about talks with the kremlin. lies about the firing of fbi director james comey and lies about efforts to fire you, director mueller, andies cover it up. lies about secret negotiations with the russians over sanctions

and lies about wikileaks. lies about polling data and lies about hush money payme ms. lies abouttings in the seychelles to set up secret back channels and lies about a sec lt neo y, and lies to this committe committee. lies to obstruct an investigation into tt serious attack on our democracy byhe a foreign power in our history. that is where your report ends, director mueer, with a scheme to cover up, obstruct, and deceive every bit as systemic and pervasive as theus ran disinformation campaign itself, but far more pernicious since this rot came from within. even now, after 448 pages and two volumes, the deception continues. the president and his acolytes say your report found no collusion, though your report explicitly declined to address

that question, since collusion can involve both criminal and non-criminal conduct. your rtiort laid out mule offers of russian help to the trump campaign, the campaign's acceptance of that help, and other acts in furtherance of russian help. to most americans, that is theit very defn of collusion, whether it is a crime or not. they say your report found no evidence of obsthoction,h you outline numerous actions by the president intended to obstruct the investigation. they s the president has been fully exonerated, though you specifically declare you could not exoneratehim. in fact, they say your whole investigation was nothing more than a w tch hunt,t the russians didn't interfere hoin r election, that it's all a terrible hoax. the real crime, they say, is not that the russians intervened to help donald trump, but that the fbi had the temerity to investigate it when they did.

and worst of all, worse than all the lies and the greed, is thes dialty to country. for that, too, continue when asked if the russians intervene again, will you take their help, mr. president? "why n why not was the essence of his answer. everyoneoes it. no, mr. president, they don't. not the in the america envisioned by jefferson, madison, and hamilton, not for those who believe in the idea that lincoln labored until his dying day to preserve. the idea animating ouronreat nati experiment, so unique then, so precious still, that our government is chosen by our ople, through our franchise, and not by some hostile foreign power. this is what is at stake.ct

our next elen. and the one after that. for generations to come. our democracy. this is why your work matters, director eller. this is why our investigation matters. to bring these dangers to light. ranking member nunes? >> thank you, mr. chairman. welcome, evyone, to the last gasp of the russia collusion conspiracy theory as democrats continue to collusion theory. the democrats push this spectacle on the american people, as well as you, mr. mueller. the american people may understandou brought this conspiracy in the spring of 2016, when fusion gps funded by the dnc and the clidevehe stle ng tlodossier.

out landish accusations that trump and his associates were russian agts. others spread these to partisan reporters and top officials in numerous government agencies, including the fbi, the department of justice, and the state department. among other things, the fbi used dossier allegations to obtain a warrant to spy on the trump campaign. despiteing despite acknowledging dossier allegations as being salacious and unrified, former director james comey briefed those allegations to president obama and president-elect trump. those briefings conveniently leaked to the press, resulting in thee publication of th dossier and launching thousands of false press stories based on the o word a foreign ex-spy, one who admitted he was at donald trump lose the election and who was eventually fired as an fbi

source for leaking to the press. after comey, himself, was fired by his own admission, he leaked derogatory information on president trump tohe press f the specific purpose and successfully so of engineering the appointment of a specialth counse sits here before us today. the fbi investigation was marred by further corruption and bizarre abuses, top doj official bruce orr, whose own wife worked on fusion gps' anti-trump operation fed steele's information to the fbi even after the fbi fired steele. the top fbinv itigator and his lover, another top fbi fish, constantly texted about how much they hatedrump and wanted to stop him from being elected. and the entire investion was opened based not on five eyes' intelligence but on a tip fm a

foreign politician about a conversation involving joseph misog, aaltese diplomat who is widely portrayed as a russian agent but seems to have far more connections with concern governments, including our own fbi and our own state department than with russia. brazenly ignoring all these red flags as well as the transparent absurdity of the claims they are making, the democrats aurked for nearly three years evidence of collusion is hidden just around the corner. like the lock nestns r, they insist it's there even if no one can find it. consider this in march 2017, democrats on this committee said they had more than circumstantial evidence of collusion, but they couldn't reveal it yet. mr. mueller was soonpo apted, they said he would find the collusion. when no collusion was found in indictments, the democrats say we find it in his final report.

then when there was no collusion in the report, we were told g attorneyeral barr was hiding it. then when it was clear barr wasn't hiding anything, we were told it will be revealed through a hearing with mr. mueller, himself. now that mr. mueller is here, they're claiming that the collusion has actually been in his report all along, hidden in plain sight. and they're right. there is collusion in plain usght. colln between russia and the democratic party. the democrats colluded with russian sources to develop the steele dossier and russian lawyerollided with the dossier's key architect, fusion gps head glen simpson. the democrats have already admitted through interviews and their usual anonymous statements to reporters that arday's heg is not about getting information at all. they said they want to quote bring the mueller report to life and creat a television moment

through ploys like having mr. mueller rete passages from his own report. in other words, this hearing is political theater. it'sy hail mar attempt to convince the american people that collusion is real and that it's concealed in the report. granted that's a strange argument to make about a report lmat is public. it's at like the democrats accusing arguments o mr. bar tore hide the report and didn't update their claims once es published the entire thing. among congronal democrats, the investigation was never about finding the truth. it's always been a simple media operation by their own accounts, this operation continues in this room today r. once again, numerous pressing issues this committee needs to address are put on hold to indulge the political fantasies of people who believed it was their destiny to serve hillary clinton's administration. it's time for the curtain t

close on the russia hoax, the conspiracy theory is dead. at some pnt iould argue we're going to have to get back to work. until then, i yield back the balance of my time. >> to ensureakairness and sure that our hearing is prompt. i know we got a late start, director mueller. the hearing will be structured as follows. each member of the committee will be afforded five many wants to ask questions, beginning with the chair and ranking member. as chair i will recognize thereafter an alternatingfa ion and descending members of the majority and minority. after each member has ask his or her questions, thera ing member will be afforded an additional five minutes to ask questions followed by the chair, who will have aitional five minutes for questions. the ranking member and the care will not be permitted to delegate or yield our final round of questions to any member.

after six members of the majority and six members of the minority have continued. we will take a break. before resuming with hearing with sngressmanlwell following his round of questions. special counsel mueller is accompanied today by aaron zebley, who served as deputy special counsel from may 2017 to may 2019 and had overnight investigation. they resigned at the end of may 2019 when the special counsel' office was closed. both mr. mueller and mr. zebley will be available to answer questions today. they wl be sworn in consistent with the rules of the house and the committee. mr. mueller and mr. zebley's appearance before the committee is in keeping with the committee's long-standing practice of receiving testimony from current or former department of justice and if ib fib personnel regarding open and closed investigative matters. as this hearing is under oath and before y we beginr

testimony, mr. mueller and zebley, would you please rise and raise your right hands to be sworn? zblmp do you swear or affirm thbo the testimony are you a to give at this hearing is the whole truth and nothing but the truth? >> yes. >> thank you. the record will reflect the witnesses have been duly sworn. ranking member. >> thank you, mr. chair. i just want to clarifyhi that t is highly unusual for millir. zy be sworn in. our counsel will not be asking questions. f have concerns about his prior representation oe hillary clinton campaign aide. so i just want to voice that concen that do have.

we will not be addressing any questions to mr. zebley today. >> i think the ranking member, i yalized as you probabl do, mr. zebley, that there is an angry man down the street who is not happy abo your being here today. but it is up to this committee and not anyone else who will be al blotomed woe srn as a private citizen to testify and their may direct questions to whoever they choose. with that, director mueller, you are recognized for any opening marks you'd like >> gted afoon, chairman schiff, ranking member nunes and members of the committee. i testified this morning before the house judiciary committee. i ask the opening statement i made before that committee be incorporated into t record here. >> without objection, director. >> i understand that this ommittee has a uniqu jurisdiction and that you are

interested in further understanding the counterintelligence imications of our investigation. let me say a word about how we handle the potential impt of our investigation on counterintelligencmatters. we explained in our report, the special counsel regulations effectively gave me the role of the united states attorney. as a result, we structured our investigation around evidence e for possibl use in prosecution of federal crimes. we did not reach what you would call counterintelligence conclusions. we did, however, set up proce processesn ie office to identify and pass counterintelligence information onto the if ib fi members of our office periodically briefed the fbi about counterintelligence in rmation. in addition, there were agents and analysts from the fbi who are not on our team but whose job it was to identify

counterintelligence information in our filesnd to disseminate that information to the fbi. for these reasons, questns about what the fbi has done with the counterintelligence information obtained from our investigation should be directed to the fbi. i also wan to reiterate a few points that i made this morning. and not making any judgments or offering opinions about the guilt or innocence in any pending case. it is unusual for a prosecutor to testify about a criminal investigation and given my role as a prosecutor, there are reasons why my testimony willil necessar be limited. first, public testimony could affect several inongo matters. in some of these matters, court rules or judicial orders limit the disclosure of information to protect the fairness of the proceedings. and consistent with

long-standing justice department policy, it would be inappropriate for me to comment in anyway that cou affect an ongoing matter. second, the justice department has asserte privilegings concerning investigative ongoing matters within the justice department and deliberationithin our office. these are justice department privileges that i will respect. the department head's recent letter has instructions on my testimonth i, efore, will not be able to answer questions about certain areas that i know are of blic interest. for example, i am unable address questions about the opening of the fbi's russia investigation, which occurred months before my appointment. or matters relateddossier. these matters are the subject of ongoing review by the me depart. any questions on these topics

should, therefore, be directed to the fbi or the justice department. third, as i explained thismport to adhere to what we wrote in our report. the report conins our findings and analysis and the reasons for the decision we made. stated the results of our investigation with precision and i do not intend to summarize or describe the results in our work in a different way in the course of my testimony today. as i stated in may, i also will not comment on the actions of the attorney general or of congress. i was appointed as a prosecutor td i intend to adhere to that role and the department's standards that govern. finally, as i saidrn this mog, r of t challenges career, to our democracy. the russian government's efforts to interfere in our election is among the most serious.

i am sure that the committee agrees. now, before we go to questions, i'd want to add one correction morning.stimony this i want to go back to one thing that was said this morning by mr. lieu, who said and i quote, you didn't charge the president because of the olc opinion? that is not the correct way to say it. as we say in the report and as i said at the opening, we did not reach a determination as to whether the president committed a crime with that, mr. chairman, i him ready for rognize myself have minutes. mr. mueller, your report is a way to describe the president essential election, is that correct? >> that is c effect. >> during the course, the ou russians made each for the trump campaign, did they not? >> that occurred over the course

of, yeah, that occurred. >> it's also clear from your report that during that rus outreach to the trump campaign, no one associated with the campaign ever called the fbi to report it, am i right? >> i don't know that forsure. >> in fact, the campaign welcomed the russian help, did they not? >> i thinke have a report, in the report, indications that that occurred, yes. >> the president's son saidhen he was approached about dirt on hillary clinton that the trump campaign would love it? >> that is generally what was said, yes. >> the president, himself, alled on the russians to hack hillary's e-mails? >> there was a statement by the presidt on those general lines. >> in numerous times during the campaign, the president praised the relees of the russian hacks through e-mails at wikileaks. >> that did occur. >> your court found the trump campaign planned quote a press strategy communications campaign

and messaging unquote based on that russian assistance? >> i a not familiar with that. >> that language comes from volume 1, page wanting to help. trump win, several d with the associa trump campaign were also trying to make money during the campaign in transition. is that correct? >> that is true. >> paul manafort was trying to make money orebt forgiveness from a rug oligark? >> generally, that is ac rat. >> donald trump was trying to make millions frome deal in moscow? >> to theea extent you are talkg about the hotel in moscow? >> yes. >> yes. >> when your investigation looked into these matters, numerous trump associates lied to your team, the grand jury and congress? >> a number of persons that we interviewed in our investigation, it turns out did lie. >> mike flynn lied? >> he wasonvicted of lying,

yes. >> george pap tadopoulos was convicted of lying? >> frou. >> paul manafort went so far as to encourage other people to lie? >> that is ac rat. >> manafort's deputy rick gates ac rat. >> his lawyer was indicted for lying? >> true. >> he stayed on message with the president? >> allegedly by him. >> when donald trump called your investigation a witch hunt, that was also false, was it not? >> i would like to think so, yes. >> well, your investigation is not a witch hunt? >> it not a witch hunt. >> when the president said the russian interference was a hoax. that was false, wasn't it? >> true. >> when he said publicly it was false? >> he did say pubcly that it was false, why e. >> when he told it to putin, that was false, too, wasn't it? >> that i am not familiar with. >> when the president said he had no business dealings with russia, that was false, wasn't

it? >> i'm not going to go into the details of the report thafr, along those lines. >> when the president said he had no business hdealings wit to build a trump tower in moscow, was there not? >> i think there was some question about when this was accomplished. >> you would consider a billion dollar deal to build a in moscow to be business dealings, wouldn't you, director mueller? >> absolutely. >> in short, your investigation found evidence that russia wanted to help trump winhe election, right? >> i think generally that would be accurate. >> russiaam informedign officials of that? >> i'm not certain to what conversations you are referring to. >> well, through andi intermey inform papadopoulos they could help with the anonymous release of stolen e-mas? >> accurate. >> russia committed federal crimes in order to help donald trump. >> when are you talking about computer crimeha c cpaigned irg

messaging strategy around those correct?rue. >> that's true. >> we have an election coming up in 2020 direor. if a campaign receives an off of dirt from a foreign individual or a government, generally speaking, should that campaign report those contacts? e> should be and can depending on the circumstance of the crime. >> i yield back the balance of my time. >> mr. conway. >> mr. mueller, did anyone ask you toth exclude anyg from your report that you felt should be int report? >> i don't think so. but it's not a small report. >> but no one asked you specic to exclude something you think should be in there? >> not that i could recall.

>> thank you, gentleman, for yielding. good afternoon, director mule early. in your may 29th press en conferce, again in your opening remarks this morning, you made it pretty clear you wanted the special counsel to speak for itself. you said that was the office's final position and we will not omment on any other conclusions orhypotheticals about the president. you spent the las few hours of your life from democrats trying to get you to answer all kind of hypotheticals about the president. ixpect it m continue for the next few hours of your life. i think you've stayed president etty much true to what yr intent and desire was, but i guess regardless of that, the special counsel's office is closed and it has no continuing jurisdiction or authority, so, whatould be your authority or jurisdiction for adding new conclusions or determine nations to the special counsel's written report? >> as to the latter, i don't now or expect a change in

conclusions that we included in our report. >> so to that point, you addressed one of theissues that i needed to, which was from your testimony this morning, which some contrue as a changehe to t written report. you talked about the exchange that you had with congressman otlieu. i wr it down a little different so the director is perfectly clear. i reported heed you, quote, the reason you ask did not indi donald trump is because of the olc opinion stating you cannot indict a sitting president to which you responded, that is correct. >> that response is inconsistent i think you wl agree with your written report. i want to be clear, it is not your intent to change your written report, it is your intent to clarify the record today? >> as i started today, this afternoon, and eitr a footnote or end note, what i wanted to clarify is the fact that we did not make any determination with

regard to culpability in anyway. we did not start that process down the road. >> terrific. thank you for clarifying the record. a stated purpose your appointment as special counsel was to ensure a full and thorough investigation of the russian government efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. as part of that full and thorough investigation, wha determination did the special counsel's office make whether the steele dossier was a part of the russian government efforts to interfere in the 2016 election? ee again when it comes to mr. st, i defer to the department of justice. >> well, first of all, director, i very much agree with your determination that russia's efforts wereweeping and systematic. i think it should concern every american. that's why i want to know how sweeping and stematic those efforts wheere. i want to find out if russia terfered with our election by providing false information to

sources to christopher steele about a trumpon ciracy you determined didn't exist? >> again i will not discuss the issues with regard to . steele. in terms of a portrayal of the conspiracies, we returned two indictments in the computer crimes arena. one gru and another active measures in which we layout in cruciating detail what otoured in those two rather large conspiracies. >> ire agree with ect to that. whyeehis t renewal applications were submitted bit the un states government to spy or surveil on trump campaign carter associates or carter page and on f allr occasions the united states government submitted the steele dossier as a centralvi piece of ence with respect to that. the basic premise of the dossier as you know is that there was a well developed conspiracy of

cooperation between the trump campaign and the russian government. but the special counsel investigation didn't establish any conspiracy. correct? >> what i can tell you is tha th events that you are characterizing here now is a part of anoth matter that is being handled by the department of justice. >> you did not establish any conspiracy, much less a well developed one? >> again i pass on answering that question. >> the special counsel did not charge carter page with anything, correct? >> special counsel has not. >> my time has expired. i yield back. >> director mueller, i'd like to turn your attention to the june 9th, 2016, trump tower meeting. slide two, which should be on the screen now is a part of an e-mail chain between don, jr., donald trump, jr. and a publicist, representing the son of a russian oligark. it led to the nows infamou june 9th 2016 meeting.

the e-mail from the publicist to john alleged donald trump u trump, jr. reads in part. the crown prosecutor of rsia offered to provide the trump campaign with information and is a part of the government support of mr. trump. in this e-mail, donald trump, ., is being told that the russian government wants to pass along information which would hurt hlary clinton and help donald trump. is that correct? >> that's correct. >> now, trp, jr.'s response to that e-mail is slide three. he says and i quote if it is what you lay iove it, especially later in the summer. then donald, jr., invited senior campaign officials paul manafort and jared cush iner to the meeting. did he not? >> hedid. >> this e-mail everyday is offer of illegal assistance is it not? >> i cannotdo a that character zaition. >> isn't it against the law for

a presidential campaign to accept anything of value from a foreign government. >> generally speaking, yes, but allndications or circumstance -- are unique. >> you say page 184 volume 1 the federal campaign finance law broadlyprohibits foreign nationals from making contributions, et cetera. you say foreign nationals may not make a ctribution or donation of money or anything of value. it says clearly in the report, itself. >> thankou. >> w, let's turn to what actually happened at the meeting, when donald trump, jr. and the oughts got j to thee 9th meeting, they realized the russian delegation didn't have the quotenquote dirt. in fact, they got upset about that, did they not? >> generally, yes. >> youay in volume 1, page 118, that trump, jr., asked what are we doing here? what do they have on clinton? and during the meeting, cush nir

texted manafort saying it was a waste of time, end quote. is that correct? >> i believe a ten report along the lines you specify. >> so to be clear, top trump campaign officials learned that russia wanted to help donald trump's company by giving him dirt on his opponent? trump, jr. said loved it. then he and officials held a meeting to try to get that russian help. they were disappointed because the dirt wasn't as good as they had hoped. so to the next step. did anyone to your knowledge in the trump campaign ever tell the if ib fib of this offer? >> i don't believe so. >> did donald trump, jr., tell the t fbiy received an offer of help? >> that's about all i'll say on this aspect of it. >> wouldt be true, sir, if they had reported it to the fib to be or anyone during that campaign during the two years, you would have uncovered it? >> i would pe, yes.

>> sir, it not the requirement-to-if they received information from a foreign government? >> i would think that's something they should do. >> not only did the campaign not tell the fbi, they sought the hide existence of the june 9th meeting for over aer 82, is that not correct? >> on the general aracterization, i would question it. if you are referring to later, and an incident that flowed from the media then. >> what i'm suggesting is you said if volume 2 page 5 on several oindications the president directed aides n to publicly disclose the e-mails setting up the june 9th meeting. >> yes, that's accurate. >> tnks sir, given this illegal assistance by russians, you chose even given that, you did not charge donald trump, jr., or any of the other senior officials with conspiracy. is that right? >> correct. >> and while --

>> when you are talking about, if you are talking about other e individuals, aou talking about the attendees of june 9th, that's accurate. >> mr. muelle even though you didn't charge them with conspiracy, don't you this i the american people would be concerned thes three campaign officials sought a foreign adversaries's help and don'tou think it's important to set a precedence for future elections -- >> i can't accept that cracter zaition. >> it seems like a betrayal of american values to me, sir, someone is not being criminal is definitely unethical and wrong, i would think we would not wt set a precedent that political campaigns should not divulge information from foreign gornments assistance. thank you, sir. mr. turner. >> mr. mueller, i have yourn statement and in the beginning of your opening statement, you indicate that pursuant to justice department regulations that you submitted a confidential report to the

attorney general at the conclusion of the investigation. what i'd like you to confirm is, a report that you did, that is the subject matter of this hearing, was to the attorney general. >> yes. >> you also state in this opening statement that you threw ollusion because it's not a legal term. you would not conclude because collusion was not a legal term. >> well it depends on how you want to use the word. in general parlance, people can thinhaof itway. if you are talking about criminal statute arena, you can't. because it really is -- accurately described as conpier is valleys. >> your words is it's not a legal term, so you didn't put it in your conclusion. >> that's correct. >> mr. mueller, i want to talk about your powers and authority. the attorney general gave you powers and authority that reside in the attorney neral. the attorney general has no ability to give you powers and

authority greater than the powers and theuthority of an attorney general, correct. >> i don't believe, i think that is correct. >> mr. mueller, i want to focus on o wordn your report. it's the second to the last word in the report. it exonerates. the report stat, accordingly, who ill this report does not conclude that the president committed a crime, it does not exonerate him. now in the judiciary hearing in your prior testimony, have you already agreed with mr. ratcliffe that exonerates is not a legal term that there is not a legal test for this. so i have question for you, mr. mueller. mr. mueller, does the attorney general have the power or authority to exonerate? what i'm putting up here is united states code. this is where the tomorrow get its power a the constitution and the annotated cases of these. we searched. we even went to your law school. i went to case western, i thought urs was differently. we bought the criminal law texbook. mr. mueller, nowhere in these, we had them scanned, is there a

process or a description on exonerate. there is no office of exoneration, no certificate at the bottom of the desk. mr. mueller, would you agree we me the attorney general does not have the power to exonerate? >> i'm going to pass on that. >> why? >> because it embroils us in a legal discussion. am not prepared to embroil in legal discussion in that arena. >> mr. mueller you would not agree with me when i say there is no place that the attorney general has the power to exx exonerate him. >> again, i take your question. >> the one thing that i guess is the attorney general probably knows he can't exonerate either and that's the pard that kin of confuses me, because if the tomorrow doesn't have the power to onerate, then you don't have the power to exonerate and i believe he knows he doesn't have the power to exoneratso his is the part i don't understand. if your report subpoena to the

ttorney general and attorney general doesn't have the power to exxonerate and he does not and he knows y do not have that power, you don't have to tell him you are not exonerating the president. he knowshat already. >> that changes the context of the report? >> no, we include it in the report for that ason. he may not know it and he should know it. >> you believe that attorney general bill barr believes somewhere in the thhallways of department ofexoneration? >> that's not what i said. >> believe he knows. i don't think you put that in there for many barr. i think put that in there what will discuss next. >> that is to "the washington post" when speaking of your report, the article said trump could not bete exonera of trying to obstruct the investigation, itself. trump could not be exonerated. >> that statement is correct, mr. mueller, in that no one can beer exoned? the reporter wrote this, this reporter can't be exexonerated. mr. mueller, you can't be exx

exonerat exonerated. in fact, in our crimintice system, there is no authority to exonerate. this is the headline o all of the news wchannelsn you were testifying today. mueller, trump was not exonerated. what you know is this can't say mueller exonerated trump because you don't have the power or authority to exonerate trump. you had no moreer pow to declare him exonerated hand the you had the power to declare him anderson cooper. the problem i have here is since there is no one in the criminal justice system. the president pardons, cour and injuries don't declare innocence. they declare guilty. the statement about exxon rakes is misleading and meaningless and it colors this investigation one word out of the entir portion of your report and it's a meaningless word that has no legal meaning and it has colored your entire report. >> ladies and gentlemen, time is expired. >> mr. >> thank you, chairman, thank

you, director mueller for your yearo of service our country. i will look more closely, sir, at the trump campaign chairman paul manafort. an individualho ielieve betrayed our country who lied to a grand jury, who tamperred with tnesses, and who repeatedly tried to use his position with the trump campaign to make more money. let's focus on the betrayal and greed. your investigation found a number of contacts during russian individuals during and after the campaign. is that right, sir? >> right. correct. >> in addition to the june 9th meeting just discussed, manafort met several times with a man named konstantin kilimnik, they obsessed he had ties with then russiaagency, is that correct, sir? >> correct. >> in fact, mr. manafort didn't just meet with him, he sharede privatump campaign polling information with this man linked to russian intelligence, is that right, sir? correct.is >> from turn, the information was shared with a russian

oligark tied to vladimir putin. is that right, sir? >> allegedly. >> director mueller, meeting with him wasn't enough. sharing internal polling information wasn't enough. mr. manafort went so far as to offer this russian oligark ties to putin, a private briefing on the campaign. is that right, sir? >> yes, sir. >> and finally, mr. manafort also discussed internal campaign strategy on four battleground state, michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania and minnesota. but the russian intelligence linkedindividuals, did he not, sir? >> that's reflected in the report. that was the items you listed previously. >> director mueller, based on your decades and years of experience at the fbi, would you agree, sir, it creates a national security risk when the presidential campaign chairman shares private polling information on the american people, private political strategy related to wvoning the of the american people and private information about

american battleground states with a foreign adversary. >> is that the question, sir? >> yes, sir. >> i'm not going to speculate along those lines. to the extent it's within the lines of the report, i support it. anything beyond that is not a part of that which i would support. >> i think it does, so, i think it shows an infuriating lack of patriotism from the p veryple seeking the high et office in the land. director mueller, manafort didn't share this information exchange for nothing, did he, sir? >> i can't answer that question without knowing more about that. the question. >> well, it's clearly he hoped to be paid back money he was owed by russian or ukrainian oligarchs in return for the passage of private campaign information. is that correct? >> that is true. >> director mueller,s my colleague mr. hech, would you

agree campaign corruption in exchange for money, is a corruption one that presents a national security risk for our country, sir? >> i'm not going to reply, i don' thave expertise to reply. >> would you agree, manafort's contacts hosted putin to exchange private information on americans for money left him vulnerableo blackmail by the russians? >> i think generally so, that would be the case. >> would you agree, sir, these acts demonstrated a betrayal of the democratic values that our country rests on? >> i can agree with that. not that it's not true, but i cannot agree with it. >> yes, sir. >> director mueller, well, i can tell you that in my years of experience as a law enforcement officer and as a member of congress, fortunate to serve on the intel committee, i know enough to say yes, trading policrcal ses for money with a foreign adversary can corrupt and leave you opened to

blackmail, it certainly represents a betrayal of valuesr underpink democracy. see,apiaounk t yha ou comingrou together. i yield back time. >>an thank you mr. chai thank you, mr. mueller, for being here today. mr. mueller, is it accurate to say your evidence showed no member ofmp tru related to clinton campaign e-mails? >> can you read that or repeat the question? >> is it accurate to say your investigation found no evidence that members of the trump campaign were involved in the theft or the publication of the clinton campaign related e-mails? >> i don't know. i don't l,know. >> wel 52 up 1 page 5 the investigation did not establish that members of the trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the russian government in it's lex

interference activiti . so, it would, therefore, be inaccurate based o this to describe that finding as open to doubt. >> that finding tbeingt trump campaign was involved with theft or publication of the clinton campaign e-mails. are youollowing that? >> i do believe i am following . but it is on that portion of that matter, it does not fall within our jurisdiction. all right. or fall within our investigation. >> well, basically, what your report says volume 1 page 5, it just wan to be clear that open to doubt is how the committee democrats described this findi in their minority views of the 2018 report. and it kind of flies in the face of what you have in your report. so is it accurate to also to say the investigation found no documentary evidence that george papadopoulos told anyone affiliated with the trump

campaign about joseph masooud's daaims on candi clinton? >> let me turn that over to mr. zebley. >> i'd like to ask you, sir this is your report.th 's what i'm basing this on. >> then can you repeat the question for me again? >> is it accurate to say t investigation found no documentary evidence that george papadopoulos told yone affiliated with the trump campaign about joseph masooud's claims the russians had dirt on hillary clinton? >> i believe the report is ac rat. >> oka in the report, it says no documentary evidence that papadopoulos shared thin informatioth the campaign. it's, therefore, inaccurate to conclude by the o timethe june 9, 2016, trump tower meeting, quote, the campaign was likely already on notice via george papadopoulos' contact with russian agents that russia, in fact, had damaging information on trump's opponent would you

say that that is inaccurate to say it's likely already i -- >>irect you to the report. >> well, i appreciate that. because the democrats jumped to this incorrect collusion in their minority viewss. again, which contradicts what you haven your report. i am concerned about a number of statements i'd like to you clarify. a number of democrats have made some statements that i have concerns with, maybe you can clear them up. a member os thi committee says president trump was a russian agent after your report was publicly released. >> that statement not supported by your report, correct? >> that is ac rat. it's not supported. >> multiple democrat member versus asserted paul manafort met with julian assange in2016 before wikileaks released the at the malthe e-ils, implying he colluded. i would assume that means you found no evidence of this meeting s. that assumption correct? >> i'm not sure i'd agree with

that assumption. >> but you make no mention of it in your report? would you agree with that? >> yes, i would agree with that. >> okay. mr. mueller, does your report contain any evidence that president trump was enrolledsin the rus system of compromat as a member ofmi this cee once claimed? >> what i can speak to is the information and evidence that we picked up as the special cannsel i think that's accurate as far as it goes. >> thank you. i appreciate that. >> so let's go for a stoked scope. did you ask the department of justice to expandcope to the mantate reethed to august 20th scoping memoranda? >> well. >> without looking at dark, i cannot answer that. >> let me ask you, did you ever make a reqst to expand your office' mandate at all?

general. >> generally, wyes. >> that ever denied? >> i will not speak to that it go es to internal deliberatio. >> i'mrying to understand process. does expanding the scope come from the actingttorney general or from you or can it come from either? >> i'm not going t discuss any other alternatives. >> thank you, mr. mueller. >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. mueller, i think i can say without fear of contradiction that you are the greatest patriot in this room today and i want to thank you for being here. >> thank you. >> you said in your report and i'm going to quibble with your words that the russian intervention was sweeping and systematic. i would quibble with that. i don't think it was just an intervention, i think it was an invasion. and i don't think it was just sweeping and systematic. i think it wasnd sinister a scheming.

having said that, one of my colleagues earlier here referred to this russian intervention as a hoax and i'd like to get your comment on that. on page 26 of your rert, you talk about the internet research agency. and how tens of millions of u.s. persons became engaged with thee posts that t made, that there were some 80,000 posts on facebook that faitbook, lf, admitted that 126 million people have probably seen the posts that were put up by the internet research agency. >> that they had 3800 twitter accounts and had designed more than 0175, tweets that probably reached m1.4lion people. the internet research agency was spending about 1.25 million a month all of this social

media in the united states in al what i would c an invasion in our country. would you agree that it was not a hoax that the russians were engaged in trying to impact our elections? >> absolutely. it was not a hoax. the indictments we returnedag nst the russian, two different ones, were substantial in their scope again and i think when we were under played to a certain extent. >> that aspect of our investigations that has or would have long-term damage to the united states that we need to move quickly to address. >> thank you for that. i'd like to drill down on that a little bit more. the internet research agencyly actual started in 2014 by sending over staff as tourists i guess to start looking at where they wanted to engage and there

are many that suggest and i'm interested in your opinion as to whether or not russia is presently in the united states looking for ways to impact the 2020 election. >> i can speak to that that would be in levels of classification. >> all right. let me ask you this. oftentimes we engage in these hearings, we forget the forest through the trees. you have a veryarge report here of over 400 pages. most americans have fought read it. we have read it. actually the fbi director yesterday said he hadn't read it, which was a little discouraging. but on behalf of the american people, i want to give you a minute and 39 seconds to tell the american people what you would like them to glean from this report. >> well, we've salnt substanti time assuring the integrity of the report, understanding it

would be a message to those that come after us. but it also is a signal, a flag to those of useho have som responsibility in this area to exercise those responsibilities swiftly and don't let this oblem continue to linger as it has over so many years. >> all right. you didn't take the toll amount of time. so i will yield the rest of my time to the chairman. >> i think the gentleman for yielng. mr. mueller, i wanted to ask you about conspiracy. generally, areonspiracy requi an offer of something illegal, the acceptance of that offer, an overt act in furtherance of it. is that correct? >> correct. >> and do jr., was made aware that the russiansof were fering dirt on his opponent, correct? >> i don't know that for sure, one would assume from the minutes at the meeting. >> and when you say that you would love to get that help, that would constitute acceptance

of the offer? >> it's wide opened request. >> and it uld acceptance if you say when somebody offers you something illegal you say i would love it, that would be considered everyday of a acceptance? >> you stay away from any odressing one particulario r>>wo t well this particular ituation what i'll have to continue in a bit -- i yield to mr. stewart. >> mr. mueller, it's been a lonk day, thaou for being here. i do have a series of important questions for you. before i do that, i want to take a moment to emphasize something my friend mr. toucher had said. i prevent no person is above the law. in many times recently they had not even the president, which i think is blazingly obvious to most of zblus i'm having a little problem hearing, sir. >> is this better? >> that is better, thank you. >> i want you to know i agree with that statement no person is

above the law. there is another principle we have to defend. >> that is the prem shun of innocen-- presumption of innocence, i believe you agree with this. i have to be honest with you. going on three years innocent people have been accused of serious crimes, including teasons, accusatns made here disrupted and in some cases destroyed by false accusations bsolutely noere is basis other than some people desperately wish that it was so. but your report is very clear. no evidence of conspiracy, no evidence of coordination, and i believe we owe it to these people who have been falsely accused, including the president and his family, to make that very clear. mr. mueller, the credibility of your report is based on the integrity of how it is handled and there's something that i think bothers me o ander americans. i'm holding here in my hand a binder ofpl 25 exam of leaks

that occurred from the special counsel's office from those who associated with you dating back to as e as a few weeks after your inception and the beginning of your work and continuing up -o just a few months ago. all of these - all of them have one thing in common. they were designed to weaken or to embarrass the president. every single one. never was it leaked tunt you had fod no evidence of collusion. never was it leaked that the steele dossier wasfa a complete asy nor that it was funded by the hillary clinton campaign. i could go on and on. mr. mueller, are you aware of anybody from your team having given advanced knowledge of the raid on roger ste's home t any person or the press, including cnn? >> i'm not going to talabout specifics. i will mention -- talk for a become bout persons who involved in an investigation. d the understanding that in a th

leng thorough investigation, some persons will be under a cloud that should not be under a cloud and one of the reasons for emphasizing as i have the speed of an election or not election, the speed of an investigation is that so those persons who are disrupted as a result of the -- >> i appreciate that but i do have a series of questions. >> with the result of that investigation. >> thank you. and you're right, it is a cloud, and it's an unfair cloud for dozens of people but to my point, are you aware of anyone providing information to the media regarding the raid on roger stone's dihome, inclu cnn? >> i'm not going to speak to that. >> okay. mr. mueller, you sen a letter dated march 27th to attorney general barr in which you claimed the attorney general's memo to congress did not fullye capte context of your report. you stated earlier today that response was not authorized. did you make any effort to determine oeaked this confidential letter? >> no, and i not certain -- this is the letter of march 27th? >> yes, sir. t i'm not certain when it was

was publicized but i do not believe we would be responsible for the leaks. >> well -- >> i do believe that we have done a good job inss aing no leaks occur. e hwe have 25 exampleserob. o not you, sir. i'm not accusing you at all. but where your office didot n information. one morepl exam do you know anyone who anonymously made claims to the press that attorney general barr's march 24th letter to congress has been misrespected or misrepresented yr -- the basis of your report? >> what was the question? >> do you know who anonymously madeth claims t press that attorney general barr's march 24th letter to congress had misrepresented the findings of your report? >> no. >> sir, given these examples as well as others, you must have realized the leaks were coming from someone associated with the special counsel's office. but i'd like to ask you -- >> i do not believe that. >> well, sir, this was your

work. you'rehe only one --our office is the only one who had information regarding this. it had to come from your office. putting that aside, which leads me to my final question, did you do anything about it? >> from the outset, we have undertaken to make certain that wo minimize theossibility of he le ak s. years that we were in operation. >> well, i wish you had been more successful, sir. i think it was disruptive to the american people. my time is expired. i yield back. >> mr. quigley. >> thank you, mr. chairman. director, thank you for being here. this, too,hall pass. earlier today, and throughout the day, you have stated the policy that a seated president cannot be indicted, correct? >>ec corr >> and upon questioning this morning, you were asked, could that -- could aresident be indicted after their service,

correct? >> yes. >> and your answer was that th could. >> they could. >> director, please speak into the microphone. >> i'm sorry. thank you. they could. >> so,he follow-up question that should be concerning is, what if a president serves beyond the statute of limitations? >> i don't know the answer to that one. icate that ifot i the statute of limitations on federal crimes such as this are five years, that a president who serves a second term is therefore under the policy above the law?'m >> i not certain i would agree with the -- i'm not certain i would agree with the conclusion. i'm not certain that i can see the possibility that you suggest. >> but the state doesn't tall, is that correct. >> i don't know, specifically. >> it clearly doe't. just want -- as the american public is watching this and perhaps learning about many of these for first time, we need to consider that and that the other alternatives are

perhaps all that we prve, but i apiate your response. earlier, in questioning, someone mentioned that -- there was a questioning involving whether anyone in the trump political worldze publici the emails. whether or not that was the case. i just want to refer to volume 1, page 60, where we learn that trump junior publicly tweeted a link to the leakf stolen podesta emails in october of 2016. you're familiar with that? >> i am. >> so th would at least be a replushi republishing of this information,>>ould it not? 'm not certain i would agree with that. >> director pompeo assessed wikileaks in one point as a hostile intelligence service. given your law enforcement experience and your knowledge of what wikileaks did here and what they do generally, would you assess that to be accurate orth

sog similar? how would you assess what wikileaks ds? >> absolutely. and they've -- currently under indictment. is julian assange. >> but would it be fair to describe them as -- you would agree with director pompeo, that's when he w- what heas when he made that remark, that it's a hostile intelligence service, correct? >> yes. >> if we could put up slide 6. this just came out, wikileaks, i love wikileaks, donald trump. october 1 2016. this wikileaks stuff is unbelievable. it tells you the inner heart. you got toead it, donald trump, october 12, 2016. "this wikileaks is like a treasure-trove," donald trump, october 31, 2016. "boy, i love reading those wikileaks," donald trump, november 4, 2016. wouldny of those quotes disturb you, mr. director? >> i'mot n certain i would

say -- >> how do you react to that? >> well, it's 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 activi. >> volume 1, page 59, donald trump jr. had direct line of communications with wikileaks during the campaign period. on october 32016, wikileaks sent another direct message to trump junior, asking yous guy to help a disseminate ledging candidate clinton had advocated drones to a jackian assange. trump junior responded that, quote, he had already done so. same question. this bavior at the very least, disturbing? your reaction? >>isturbing and also subject to investigation. >> could it be described as aid

and comfort to a intelligence service? >> i wouldn't categorize it with any specificity. >> i yield the balance to the chairman, please. >> not sure i c make good use of 27 seconds, but director, i think you madear it cle that you think it unethical to put it po tely, to tout a foreign service like wikileaks publishing stolen political documents to the presidential campaign. >> certainly calls for investigation. >> thank you, director. we're going to go now to mr. crawford and then aftmr . crawford's five minutes, e'll take a five or ten minute break. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, mr. mueller, for being here. days after your appointment, peter strzok posted about his big rn that there's no there there in the trump campaign. did strzok or anyone else tell you that around ten mone s into thvestigation the fbi still had no case for collusion?

>> who? can you repeat that?et >> p strzok. >> could you -- i'm sorry, can you move the microphone a little closer? >> sure. there's auote attributed to peter strzok, he texted about his concern that there's no bigi there therethe trump campaign investigation. did he or anyone else who worked on the fbi'snvestigation tell you that around ten months into the investigation the fbi still had no case for collusion? >> no. >> is the inspector general report correct that the text messages from peter strzok and lisapage's phones from your office were not retained after they left the special counsel's office? >> well, i don't -- it depends on what youe talking about. the investigation into those -- peter strzok went on f period of time, and i am not certain what it encompasses. it may well hav encompassed what you're referring to. >> did you ask the department to authorize your office to

thvestigate the origin of trump russia investigation? >> i'm not going to get into that.it goes to internal deliberations. >> so the circumstances surrounding the origin of investigation have yet to be then.vetted i'm certainly glad that the attorney general barr and u.s. attorney durham areoooking i this matter. with that, i'd like to yield the balance of my time to ranking member >> thank the gentleman for yielding. mr. mueller, i want to make sure you're aware of who fusion gps is. fusion gps is a political operations firm that was working directly for the hillary clinton campaign and the democrat national committee. they produce the dossier, so they paid steele, who then went out and got the dossier and i know you don't want to answer any dossier questions, so i'm not going there, but your report mentions natalia 65 times.

she meets in the trumptower, this infamous trump tower meeting if your report, you've heardy man the democrats refer to it today. the meeting was shorter than 20 minutes, i believe. is that correct? >> what our report reflects, it was about that length. >> so do you know -- so, fusion gps, the main actor at fusion gps, the president of the company, or the owner of the company, there's a guy named glen simpson who's working for hillary clinton. glen simpson, do you know how many times glen simpson met with natalia? >> myself? no. >> would it surprise you that the clinton campaign dirty ops itarm natalia more times -- >> i'm not going to get into

as i indicated at the outset. >> did you ever interview glen simpson? >> again, going to pass on that. >> accordi to -- i'm going to here. topics according to notes from the state department official, kathleen, christopher steele told her that former russian intelligence head trubnikov and putin advisor sukov were sources for the steele dossier. and knowing that these are not getting into whether these sources were real or not real, was there any concern that there could have been disinformation that was going from the kremlin into the clinton campaign and then being fed into the fbi? >> as i said before, this is an area that i cannot speak to. >> is that because you're -- it's not in the report or

because of an ongoing -- >> internal deliberations, other proceedings and the like. >> okay. when andrew weissman and zanab joined your te, were you aware that bruce orr, department of justice top offial, directly briefed the dossier allegations to them in the summer of 2016? >> again, i'm not going to speak to that issue. >> okay. fore you arrested george papadopoulos in july of 2017, he was given $10,000 in cash in israel. do you know who gave him that cash? >> again, it's outside our -- and questions such as that should go to the fbi or the department. >> but itnvolved your investigation. >> it involved personsin involv my investigation. >> thankou, mr. chairman. >> we will stands reces for five or ten minutes. please, folks, remain in your

seats, allow the director tomb exit the cha. in robert mueller about halfway through this hear the second hearing of the day, this one with the house intelligence committee, taking questions from some of the 22 membersf that committee on a number of issues. it made news, actutoly, at the before he began taking questions, essentially correcting -- correcting the record of something he had said before the judiciary committeei earlier he day, suggesting that if not for justice department guidelines, that he believed the president b could indicted on obstruction of justice. he clarified that and went back to the original language that is in the report and then i'll turn to my panel here, chuck todd, andrea mitchell and chuck rosenberg. he seemed a little more willing to engage in this hearing. >> today -- this was a reminder that i actually think democrats did this backwards. there's a reason robert mueller part one was about the crime and part two was about the obstruction. there's a reason he did one -- one is number one and one was number two.

you got to tell this story to understand the seriousness of the obstruction, you have to understand the seriousness of what happened. i thought already in the first hour this has been ten times more compelling than -- because wi obstruction, as a viewer, and you ve to think like an average viewer that may not be following every single detail the way we have beenollowing it, we understan b theis of what the obstruction charges sort of came from, but witho understanding the initial crime and detaing that first, i think it makes it even harder ts coe the obstruction part of this story and to grasp why was so serious until you i understand thetial crime, and i think already, and, look, we can't tellpl how many peo are still watching and things lihat. this part is more compelling and i think would have actually informed the questning better, more importantly, perhaps, understanding as a viewer better had th basically done this any otherorder. e> and he became more animated because this is th thing, even when he did his news confewnce a fe weeks ago, what he really

focuses on is the russian interference. to him -- >> that's where his passion. >> that's a big thing that's been ignored. >> it wa the first thing he mentioned and the last thing he mentioned in that initial statement nine minutes, whatever, that i went and this is what he is focused on. this was, as chuck says, the original crime. and a when he wased about president trump's comments about wikileaks, you know, i love wikileaks, during the 2016 is campaign and h comments to our wn katie tour on those days following up any news conference and those quoted to him, i'll refer aying you to the report, he said problematic. he was asked, would those be problematic to you? and he said, problematic isn understatement. >> and i want to -- >>raise for wikileaks. >> and i want to play a little of what heaid to congresswoman speier on the issue. >> would you agree that it was not aoax that the russians were engaged in trying to impact ouio elect?

>> absolutely. that was not a hoax. the indictments we returned against the ssians, two different ones, were substantial in their scope using the scope word again. and i think one of the -- we hade unlayed, to a certain extent, that aspect of our investigation that has and would have lg-term damage to the united states that we need to move quickly to address. >> that, a response to jackie er spei question. let me bring in chuck rosenberg, contributor. what stood out to you in this first hour of this hearing? >> yeah, so, the movie has been quite faithful to the book, lester. we knew from the report that russian interference was sweeping and systematic. we heard that againoday. we knew that the russians believed that they would benefit from a trump presidency. it was in the book. it's also in the hearing today. we know that the trump campaign

welcomed russi assistance, book and movie. right? and we know that officials connected to the trump campaign lied about their interactions with the russians, she tre's a constant thread through all of this, and you can argue whether the book is better or the movie is better, but i'll tell you this, they're the same and it's od for folks to hear it because this was not an attack on, you know, democrats or republicans. it was an attackn america. and i agree with chuck todd. this is a place where bob mueller has been very strong and entirely consistent. >> i want to bring in cynthia mcfaddenw, right no who has covered a lot of the russia investigation and cynthia, you know, we hea about wikileaks here, what's the line that this report essentially tries to draw or does draw from the russians on down? >> well, you just heard the mr. mueller say that he considered wikileaks a foreign government operation. there has been indictment, as you know, of the -- of

wikileaks. i would like to just go to 30,000 feet for a second because we know that this all happened within a stsy, a very vulnerable, very frail, election system in this country, 1000 jurisdictions in the country, and the -- the system is aging, and we've talked about this before lester, but this is an opportunity for the members of congress and for the american people to demand that we upgrade this very fragile structure. i mean, it's shocking. 38 states have at least 1 or more jurisdictions where the election machinery they're operating with is no longer nufactured. at least eight states have systems that, in the entire state, there's no paper back-up if there is an irregularity, it can't be adjudicated fairly. so really,s thi whole entire hearing could be heard as a way to, you mknow,ivate congress

to appropriate some more money, perhaps, and the american people to vent their outrage that we have doney ver little since 2016 to protect this vulnerable structure. you know, that's not eudn ing the disinformation concerns. >> yeah, cynthia, i want to bring in richard engel into the conversation who's a covered lot of this from russia. richard, some of the seeds of doubt have been planted and some ofhe questioning about whether this was truly a russian government operation, that the internet research agency wasn'ta working as agent of the russians. what do we know? >> so, i think if you're vladimir put and you're watching this right now, you're very comfortable with what is going on. you see half of the members of the house there questioning, trying to put the words into robert mueller's mouth, almost begging him to tell a story to make this movie better than the book, to convince the americanple that something happened and then you have the

republicans looking for mistakes, trying to hurt his credibility, trying to trip him up, so if you're russia looking back and you t sees division, you see this confusion, i think you're quite convinced that not only did you get away with it, but that there are very few costs to trying to do it again. going -- at the internet research agency, just as one example, this was the group of hackers, a hacker acemy, that was run by a close confidante of vladimir putin. he is sometimes known as putin's chef, he's a well-known oligarch, and he used this squad of hackers not only torond bu ct realso in some cases to p people on the ground, to organize protests on american streets, sometimes competing protests, so propaganda operation to sway votes, but also physical disruption operations.

these happened. we've spoken to independentex rts who have looked through the internet research agency. nbce done stories on it, on "nightly news" and other platforms, describing exactly how this played out. yet, tore are seemingly n consequences to these actions when you have these -- this incredibly dividre debate whe some people are trying to drag the story out of a reluctant witness and others trying toay that there's no story there at all. >> andrea. >> and to cynthia and richard's point, one of the reasons -- thi mostortant reason why nothing has been done, i mean, some efforts have been made, but not a governmentwide effort is that the president of the united etates has stood in helsinki and elsewhere, at th g20 in hamburg, initially, and then again in japan, andadefended vlir putin against the advice of his own intelligence agencies. you have had acting homeland security chiefs. you have had complete turmoil in that department, which was led

by jay johnson under obama, and they've been criticized for not doing enough but they were doing something about it. but you have to have cabinet agencies and national security advisor and a president of the united states leg this, and as long as you have a national security advisor, a secretary of state arguably, and other cabinet officials, some in acting capacities for months at a time, you're not going to defend against thisnd especially at homeland. that's where it's all -- it all resides. and the president of the united states has to make the decision that this is critical, critical to the infrastructure and he agrees with the russians. e what has h acknowledged? i feel like we've heard both versions, that, you know, yes,m sothing happened or no, it didn't happen. >> well, he keeps saying -- he said specifically that, well, you know, in helsin, he said, well, you know, he was asked, do you agree with your intelligence? >> he deferred to putin. >> he said, well, heenied it. and he has consistently signalled that he does not

accept the conclusions of the intelligence. >> i take it a step further. i think the real issue here with this president is he doesn't believe this is a serious issue. he is a -- i think what we've learned about him is he's transactional in nature. hisefense and his rationalization of this is always, well, anybody else would have done it. how many times has he himself almost stepped there? well, anybody would ha that meeting. ak's opposition research.ves enthis i t politics. i think that, again, we can't crawl inside his head. we don't know whether he's acting this way because he knows he did something wrong or he's acting this wayecause he believes there's nothing wrong to it. but i think we can't rule out, he't doesn view this as as serious as others do and that is, i think, what's so alarming to so many policymakers because you're like if the president of the united states isn't taking this seriously, then the entire government is hamstrung. >> chuck. >> when i read the report, there was a big, startling number in it that was that 126 million people, according to fahabook, contact with the russian

troll operation, right? they had seen or they had visited the web page, they had interacted in some way. that moment occurred today as well in the movie, in the hearing, but it goes by so quickly, sometimes you have to stop and think about what you just heard. how successful the russians were. 126 million americans reprents 39% of our population. 2 out of 5 americans were affected just by the facebook sieration that the russ ran against us. and so -- and andrea and chuck e have both madhis point and they have made it well. we need leadership in this country who takes that threat seriously, who recognizes it for what it is. it was a startling number, and it just passed like that. i worry t'tt we don listen to it. >> and they were fake rallies. we've documented the rally in texas that was aomplete russian fake. there were black lives matter -- >> in the movie version, you'd actually show that ral so people could see how it actually came to be. >> we're less than two minutes

away from the hearing resuming. io do want t to hallie jackson right now at the white house. i have not picked up and looked at my twitter. are weri hea from the president. >> reporter: he has been continuously, throughout this hearing process, tweeting various clips, for example, and vamous comments fro the cable coverage of the mueller hearing, the testimony that we've been watching. and we are also getting an ofmecial state from the white house, new press secretary stephanie grisham is calling today in her words anpic embarrassment for the democrats, that's how she characterized the first half of today's hearing and what she expects to see more of in the second half. turns out, by the wae during thbreak here, one of the president's top allies on espitol hill, congran mark meadows, who was in the room for the first part of the hearing, arrived heret the white house, lester. >> and the director returning back to the hearing room, about to take his seat and they'll go back to the questioning. again, this,on the sec of two hearings today and this one, primarily focusing on the central part of the case, which was russian influence in the

2016ampaign and the report's conclusion that it was made to benefit president donald trump candidate donald trum and we heard the director in his testimony today acknowledging that that was the belief that they were able to glean from their investigation. >> come to order. >> thank you, sir. >> thank you, director. mr. swalwell, you're recognized. >> thank you. director mueller, as a prosecutor, w yould agree that if a witness or suspect lies or obstructs or tampers with witnesses or destroyrievidence dung an investigation, that generally that conduct c be used to show a consciousness of guilt, would you agree with that? >> yes. >>et's go through the different people associa the trump campaign and this

investigation who lied to you and other investigators to cover up their disloyal and unpatriot conduct. if we could put exhibit 8 up. dictor muelle i'm showing you campaign chairman paul manafort, political advisor roger stone, deputy campaign manager rick gates, national security m advisorichael flynn, donald trump's personalrn atto, michael cohen, and foreign policy advisor george papadopoulos. these six individuals have each been charged, convicted, or lied to your office orther investigators, is that right? >> yes, although i look askance at the mr. stone because he is -- he is in a different case here in d.c. >> so, national security advisor flynn lied aboutcu disions with russian ambassador related to sanctions, is that right? >> that's correct. >> michael cohen lied to this committee about trump tower moscow, c is thatrect? >> yes. >> george papadopoulos, the

president's senior foreign policy advisor,thied to fbi about his communications about russia's possession of dirtll o hiy clinton, is that right? >> yes. >> the president's campaign chairman, paul manafort, lied about meetings that he had with someone with ties to russian intelligence, is that correct? >> that's true. >> and youas investigation hampered by trumpn campaig officials' use of encryption ghcommunications, is that >> we believe that to be the case. >> you also believe to be theca that your investigation was mpered by the deletion of electronic messages, is that correct? >>t would be, yes. generally, any case would be if those kind communications are used. >> for example, you noted that deampaign manager rick gates, who shared internal campaign polling data with the person with ties toussian intelligence at the direction of manafort, that mr. gates deleted those co basis, is that right?

>> i take your word. i say i don't know specifically but if it's in the report, then i support it. >> that's right, director, it's volumege 136. >> thank you. >> in additi to that, other information acs incessible because your office determined teroasthorre p? >> that ctis edtrue. >> that would include that you do not know whether communications between donald trump andis personal attorneys, jay sekelow, rudy giuliani and others discouraged witnesses from talking with the government, is that right? >> i'm not going to talk to that. >> that would also mean that yot ca talk tot whether or no pardons were dangled through the president's attorneys because of the shield of attorney-client privilege. >> i'm not going to discuss at. >> did you want to interview donald trump jr.? >> i'm not goingato discuss th >> did you subpoena donald trump syrian? > i'm not going to discuss that >> did you want to interview the

president? >> yes. >> directorn mueller, o january 1, 2017, h througrch 2019, donald trump met with vladimir putin inn perso six times, called him ten times, and exchanged four letters with him. between that time period, how many times did you meet with donald trump? >> i not going to get into that. >> he did not meet with you in person, is that correct? >> he did not. >> as a result of lies, deletion of text messages, obstruction and witness tampering, is it fair to say that you were unable tod ully assess the scope an scale of russia's interference in the 2016 election and trump's role ininrference? >> i'm not certain i would adopt that characterization. maybe pieces of it that are accurate but not in total. >> but you did state in thi1pahage t w0, andt le

legal determinations, the office believes it to be accurate and complete to the greatest extent possible, given these identified gaps, the office cannot rule the possibility that the unavailable information would shed additional light, is that correct? >> that is correct. we don't know what we don't know. >> why is it so important that witnesses cooperate and tell the truth in an investigation like this? >> because the testimony of the witnesses goes to the heart of just about any criminal case you have. >> thank you. and mr. chairman, i yield backd an thank you, director mueller. >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. mueller, as special counsel, did you review documents related to the originf the counterintelligence investigation into the trump campaign? >> on occasion. >> was the steelef dossier one o those documents that was reviewed? >> i can't discuss that case. >> i'm just asking a process question. have you read the steele dossier? >> and again, i'm not going to respond to that. >> you were tasked as special counsel to investigate whether

there was collusion between russia and the trump campaign associates to ierfere with the 2016 election and the fbi, we know, has relevant documents and information related to the opening of the ci investigation. were you and your team permitted to access all of those documents? >> and again, i can't get into that investigative -- what wed collected what we're doing with investigation materials. way.t me ask it this was there any limitation in your access to documents related to the counterintelligence? >> that'sh a broad question that i really -- i have real trouble answering. counsel'se special office undertake any efforts to investigate and verify or disprove allegations contained in the steele dossier? >> again, i can't respond. >> the reason i'm asking for the american public that is watching, it's apparent that the steele dossier formed part of the basis to justify the fbi's

counterintelligence investigation into russian interference in the 2016. election as we know, it was used to obtain a fisa warrant on carter page. this is why i'm asking tse questions. did your office undertake any efforts to identify steele's sources or sub sources? >> tagai same answer. >> were these tasks referred to any other agencies? >> aga i,an't speak to it. >> did your office consider whether the russian government used steele's sources to provide steele with madisinforon? >> again, i can't speak to that. >> i understand. i'm asking these questions just for the record, so thanks for nc your patie shifting gears here. did any member of the special counsel's office staff travel overseas as part of the investigation? >>ur yes, but i can't go fer than that. >> i'm going to ask. to which countries? >> and i can't answer that.

>> did they meet withor fgn government officials? >> again, it's out of our bailiwick. >> did they meet with foreign private citizens? >> again, same response. >> did they seek information about a u.s. citizen or any u.s. citizens? >> again, territory that i can not go to. >> thank you for answering on the record. these are important questions for the american public and we're hopeful that the ig is able to answer these questions. i will yield the balance of my team to the ranking member. >> i thank the gentle lady for yielding. mr. mueller, i want to go to, we started off with joseph, who's at the center of this investigation. he appears in your report. a dozen times or more. he's at the origin, the p epicenter of this, he's the man who supposedl knowsbout clinton's emails.

you've seen on the screen the democrats have put up all the prosecutions that you made against trump campaign officials and others. but i'm struggling to understand why you didn't indict joseph mifsud, who seems tinbe the man he middle of all of this. >> well, i think you understand that you can nothe get into eit classified or law enforcement information without a rationale for doing it, and i have said on -- going to be able to say with regard to mr. mifsud. >> were you aware of kathleen's involvement that she had met th ms. steel, the state department official. >> again, i can't respond to that question. it's outside my jurisdiction.

>> the carter pe fisa warrant was reupped three times. the last time it was reupped was under your watch. so, you -- did you -- were youva in the approprocess of that last time that the carter page warrant was -- >> well, i can't speak specifically about that warrant but ifsk you a are -- was i in the approval chain, the answer is no. >> okay. very helpful. thank you, mr. chairman. yield back. >> mr. castro. ch thank you, rman. thank you, special counsel muell mueller, for your testimony and your service to our country. donald tmp, over the ars, has surrounded himself with some very shady people. fe people that liedor him, covered up for him, people that helped him enrich himself. i want to talk specifically about one of those instances that's in your report, specifically let's turn to the trump tower moscow project which you describedor in your rep as, quote, as a, quote, highly

lucrativ deal for the trump organization, r is thatight? >> i would have to look at the quote from the repo.. >> sure >> if you have it. >> sure. it's on volume 2, page 135. it's described as highly lucrative. >> okay. i have it. i have it. thank you, r. >> yeah. no problem. your office prosecuted michael cohen and michael cohen was donaldtrump's lawyer for lying to this committee about several aspects of the trump organization's pursuit of the trump towerw deal, is that right? >> that's correct. >> according to your report, cohen lied to, quote, minimize links between the project and trump, unquote, and to, quote, stick to the party line, unquote,t in order no to contradict trump's public message that no connection existed between trump and

russia. is that right? >> that's an -- yes. c that'sorrect. >> now, when you're talking about the par line here, the party >> if i could interject one thing i should have said at the outset, if it was in the report and consequently i do believe it true. >> thank you. the party line in this case, was it the deal ended in january 2016. in other words, they were saying that the deal ended in januaryth 2016 before e republican primaries. in truth, though, the deal extended to june 2016 whenru donald t was already the presumptive republican nominee, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> the party line was also that cohen discussed the deal with trump only three times when in trut they discussed it multiple times, is that right? >> also true and the basis for -- and part of the basis for the plea that he -- that he entered or lied to this entity. >> thank you.

and thank you for prosecuting that. the party line was also and tru traveling to russia during the campaign when in truth, they did discuss it, is that right? >> that's accura p. >> and thety line was that cohen never received a response from the kremlin to his inquiresries about the trump tower moscow deal. in fact, cohen not only received a response from thein kremlo his email but also had a lengthy conversation with a kremlin representative who had a detailed understanding of the project, is at right. if it's in the report, that is accurate recitation of that piece of the report. >> so you had the candidate trump the time sayinge had no business dealings with russia, his lawyer who was lying about it, andn t the kremlin who during that time was talking to president trump's lawyer about the deal, is that right? >> i can't adopt your characterization.ot >> n only was cohen lying on

trump's behalf but so was the kremlin. on august 30, 2017, two days after cohen submitted his false statement to this committee, claiming that he never received a response to his email to the kremlin, vladimir putin's press secretary told reporters that the kremlin left the email unanswered. that statement by putin's press seetary was false, wasn'tit >> i can't speak to that. >> although it was widely reportedth in e press. >> again, i can't speak to that, particularly if it was -- if it was dependent upon media sources. >> but it was consistent with the lie that cohen had made to ine committee, is that right? >> i'm not certa can go that far. >> so, cohen, president trump, and the kre the same lie.elling >> i defer to you on that. that's -- i can'tet into the details. >> special counsel mueller, i want to ask you something that's very important to the nation.

did your investigation evaluate whether president trump could be vulnerable to blackma t byhe russians because the kremlin knew that trump and his associates lied about connections to ra related to the trump tower deal? >> i can't speak to that. >> i yield back, chairman. >> mr. hurt. >> thank you, mr. chairman. director mueller, you've been es asked many tim this afternoon about collusion, obstruction of justice, and impeachment and the steelesi dos and i don't think your answers are going to change if i ask you about thoso question i'm going to ask about a couple of press stories because a lot of what the american people have received about this have been on press stories and some of that has been wrong and some of that -- some of those press stories have been accurate. on april 13, 2018, mclatchy reported that you had evidence michael cohen made a secret trip toe pra ding the 2016 presidential election. i think he told the -- one of

the committees here in congress that was incorrect. true?at story >> i can't -- well, i can't go into it. >> got you. on october 31, 2016, slate published a report suggesting that a server at trump tower was secretly communicating with russia's alpha bank and i quote, akin to what criminal syndicates do. do you know if that story is true? >> do not. do not. t' you do not -- >> no whether i true. >> so did you not investigate these allegations which are suggestive of potentialru trump-ia -- >> because i believe it's not true does not mean it would not been investigated. it may well have been investigated although my belief at this point is it's not true. >> good copy. thank you. as a former cia officer, i want to f on something i think both sides of the political aigre can a on, that is, how do we prevent russian intelligence and other adversaries from doing this again? and after overseeing a

counterintelligence operationsf 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 mad a recommendation that the fbi should improve its victim notification process when a person, entity or campaign has fallen victim to active measures would you agree with this -- with this? >> it sounds like a worthwhile endeavor. i will tell you, though, that the ability of our intelligence agencies to work togethern this arena is perhaps more important than that. and adopting whether -- and i'm not that familiar with legislation, but whatever legislation will encourage us working together, by us, i mean thfbi, cia, nsa and the rest, it should be pursued

aggressively early. >> who do you thinkrehould be onsible within the federal government to counter disinformation? >> i'm no longer in the federal government. >> but you have -- you have had a long career -- storied careert and i donhink there's anybody who better understands the threat that we are facing than you. do you have an opinion as a former fbi officer? >> as to? >> as to who should be the coordinating points within the federal government on how to deal with this situation. > an't d good w w cop one of the most strikingy. thin in your report is that the internet researchgency not only undertook a social media campaign in the u.s. but they political o organize rallies after the election. our committee issued a report and insight saying that russian active measures are growing with frequency and intensity and including their expanded use of

groups such as the ira and these groups pose a significant threat to the united states and our i allies upcoming elections. would you agree with that? >> yes. in fact, one of the other areat the have to look at, many more companies -- not companies, many more countries are developing capability to replicate what the russians have done. >> you -- you alluded to making sure the other -- all the elements of the federal government should be working together. do you have a suggestion on a strategy to do that to counter this disinformation? >> not overarching. >> is this, in your investigation, did you think that 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. >> it wasn't a simple attempt. they're doing i as the sit here and they expect to do it during the next campaign. >> decr mueller, i appreciate your time inin

indulg us here in multiple committees and i yield back to the ranking member if he has -- i yield back to the chairman. >> mr. heck. >> director mueller, i would li to go to the motives behind the trump campaign encouragement and acceptance of help during the election. obviously, a clear motivation was to help them in what would turn out to be a very close election, but there was anoth key motivation, and that was, frankly, the desire to make money. i always try to remember what my dad, who never had theop rtunity to go beyond the eighth grade, taught me, which is that i should never, ever underestimate the capacity of some people to cut corners and even more in order to worship and chase the almighty buck. and this is important because i think it, in fact, does go to the heart of why the trasp campaign wo unrelentingly intent on developing relationships with the kremlin. so let's quickly revisit one

financial scheme we just discussed, which was the trump tower in moscow. we indicated earlier that it was a lucrative deal. trump, in fact, stood in his company to earn many millions of dollars on that deal, did they not, sir? >> true. >> and cohen, mr. cohen, his attorney, testified before this committee that president trump believed the deal required kremlin approval, is that consistent with what he told you? >> i'm not certain whether it's mr. trump himself or others associated with that enterprise that had discussed the necessity of having the input from the state, meaning the russian government, in order to -- for it to go forward successfully. >> isn't it also true that donald trump viewed his presidential campaign as he told top campaign aides that the campaign was an infomercial for the trump organization and his r operties? >> i'm not familiath that.

>> then let's turn to trump campaign chair paul manafort. did, in fact, your investigation find any evidence that manafort intended to h use position as trump's campaign chair for his own personal financial benefit? >> weay, i would shere was some indication of that but i won't go further. >> i think you'll find it on epage 135 of volum 1. during the transition, trump's son-in-law, jared kushner, met with sergei gorkov, the head of a russian owned bank that was under -- is und u.s. sanctions. and according to the head of the bank, he met with kushner in his capacity as ceo of kushner companies to discuss business opportunities. is that correct, sir? >> i'm not certain. >> it was -- >> i'm not certain about that, let me just put it that way. >> it was asserted thusly in your report, volume 1, pages 161 and 162.

your report notes that at the time, kushner companies were trying to renegotiate a billion, with a "b," a billion dollar lease of their flagship building at 666 fifth avenue, correct? >> i'm not familiar with those financial arrangements. >> also on page 162, where kushner companies it was assertedblad debt oations coming due on the company. eric prince, a supporter close to trump caaign, an administrative -- >> supporter. i was -- >> yes. he m during the transition with ril, which was part of a sanctioned arm that had close ties to vladir putin, correct, sir. >> yes. >> your investigation determined that mr. prince had not known nor conducted business with him

before trump won the election. >> i defer to the report on that. >> yet it does and yet prince, who had connections to top administration -- trump administration officials met with dmitriev during the transition period to discusssi buss opportunities among other things. but it wasn't just trump and his associates who were trying to make money off this deal, nor hide it, nor lie about it. russia was too. that was the wholega point, to relief from sanctions which would hugely benefit their incredibly wealthy for example, sanctions relief was discussed at that june 9th meeting inhe trump tower, was it not, sir? >> yes. but it was not a main subject for discussion. >> trump administration national security advisor designate michael flynn also discussed sanctions in a secret conversation with the russian

ambassador, did he not? >> correct. >> so, to summarize, donald trump, michael cohen, paul ma fort, jared kushner, erik prince, and others in the trump orbit all tried to use their connections with the trump organization to profit from russia, which s openly seeking relief from sanctions, is that true, sir? >> i'm not certain i can adopt what you -- >> i will and i would further assert that was not only dangerous, it was un-american. greed corrupts. greed corrupts, and it is a terrible found ion for developing american foreign policy. >> mr. radcliff. >> director mueller, given your constraint on what you're able or allowed toit answer w respect to counterintelligence matters, or other matters that are currently open and under investigation, y're not going to be able to answer my

remaining questions, so i you for your courtesies in the answers that you have given to my prior questions and i do thank you for your extraordinary career and record of service and yield the balance of my time to the ranking member. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. ratcliffe. and mr. mueller, let me associate my words with mr. ratcliffe. few more questions i want to clean up a little bit about the erik prince meeting. so erik prince testified before this committee that he was surveilled by the u.s. government and the information from this surveillance was leaked to the press. did wou investigatether prince was surveilled and whether classified information on him was illegally leaked to the media? >> did you say did you or will you? >> well, i know you can't. i know you're not -- >> i can't discuss either way. >> you're not going to join back

up in the ranks but did you refer -- wereou aware that, you know, prince has made these allegations that he was surveilled, he' concerned there were leaks about this surveillance. did you make anyer rls about these leaks? >> i can't get in a discussion on it. >> okay. also want to -- gen ial flynn, know you came after the leak of his phone call with the russian ambassador. your time at fbi, it would ber mascandal, wouldn't it,