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WASHINGTON – President Trump's lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, on Friday attacked the credibility of a former White House lawyer, claiming that his account of how Mr. Trump had told him to remove the special advocate was inaccurate.
Mr. Giuliani's statement was the most important refoulement of the president's lawyers against the former council, Donald F. McGahn II, who cooperated extensively with the investigators of the special council. The report detailing the findings of the investigation, released Thursday, also included several damning examples of how Mr. Trump had tried to interfere in the investigation, such as the story of Mr. McGahn.
"We can not take it literally," Giuliani said in an interview. "This could be the product of an inaccurate memory or could be the product of something else."
Mr. McGahn's lawyer, William A. Burck, rejected Mr. Giuliani's attack.
"It's a mystery why Rudy Giuliani felt that the need to relaunch the procedures used by the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General had concluded that this was not an obstruction," Burck said. "But they are accurately described in the report."
The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, examined a wide range of measures that Mr. Trump had taken as chair that could be considered an obstruction of justice. The investigators relied heavily on Mr. McGahn, who provided detailed accounts of what Mr. Trump did and said in camera while he was trying to keep control of the investigation being conducted. Russia.
Among the damaging episodes, one largely relying on Mr McGahn, explained how Mr Trump had told him in June 2017 to eliminate Mr Mueller because of several conflict issues d & # 39; interests. Mr. McGahn felt that the conflicts had little merit and told senior White House officials that he was going to resign instead of following up on Mr. Trump's order.
Mr. Giuliani stated that the President had never asked Mr. McGahn to have Mr. Mueller dismissed, adding that Mr. Trump had simply expressed his frustrations with the investigation of the special council, which had thrown a shadow over his presidency.
"If this were to be the subject of cross-examination or analysis, it would be a different version," said Giuliani.
The day Mr. McGahn threatened to resign, Mr. Burck told him to refrain from telling other White House officials what the President was asking him to do. Mr. Burck wanted to prevent Mr. McGahn from preventing other White House officials from participating in an investigation for obstruction of justice and to give the impression that Mr. McGahn was willing to help Mr. Trump to overthrow Mr. Mueller.
Since Mr. McGahn has mainly discussed the matter with Mr. Burck, there are not many witnesses to support it. In order to prove Mr. McGahn's credibility, Mr. Mueller's team obtained Mr. McGahn's telephone records relating to this episode. Although Mr. McGahn told investigators that he had had two conversations with Mr. Trump, the records only show one call, according to the report.
"Although McGahn is not sure of the precise dates of the appeals," according to the report, "he was convinced that he had had at least two telephone conversations with the president, during which the president had ordered him to do so. call the acting Attorney General retired lawyer. "
The report stated that the investigators accepted Mr. McGahn's story because he was "a credible witness without reason to lie or exaggerate given his position in the White House".
In attacking Mr. McGahn, Mr. Giuliani went further than the President, earlier Friday, when he approached the phone line to call Mr. McGahn on Twitter. Mr. Trump posted that "statements are made about me by some people in the report Crazy Mueller, itself written by 18 Angry Democrat Trump Haters, which are manufactured in a totally false way".
"Beware of people who take so-called" notes ", while the notes did not exist until they were needed," the president tweeted.
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