Mueller’s testimony unlikely to reshape opinions

Ex-special counsel warns of continued threat from Russia

Staff/wire report

WASHINGTON

Robert Mueller, the taciturn lawman at the center of a polarizing American drama, bluntly dismissed President Donald Trump’s claims of “total exoneration” Wednesday in the federal probe of Russia’s 2016 election interference. In a long day of congressional testimony, Mueller warned that Moscow’s actions represented – and still represent – a great threat to American democracy.

U.S. Reps. Tim Ryan and Bill Johnson had differing views on Mueller’s testimony.

Ryan, of Howland, D-13th, said: “Mueller refused to exonerate President Trump. We heard that clearly and concisely from Robert Mueller, and no matter what the president tweets, that is the truth. [Wednesday’s] hearing underscores one thing: We need to immediately start impeachment hearings. President Trump obstructed justice on more than one occasion, and Congress has a constitutional responsibility to exercise oversight of the executive branch. Actions have consequences. No one is above the law, not even the president of the United States.”

Johnson, of Marietta, R-6th, said: “There was certainly no ‘bombshell,’ despite the embarrassing attempts by congressional Democrats and the mainstream media to create news designed to undermine President Trump. If anything, these hearings served as a pointed reminder of how compromised this investigation was from the very beginning – several of the lawyers on Robert Mueller’s team supported Hillary Clinton’s campaign financially, and a few of them were bold enough to text and email about their strong dislike of Donald Trump. Maybe this will finally be the end in the House Democrats’ effort to find something, anything, they can use against President Trump.”

Mueller’s back-to-back Capitol Hill appearances, his first since wrapping his two-year Russia probe, carried the prospect of a historic climax to a rare criminal investigation into a sitting American president. But his testimony was more likely to reinforce rather than reshape hardened public opinions on impeachment and the future of Trump’s presidency.

With his terse, one-word answers, and a sometimes stilted and halting manner, Mueller made clear his desire to avoid the partisan fray and the deep political divisions roiling Congress and the country.

He delivered neither crisp TV sound bites to fuel a Democratic impeachment push nor comfort to Republicans striving to undermine his investigation’s credibility. But his comments grew more animated by the afternoon, when he sounded the alarm on future Russian election interference. He said he feared a new normal of American campaigns accepting foreign help.

He condemned Trump’s praise of WikiLeaks, which released Democratic emails stolen by Russia. And he said of the interference by Russians and others: “They are doing it while we sit here. And they expect to do it during the next campaign.”

His report, he said, should live on after him and his team.

“We spent substantial time assuring the integrity of the report, understanding that it would be our living message to those who come after us,” Mueller said. “But it also is a signal, a flag to those of us who have some responsibility in this area to exercise those responsibilities swiftly and don’t let this problem continue to linger as it has over so many years.

Trump, claiming vindication despite the renewal of serious allegations, focused on his own political fortunes rather than such broader issues.

“This was a devastating day for the Democrats,” he said. “The Democrats had nothing, and now they have less than nothing.”

Mueller was reluctant to stray beyond his lengthy written report, but that didn’t stop Republicans and Democrats from laboring to extract new details.

Trump’s GOP allies tried to cast the former special counsel and his prosecutors as politically motivated. They referred repeatedly to what they consider the improper opening of the investigation.

Democrats, meanwhile, sought to emphasize the most incendiary findings of Mueller’s 448-page report and weaken Trump’s re-election prospects in ways Mueller’s book-length report did not.

They hoped that even if his testimony did not inspire impeachment demands – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has made clear she will not pursue impeachment, for now – Mueller could nonetheless unambiguously spell out questionable, norm-shattering actions by the president.

Mueller frequently gave single-word answers to questions, even when given opportunities to crystallize allegations of obstruction of justice against the president. He referred time and again to the wording in his report.