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President Trump stops to talk to the media as he heads from the oval office to Marine One before leaving the South House lawn on Wednesday. (Jabin Botsford / The Washington Post)
John Wagner
National journalist heads the political press team at The Post newspaper
April 25 at 1:14 pm
President Trump challenged Thursday having told White House lawyer Donald McGahn to request the dismissal of special advocate Robert S. Mueller III in the midst of his investigation into the case. Russian interference in the 2016 election.
The episode, detailed in the report published by Mueller and made public last week, is among those being examined by Democrats while they are investigating whether Trump was seeking to obstruct the Mueller probe. In a morning tweet, Trump sought to blame the media for falsely announcing what had happened.
"I never said at the time to White House lawyer Don McGahn to fire Robert Mueller, even though I had the legal right to do so", wrote Trump. "If I wanted to fire Mueller, I did not need McGahn to do it, I could have done it myself. Nevertheless, Mueller was NOT fired and was allowed to finish his work on what I and many others qualify as illegal investigations. "
As was wrongly reported by Fake News Media, I never asked Don McGahn, a White House advisor, to fire Robert Mueller when I was allowed to do so. If I wanted to fire Mueller, I did not need McGahn to do it, I could have done it myself. However,….
– Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 25, 2019
…. Mueller was NOT fired and was allowed to finish his work on what I and many others described as an illegal investigation (there was no crime), led by a highly confrontational Trump hater, and a group of 18 very angry Democrats. Drain the swamp!
– Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 25, 2019
McGahn appeared as a key witness in the 448-page Mueller report, detailing several occasions when Trump ordered him to "go crazy shit," according to the findings of the special advocate. According to the report, this would involve trying to persuade the Justice Department to get rid of Mueller.
McGahn did not do it and almost quit after this episode. He also declined to make a public statement denying that the information that Trump wanted to fire Mueller was true when the president asked him, according to the report.
Although Trump claimed "total exoneration" in the Mueller report, he and his collaborators continued to attack Mueller and his team and aggressively challenge some of the most damaging details in it. Trump refused to sit down for an interview with Mueller in which he would have had the opportunity to rebut other testimonials.
The Democratic Chair of the House Judiciary Committee has issued a subpoena this week ordering McGahn to testify before the committee next month and handing over federal trump investigation documents, his finances, his campaign and the accusations that he would have sought to obstruct justice.
[White House plans to fight House subpoena of former counsel Donald McGahn for testimony on Mueller report]
The White House opposes this initiative, as well as other efforts by the Democrats to call the Mueller investigators to testify before Congress.
In television interviews on Sunday and Monday, Trump's legal spokesman, Rudolph W. Giuliani, and his former lawyer, John Dowd, also sought to question McGahn's memory of the given order. by Trump to request the removal of Mueller.
Both argued that Trump was not as direct as McGahn apparently had thought. Trump was only looking for Mueller to be "controlled," Dowd said during an appearance on Fox News.
Mueller detailed two appeals in which McGahn said Trump had "ordered" him to tell Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein that Mueller should be removed from office.
The first call came in June 2017 after the Washington Post announced that Mueller was investigating the fact that Trump had prevented justice from obstructing justice in the investigation in Russia.
McGahn remembered that Trump had said something like, "You have to do that. You have to call Rod, "according to Mueller's report.
Trump made a more direct request in a second call, saying something like, "Call Rod, tell Rod that Mueller has conflict and can not be Special Advisor" and "Mueller has to leave," according to the report that documented McGahn's memories.
Mueller's report did not find enough evidence to charge the criminal badociation with Truss or anyone badociated with his campaign. This did not determine whether Trump obstructed justice.
Attorney General William P. Barr later concluded that there was not enough evidence to justify charges of obstructing justice, but the Democrats of the House continue to pursue this issue aggressively.
Trump and McGahn sometimes had conflictual relationships during his tenure at the White House, with McGahn considering resigning several times. But he also played a key role in some of the president's key achievements, including the confirmation of two Supreme Court justices and a record number of federal judicial appointments.
Karoun Demirjian and Josh Dawsey contributed to this report.
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