What the Mueller Report Tells Us

me to talk about it is George Newhouse. He's a former federal prosecutor and now at Theodore O. Anger. George, First, your broad conclusions after looking at the report, Well, really no surprises. This was pretty much summarized by the Attorney General several weeks ago, and really the the real question is what's in the redactions, because that is largely going

to be the meat of the matter. That those redactions, I assume consists largely of grand jury material, testimony before the grand jury, including perhaps a testimony by some administration officials. So that's really the mystery which we yet don't have unwrapped for us. After looking at Mueller's explanation of why he did not make the prosecutorial judgment that we all expected him to, which was was their obstruction of justice or not? Here it seems it's very nuanced when he

explains what his reasoning was. Well, I mean, what he's really saying is we just can't draw a conclusion one way or the or the other. Remember, the the evidence has to be sufficiently strong to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt. That's on the criminal side. A political judgment, of course, would be an entirely different standard. So I wasn't surprised by that. He did conclusively state that there was no evidence of collusion or conspiracy with the Russians,

So the president is cleared on that account. But as to obstruction, really what he's signaling is we think it may have occurred, it likely probably did occur, but we don't believe the evidence is strong enough to merit a criminal prosecution. That's essentially what what the what I interpret Mueller's report is saying. Were you surprised by the number of incidents of possible obstruction and examples of the President Trump trying to block the Muller investigation in various ways

with various people. Not surprised in the slightest recall that most individuals who find themselves under investigation higher high priced white caller attorneys whose job is in a sense to impede the investigation, to close the investigation, to receive some form of exoneration. Whether that rises to the level of substruction depends on some very fine nuanced activities that would arise to the level of corruption, and that, of course,

is still the mystery that remains unsolved. Do you think that mystery is could be answered if those redacted portions were unredacted. That is certainly my suspicion, and I'm I'm confident that that's where Congress will try to go. Whether they'll get those answers remains to be seen. That the Congress needs to get access to that redacted material to draw its own conclusion as to whether or not there was the essential element of corruption. Right now, we don't

have it, and Mueller is not taking a position. We expect that if Congress, particularly the Intelligence Committee the Judiciary Committee, does not get the unredacted the redacted portions of this report, that there will be subpoenas. In fact, the House Committee has already authorized that the House Judiciary Committee. What's likely to happen in the courts though with that, actually there

is a fairly clear direction. The direction is is caused by Rules six C of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure that essentially say that grand jury material cannot be released outside of the criminal process. If there were an indictment, that would be one thing, unless there is an exception for release in connection with a related judicial proceedings, and

that requires an order of a court. But I'm not aware of any exception for release of grand jury material to Congress, and I suspect that will be the interesting issue that will be raised by the courts. Of course, there is one way for Congress easily to get the information you know what. That is the Attorney General gives it to them. No, they could pass a law amending Rules six C and and creating a new exception for the release of that information um with a subpoena to Congress.

That right now, I don't believe that exception exists, but Congress has it's in its power the ability to make that change. Also, if the a g agreed, they could go to a court and get those that area unredacted the grand jury if the great if the Attorney General agreed if the Department of Justice joined them, they could go to court and get an order allowing the release

of the unredacted materials to Congress. What what's happening is because some of this is so dense to read through that certain incidents are sort of popping up in people's coverage of this. And one that is popping up is when President Trump learned of the appointment of Robert Muller, he apparently said, this is terrible, this is the end of my presidency, and words that I can't repeat there.

Do you make much out of that? I don't really know what to make of that, other than obviously the prospective target of the investigation this will not come as a surprise. Is rarely thrilled to learn, um, that a skilled and talented and resource laden prosecutor is now looking at your activities. So I think that's just the the usual display of emotion. UM. I don't draw I don't

really draw any conclusions from that. Necessarily, if you were the prosecutor, let' say it's a regular case not involving the president, and you had all this evidence in front of you, and I'm talking about possible obstruction. The ten examples that he gives his interactions with, particularly with a White House counsel Don the Gan. Would this be the kind of case that you would indict and bring before a jury. I cannot possibly answer that question without knowing

what else is in the Muller report. Again, the critical element here on the obstruction side is the element of corruption. If the President had the power too, for example, fire um the special counsel or the FBI director, and he does so, it's going to be difficult to say that was necessarily done for a corrupt intent. The courts are very reluctant to peer into the the intent of a of a high a placed executive officer like the President.

So very very tough case to bring, which is one reason why I suspect that Mueller punted on that issue. Do you want to guess what happens next? Yeah? What happens next I believe is this will be thrust in the Congress. Congress will issue subpoenas demanding the release of the unredacted portions of the report, which are largely comprised of grand jury material, and there will then be an interesting battle in the court, probably go all the way

to the Supreme Court. That will test the limits of the ability of Congress to get access to grand jury material. I think that's a novel question which will be interesting to watch certainly. Will thank you so much, George. As always, that's George Newhouse. He's a formwork federal prosecutor and now senior attorney at Theodora Oranger. Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and on bloomberg dot com

slash podcast. I'm June Brolso. This is Bloomberg