President Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani said he is uncomfortable with his client potentially answering special counsel Robert Mueller’s questions relating to possible obstruction of justice, though he maintains that the president is innocent.
“The collusion part we are pretty comfortable with because there has been none,” Giuliani told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. “The obstruction part I’m not as comfortable with. I’m not, the president is fine with it. He is innocent. I am not comfortable because it is a matter of interpretation, not just hard and fast, true, not true.”
Giuliani pointed to Trump’s firing of former FBI Director James Comey and how that could be interpreted as obstructing the Russia investigation instead of firing someone who “was doing a bad job.”
Whether Trump sits down with special counsel investigators to discuss Comey’s firing depends on how comfortable Trump’s legal team is that investigators will have “an open mind,” Giuliani added.
[Related: Rudy Giuliani flips, now says he would prefer Trump sit for interview with special counsel]
Giuliani recently proclaimed that Mueller’s team told him it hopes to finish by Sept. 1 its investigation into whether Trump obstructed justice in the Russia probe.
Giuliani said Sunday that a potential interview between Trump and Mueller could be stalled now that Trump is preparing for a possible summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. On Thursday, Trump canceled the summit amid threats from North Korea, though the
In the interview, the former mayor of New York City revealed that Trump has spoken with him about North Korea because the summit affects the timing of a future interview with Mueller. Giuliani pushed back on the suggestion that he was advising Trump on foreign policy.
“I used to in my old role as his policy adviser but not now. I hear to the extent that it effects our timing,” he said.
