By Nancy Thorner & Ed Ingold -
Mueller's labored performance was a departure from his once towering reputation from his command of facts and physical stamina.
As David Hrsanyi wrote on July 26 in his commentary, Mueller's testimony a complete disaster for Democrats:
“If Democrats believed that Robert Mueller would provide them with additional ammunition for an impeachment inquiry, they made an extraordinary miscalculation. Not only was Mueller often flustered and unprepared to talk about his own report — we now have to wonder to what extent he was even involved in the day-to-day work of the investigation — but he was needlessly evasive. In the end, he seriously undermined the central case for impeachment of President Donald Trump.”
Democrats came up empty-handed again, and it’s not Robert Mueller’s fault. They were much better off before Wednesday’s worthless hearing.
As to the Mueller report, there should never have been a second section.
As usual, Kimberley Strassel makes perfect sense of the Mueller testimony and the Mueller report. Upon reflection, this was an FBI cover-up and obfuscation of grand proportions. The team, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic Party, that conducted the investigation and wrote the report did a grand job of hiding in plain sight, the material fundamental to the conclusions, the Steel dossier. As Kimberly states, now it is up to Barr and his team to capture and reveal the truth.
Democrats seized on Mueller’s assent that President Trump was not indicted for obstruction due to the Office of Legal Council (OLC) ruling that a sitting president could not be indicted, even though Muller has changed positions in this regard on several occasions in the past, and the OLC ruling was not cited nor mentioned in the 448 page “Mueller Report.”
Mueller went out of his way to add that he couldn't "exonerate" Trump either, to which there is one glaring problem: In a nation where people are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, it’s not a prosecutor’s role to “exonerate” a potential defendant. Instead, a prosecutor’s role is to objectively accumulate any evidence indicating criminal activity and bring charges if warranted or decline prosecution without elaboration if the evidence proves insufficient.
Instead of elaborating on the obstruction issue, Mueller responded with a simple “yes” response at the end of a 3-minute soliloquy by a Democrat representative, which contained many assumptions and misrepresentations. Muller did elaborate on factors required for a charge of obstruction and that the third part, “corrupt intent,” could not be proven.
Regarding the importance of the “OLC” rule that a president could not be indicted, Mueller responded accordingly:
- NO – In William Barr’s 18-page summary of the findings, made in consultation with Mueller in a documented conversation
- YES – in Mueller’s press conference three weeks later.
- NO – About 3 hours after that press conference, Mueller retracted his statement.
- YES – On the morning of 7/24/19, before the House Judiciary Committee.
- NO – Retracting that statement as a preface to the House Intelligence Committee hearing that afternoon.
Mueller doesn’t seem to remember what reasons were behind the decision to “not exonerate nor indict” the President on obstruction, nor other essential details of the report. It is likely Muller didn’t write the
The hearings were a farce, where answers counted for little, and the questions were the news. Democratic congressmen launched into long monologues, expressing their own conclusions with little reference to the facts. They want us to believe that Muller agreed with everything they said in 4 minutes by agreeing to a yes/no question at the end Democrats want us to believe that Muller agreed with everything they said in 4 minutes by agreeing to a yes/no question at the end.
Reaction to Mueller hearing
Maryland Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings, chair of the Government Reform and Oversight Committee, called the hearings a "giant step in making sure that the American people got a picture of all this and, hopefully, will look towards the future and say we’re not going to have this." Cummings further said, "I’m begging the American people to pay attention to what is going on."
Time magazine managing editor Richard Stengel claimed the media didn’t talk about the story in basic enough terms for people to understand.
For House Republicans, Robert Mueller’s testimony uncovered no meaningful new information. Ohio Representative Jim Jordan said, “It’s definitely time to move on.” As to Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, “This should be the end of the chapter that wet America through.”
Down the impeachment road
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made her strongest comments yet about the House possibly proceeding with impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump. In speaking to reporters after the committee hearing, Pelosi claimed a “cone of silence” from the White House that’s not providing documents and witness testimony “will not prevent us from going forward.” Adding, “In fact, it’s even more grounds to go forward.”
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler said his panel will file lawsuits this week to obtain more information about special counsel Robert Mueller’s report and to enforce a subpoena against former White House counsel Donald McGahn to provide documents and testimony.
As part of the suits, the House is expected to challenge the White House’s claim of “absolute immunity” for McGahn and others who worked in the White House. Of those claims, Nadler said, “If we break that, we break the logjam.”
A ruthless scorched-earth policy is being directed to remove Trump from office because of their hatred toward him. Hopefully this impeachment fantasy will come back to bite Democrats.
In an interview with Fox News channel’s Sean Hannity the day after former special counsel Robert Mueller testified before the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, President Donald Trump had this to say:
“This should never happen to another president of the United States again. This is an absolute catastrophe for our country. This was a fake witch hunt, and it should never be allowed to happen to another president again. This was treason. This was high crimes. This was everything as bad a definition as you want to come up with. This should never be allowed to happen to our country again."
