President Trump Thursday said he would leave it up to his attorney general to decide whether special counsel Robert Mueller would testify before Congress on his investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Barr, a longtime, respected Washington presence, has become the object of scorn for Democrats, who say he is acting more as the president’s personal lawyer than the attorney general with respect to the Mueller report.
“I’m going to leave that up to our very great attorney general and he’ll make a decision on that,” said Trump when asked whether he would allow Mueller to give testimony.
But he said he had been open with Mueller’s investigators, allowing White House staff to hand over documents and submit to interviews.
“No one in the history of our country was more transparent,” he added.
Trump spoke at length on the subject after an unrelated event at the White House. He went on to claim the Mueller report “essentially” cleared him of obstruction of justice, despite 10 potential examples being detailed in its 448 pages.
“At the end of the testimony: No collusion and essentially no obstruction,” Trump said. “A lot of people say how can you obstruct when there was no crime, no collusion.”
Mueller in his report did not charge Trump with obstruction but said he wasn’t ruling out that the crime was committed.
Trump is already locked in battle with Congressional Democrats about releasing the full, unredacted version of the Mueller report. A day earlier the White House asserted executive privilege to prevent its release.
