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After a quick reading of the Mueller report of more than 400 pages, here are some points to remember.
Two things stand out clearly. First, although the Trump campaign did not conspire directly with the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, evidence of implicit cooperation and shared interests between the campaign and the Russian government are overwhelming. Second, Mueller presented clear and unequivocal evidence that the President had repeatedly tried to interfere in the investigation of Russia and obstruct justice.
Contrary to the summary provided by Attorney General William Barr, the Mueller team does not exonerate Trump on the issue of obstruction; indeed, it seems implicitly clear that they believe that the president has broken the law. The key passage in the report is the one in which Mueller's team states that it "decided not to pass a traditional prosecutorial judgment" because of the Ministry of Justice's regulations prohibiting criminal prosecution or prosecution. of the President-in-Office. As a result, the Special Council "did not reach an ultimate conclusion on the actions of the President".
However, as the report also states, "after a thorough investigation of the facts, we would have stated that the president had not obstructed justice". Mueller seems to consider that (a) this is not his case. (b) it is up to the Congress to make that decision; and (c) the evidence gathered by his team suggests that the President actually obstructed justice.
Given this, the discussion of the obstruction report is interesting. In the section devoted to this question, Mueller's team exposes the evidence that Trump interfered in the investigation, then gives an overview of the "intent" of the president, essential for any pursuit for impediment. What Mueller seems to be doing is to establish a roadmap for Congress when he decides to initiate a dismissal procedure. Rather than exonerate Trump, Mueller's team has, in fact, given Congress the means to remove him from office.
On the question of collusion, it is far from clear that the president is not involved – at least politically. Although Mueller does not determine that collusion has occurred, what he exposes is almost as overwhelming. In the Trump campaign, Mueller writes, "the audience reacted enthusiastically to report piracy" by the Democratic National Committee and emails from the Hillary Clinton campaign. Trump personally "discussed the possibility of new releases" of WikiLeaks; wanted to be kept informed of any leaks; told his associates that "other releases of damaging information would be broadcast"; and that the campaign "planned a communication strategy based on the possible publication of Clinton email by WikiLeaks". Much of this section is written. It is therefore possible that the report contains information that is even more overwhelming than what we have seen. But what we know is very bad. The Trump team was aware of the Russian interference. had prior knowledge; sought to profit from it directly and had the same objectives as a foreign power intending to interfere in the American elections. It may not be a crime, but you feel traitorous.
Campaign leader Paul Manafort also provided a Russian intelligence officer with survey data and other information on the main candidate states. It is difficult to understand why this is not evidence of collusion between the campaign and Russian officials.
We know that the president is lying a lot. But the extent to which he and his staff have actively misled the American people, as noted in the report, is staggering. Trump rewrote the White House statement on the infamous Trump Tower meeting, omitting the fact that it was about getting information on the Clinton campaign. He has repeatedly lied about why former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn and former FBI Director James Comey were fired. He lied about his discussions with Comey and the media claimed that he had asked him for loyalty.
Deputy Adviser on National Security, K.T. McFarland was invited to lie to a Washington Post reporter about the contact between Flynn and the Russian ambassador to the United States (a fact she confessed in the report). The director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, lied to the special advocate and to Congress about his conversations with Trump. White House press secretary Sarah Sanders lied that FBI agents had shown her support for the dismissal of Comey – and confessed to Mueller's investigators. And so on. Again, although not surprisingly, it's still shocking to see how much Trump and his entourage do not tell the truth regularly. This is something to keep in mind as the White House seeks to refute the findings of the Mueller Report.
In the same vein, the Attorney General of the United States, William Barr, is a big liar. There will be a lot of talk about Trump's removal in the coming days and weeks, but let's start with Barr's impeachment.
Last month, he published the famous four-page summary of the Mueller report in which he exonerated the president of his connivance with Russia and largely rid him of his actions for obstructing justice. Barr suggested that the Ministry of Justice's ban on indicting and prosecuting a sitting president plays no role in Mueller's decision on the issue of impediment. It turns out that it was wrong. In fact, the prohibition of the Department of Justice was the singular factor that prevented Mueller from determining whether the President was obstructing justice.
Earlier Thursday morning, Barr gave a bizarre and unseemly press conference in which he repeated the words "no collusion" about half a dozen times and suggested that any evidence of obstruction of justice in the report was softened by the president's "sincere" frustration. on the investigation on Russia. This is a blatantly misleading description of what the report says. It now seems clearer than ever that Barr is acting not as law enforcement official, but rather as the president's public relations officer. From the beginning, Barr has sought to present the Mueller report in the best possible light. He ignited his own reputation and that of the agency he directs. He must go.
One of the most interesting aspects of the report is that it will seem familiar to you, as we have already read many of these articles in the journalistic coverage of the Russian investigation. Despite all the claims of the White House's "Fake News", the most important thing to remember from the report is that virtually everything the media reported about the Russia investigation was correct.
So where does this leave us? The ball is now in Congress's court and, in my opinion, the way forward is clear: the impeachment procedure must begin. The evidence is overwhelming that not only does the president regularly break the law, but he does not understand the limits of his own power.
One of the recurring points in the section on obstruction is that the President has consistently strived to hinder and interfere with the investigation conducted in Russia. The only thing that prevented him from succeeding was that his associates did not want to be complicit in his violation of the law.
Trump repeatedly tried to fire Mueller (and was thwarted by his lawyer, Don McGahn). He has tried to make sure that government officials, including his own staff, slow down the investigation or publish false stories that would minimize his efforts to obstruct. He launched a charm offensive with Comey to "silence" Mike Flynn and rid him of any wrongdoing. He criticized the sessions for being recused and failing to protect the president.
If you can say something positive about Trump's White House, it's because many of his associates did not want to break the law on his behalf. But that does not prevent the president from not adhering to legal or normative security barriers with regard to the exercise of presidential power. He will continue to push the envelope on an illegal territory without anyone to blame him. At the moment, the only institution that can do this is Congress. He has no other option. Refusing to hold a president who has made such a clear commitment to breaking the law would be a fundamental denial of congressional oversight responsibilities.
The column of Michael A. Cohen appears regularly in the Globe. Follow him on Twitter @ speechboy71.
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