now tonight, in this new surprise letter from william barr, barr is identifying two additional categories of information he says he wants to cut out of the mueller report even though he didn't mention them last week. he now says in addition to what he talked about last week, he also wants to cut out material the intelligence community identifies as potentially compromising sensitive sources and methods. and he says he wants to cut out quote, information that would unduly fringe on the personal privacy and reputational interests of pthird parties. so let's just take those in turn. on the intelligence stuff, i mean, it may be that what he's trying to say there is that he needs to cut out any classified information in the report. well, yeah, you know, duh. again, you don't release classified material to the public, right? and mueller and his team know how to deal with that. if there is classified material in the report, mueller and his team would have treated classified information as such. in any report that they provided to him or anyone else. if there is classified material in what muelle

barr doesn't stop there. he goes on to stay that mueller's decision in his view least it up to him, barr about the obstruction. i'm going to my guests what. do you see matt as the issue? was this done the right way so far? >> i don't think it was. and i think the language he uses kind of gives it away. when he says the special prosecutor bob mueller and his team. em -- made a lot of hard decisions. i assume they made the decision not to make a final determination on that because doj's only rules left that decision to congress. they didn't think indictment was an option so they didn't make a decision because they didn't have to. >> you are making ab interpretation that is that barr is essentially mischaracterizing the purpose of mueller leaving that open. >> he doesn't quite characterize in any way. there is an absence of characterization. he says it just leaves it to me. decisions aren't really left to the attorney general in this way in the department of justice. eric holder said he couldn't remember one tim

barr and rod rosenstein found. attorney general barr and deputy attorney general rosenstein further found no obstruction. a complete exoneration of the president of the united states. number one, special counsel did not find collusion, sarah sanders is trite say that. she not right to say they did not find any obstruction. they left that question explicitly up to both william barr and rod rosenstein, and william barr and rosenstein determined that there was no obstruction. she said it is a total and complete exoneration of the president. the mueller summary according to bill barr says while the president did not commit a crime, it does not exonerate him. expectly said in that letter. even in circumstances where the news is good for them they have to be incorrect. that's consistent, i guess, with this white house. >> and katy, why you are going to see such a pitched battle to get the actual report. jerry nadler earlier today on "meet the press" said essentially arguing that some of the documents are protected by exe

again, this is bill barr's letter. i intend to consult with deputy attorney general rod rosenstein and robert mueller to determine what information from the report can be released to congress and the public consistent with the law including the special counsel regulations and the department's long-standing practices and policies. quote, i remain committed to as much transparency as possible and keep you informed to the status of my review. so couple of important things here. number one, obviously, barr is saying i did not block robert mueller from doing anything that he wanted to do. there wasn't anything he was trying to pursue where i said no as attorney general i'm stepping in and blocking that. interesting. i would like to know more about that but that's the blunt assertion tonight from attorney general william barr. also, barr is going to maybe as soon as this weekend brief mueller's principle conclusions to the leadership of the judiciary committees. we don't know what principle conclusions are and don't know for

barr would be does mr. mueller agree with every word in the four-page letter that you sent to congress? and if he doesn't, let's start there because i am concerned, especially on mr. barr saying that there is no collusion or no coordination or conspiracy. i think mr. mueller probably would tell us that there's no conspiracy beyond a reasonable doubt but there was certainly evidence of it because we've seen in plain sight what the meetings of trump tower, the candidates asking the russians to impact the areas that moscow would no disclose. there was certain evidence of collusion so i would like to hear from mr. barr and mr. mueller disagree. >> eric swalwell, thank you for joining us. i'm very grateful. >> sure, nicolle. >>> i will stop feeling sad we need a law now so people who work on presidential campaigns call law enforcement when hostile american adversaries call and offer them dirt on their opponent but is this where we are? >> apparently now, at least with this president. that is the sort of thing i

barr was attorney general. as you say, we know he had an opinion about it, so i do think we cannot accept barr's letter. i don't say this to say that barr is behaving illegally or unethically. but we cannot accept the letter as an accurate or simply a fair summary of the report. and we need to see the report and we need to see it as quickly as possible. >> barbara mcquaid, what we can expect as barr put forward is his interpretation of the mueller report and the words does not exonerate him leaves a lot open for the imagination as to what could be in there. so i wonder if that stands out to you and what you think it means. and secondly, do you have any questions about why roger stone -- why he sort of waited on certain cases that still remain that could be re -- that could potentially reopen this? >> you know, the fact that they finished without completing the roger stone trial suggests to me that they did not believe that roger stone could be an effective cooperator in any way, shape or form and there are a nu

as i say if barr honors his word we'll know more soon. >> now, garret, barr has said he wants to put out as much as he can. barr is obviously very respected lawyer and when he became attorney general. he's now reading the report as he speaks. and he did say from what he knew he thought some principle conclusions, he'd be able to make those to congress as soon as this weekend. the report is comprehensive. when you put all that together, what do you take away from it, garret? >> so the challenge with the comprehensive phrasing is the extent to which it gets into non-criminally charged conduct, which presumably a comprehensive report would. but that's been one of these lightening rods as bill barr has been talking about it. everyone is very concerned about the jim comey example from 2016 about hillary clinton and her e-mails, about sort of getting deep into the weeds why the justice department didn't pursue criminal charges in certain cases. but if mueller is supposed to tell a comprehensive narrative here, he is surely going to be talking about information that doesn't rise to the leve

do you think barr would be that cute or -- >> i don't think barr is cute. you thts in the comments afterwards there's no evidence. they never say even in this pr construct they say the investigation did not establish -- okay, it did not establish this crime? well, what was your standard? was it beyond a reasonable doubt, which is not the standard for a grand jury or any investigation i ever ran when you begin it because the case continues and you get more evidence and people cooperate and people drop off? so that's not the standard. also did not establish according to what crime? when they issued these thousand of subpoenas every one of them probably at least said section 371 which is conspiracy charge. they don't tell us what the charge is. and here's the other thing, you make a judgment when someone takes the stand you've never heard before, they're a truth teller or not and you operate on that premise when you question them. in this case we go in the second part when they're talking about whether or not there's obstruction, that's a very funny paragraph

lisa, on that front i want to start with you on william barr's claim, william barr writes that robert mueller ultimately determined not to make a traditional prosecutorial judgment on the issue of obstruction of justice. knowing robert mueller as you do, any thoughts about why he may have chosen not to tell us whether or not he believed the president broke the law and credib credibly criminally obstructed justice? >> i think it's going to be important to see what they said on the subject. what we know from barr's letter is that the special counsel and his team laid out what may well be a substantial record, a substantial set of facts regarding obstruction and barr's letter says that was done on both sides of the obstruction question. and then goes on to say that they made a prosecutorial judgment. that's very precise language and i'd like to eat report on thsee this case. but we know you cannot indict a sitting president. so it does not surprise me at all that bob mueller who hue to that guidance and follow that policy. but what i think is quite striking is the attorney general's deci

barr and mr. barr released his controversial letter. and there is also signs of news on the hill when we're back in 30 seconds. en we're back in 30 seconds few have pure grace. many have strength... few have raw power and many possess beauty but only a few can touch our souls. there are many suvs, but there's only one legend. the 2019 jeep grand cherokee the most awarded suv ever. >>> welcome back. breaking news on capitol hill. moments ago, i'm holding the letter that just came out. it has signatures of six different democratic committee chairs, and they're pushing bill barr, demanding he submit mueller's full report, by a deadline of april 2nd. this is fast movement on a story that's been unfolding ever since mueller finished his probe on friday. i'm joined by a senator with a big view and a big role in this, senator cory booker of new jersey for his first interview since the release of barr's now quite well-known four-page set of highlights according to him of the report. senator booker is a member of the judiciary committee. he even

at least as far as this letter goes from the attorney general bill barr tonight, barr says he never exercised that power. he's notifying congress formally. there's never anything the special counsel sought to do that bill barr stopped mueller from doing. and that's fascinating. of course everybody would like to hear that from robert mueller as well as from bill barr but at this point it's only bill barr who is speaking on mueller's behalf. robert mueller is still at this point publicly silent as he has been from the very beginning. although we'll have more on that in a moment. here's more from the letter, though, quote the special counsel has submitted to me today a quote, confidential report explaining the prosecution or declination decisions he has reached as required by the regulations. quote, i am reviewing the report and anticipate that i may be in a position to advise you of the special counsel's principal conclusions as soon as this weekend. so this is the attorney general telling us that he has mueller's report and he is not handing the report over to congress, right? this letter from

what barr says in his letter, he's deferring to barr to make that review. so it may well be that bill barr in his position as attorney general says i believe these are issues of executive privilege, it's not going to the president, not going to go to his counsel, not going to his private lawyers, but i may decide there are elements here. >> true, but at the end of the day doesn't the president have to assert executive privilege? >> well, according to this, it says he has stated publicly that he intends to defer to me. so, i don't know how it would be done. whether he would have to invoke it or not. sure sounds like it might come to a point where he says i think this is improper, and the president has to invoke it. >> chris wallace getting ready for his sunday program, check your local listing, appreciate your insights in the meantime. >> thanks. >> and bret baier, getting ready for his big program tonight, will join us after the break with more breaking news about the mueller report and bill barr's latest letter to congress. that's coming up. us as people.

barr doesn't stop there. he goes on to stay that mueller's decision in his view least it up to him, barr about the obstruction. i'm going to my guests what. do you see matt as the issue? was this done the right way so far? >> i don't think it was. and i think the language he uses kind of gives it away. when he says the special prosecutor bob mueller and his team. em -- made a lot of hard decisions. i assume they made the decision not to make a final determination on that because doj's only rules left that decision to congress. they didn't think indictment was an option so they didn't make a decision because they didn't have to. >> you are making ab interpretation that is that barr is essentially mischaracterizing the purpose of mueller leaving that open. >> he doesn't quite characterize in any way. there is an absence of characterization. he says it just leaves it to me. decisions aren't really left to the attorney general in this way in the department of justice. eric holder said he couldn't remember one tim

barr was about a statute. it is very problematic to bring an obstruction case, in my view, from making a personnel decision. if he fired a u.s. attorney somewhere, does that lead to an obstruction argument because you have a political difference with that attorney general who is not serving your agenda? what mr. barr said at the hearing was that nobody, including the president, can get a witness to lie. nobody including the president can conceal information from a court. those are classic obstruction activities. mr. mueller apparently could not find sufficient evidence to conclude on his own that the president obstructed justice in a classic sense. and mr. barr said, along with mr. rosenstein, having looked at the evidence, we do not believe there is evidence to support a charge of obstruction of justice. it is important but not dispositive that the underlying crime did not exist. you can actually obstruct justice if there is not a crime, but the intent really does go to whether or not somebody is trying to pr

but it's a message that barr wants to deliver that mueller is buying into what barr is doing. >> it does sound like a message. from a practical standpoint, john, you'd have to have the mueller team's assistance in scrubbing what's the grand jury material and ongoing investigations. so, that's really sort of a practical point that he puts out there, but it certainly has the implicit atmospheric that the special counsel is buying into everything that we do. >> mueller was not a part of the four-page summary last week, so that he's a part of this now is interesting. shan, john, maggie, thank you very much. >>> a lot more ahead for us tonight, including a discussion with the man who's been pushing for the impeachment of the president. is he going to back down after the barr summary and as democrats have quieted talks of such efforts? >>> and later, president trump is warning that he will close the border with mexico as early as next week. what is behind this new threat and the new deadline? we'll have the latest ahead. the right gear... matters. introducing the all-new 2019 ford ranger, it's

. >> and the barr report on the mueller report is out. >> we don't need the barr report. we need the mueller report. >> tonight, what we now know about the 2016 election of donald trump and the push to learn more by making the special counsel's report public. >> wouldn't bother me at all. >> plus, the problems with the barr leather, mueller's punt on obstruction and no exoneration. what all of this means for the candidates trying to take donald trump's job -- >> everyone needs to get a chance to read the mueller report. >> -- when "all in" starts right now. >> good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes. so we have considerably more information today than we had friday about what exactly the mueller report concludes, though crucially it is far less than we need. you have probably seen the top line conclusions as filtered through the president's chosen attorney general who quotes only three sentences, two of them partial, from the actual report itself, a report whose length like nearly everything else about it remains a mystery. but before getting further into what william

barr is at the u.s. justice department right now with deputy attorney general rod rosenstein reviewing the report. the president, well, he just returned to mar-a-lago just moments ago after spending the day at his golf club in west palm beach, florida while he, too, awaits the brief. cnn has a team of reporters and analysts standing by who have covered this story for nearly two years now. let's go to cakara scannell. the deputy attorney general and the attorney general about to release the details. in what way will they be released, do you know? >> we do expect the report to be delivered today, that's bill barr's report from the principal conclusions of the mueller investigation. that is expected to happen today, but the big questions still loom of what will we learn in this report? does it answer questions of obstruction of justice and collusion relating to the president's actions? do they explain why they did not interview the president and require a sit-down interview with him? another big question he

that's not as clear in the letter from bill barr. they're saying this is a total vindication from the president, and they want to use this as a way to restart a conversation with moderate voters about what president trump has been up to as president and perhaps push those moderate voters away from democrats. they're suggesting that democrats have been blind sided by their inability to deal with the 2016 election and have been pushing conspiracy theories. so a really interesting window into how they're already, as of this very moment, pivoting to 2020 and feeling very hopeful about what it means for president trump to move over this hump of the mueller probe that he's been kind of waiting for all these months and these last two years, wolf. >> significant development, indeed. james clapper is joining us right now, former director of national intelligence. in additi anxiety anxious to get your reaction. what do you think? >> well, it's actually more forthcoming than i thought it would be, but it certainly leaves a lot of unanswered que

bill barr and his team will know this. i imagine they are looking for things like this now less today inadvertently violate the law themselves. >> bret: judge, standby, if you will, as we go through this step-by-step. we are getting new information. the doj not telling us much. asking how long is this report, the special counsel report, telling our producer they want tell us how many pages it is, but that it is "comprehensive." also all this talk that the president throughout these two years was going to fire special counsel mueller or he was somehow going to be blocked from investigation. catherine herridge joins us again with more from that letter and the attorney general sending to capitol hill. >> this letter is very crisp and concise with its language and every time you read it, there's something else that comes to the fore, and a line has caught my attention. it's related to cfr 600.9 letter a3. that is a section of the code of federal regulations that relates to whether robert mueller wanted to take any actions that

he sent it to barr, and from there it was completely obvious what barr would do. barr has been openly hostile to the obstruction of justice theory that mueller had been proceeding on since before he was attorney general. he wrote this long unsolicited letter to the doj saying that mueller's theory was fatally flawed. so it's no surprise that's where barr came out. >> let me read his reasoning for saying the president did not obstruct justice. here's what he wrote in this report. in making this determination, we noted that the special counsel recognized that the evidence does not establish that the president was involved in an underlying crime related to russian election interference. and that, while not determine ative bears on the president's intent with respect to obstruction. does that reasoning make sense to you? >> yes, it does make sense to me. it seems to me in an investigation of this sort, where mueller has a theory of obstruction that's really an outlying theory, and doj has a more mainstream theory that one of the things you're going to look at is what

are you talking to barr, attorney general barr, and what is he saying? senator graham: what i want to do is see if he'll appoint a special counsel. i fully realize that the oversight role of the committee is legitimate, but we're republicans. hey are democrats. i'd like to find somebody like a mr. mueller that could look into what happened with the fisa warrant, what happened with counterintelligence investigation. am i right to be concerned? seems pretty bad on its face, but somebody like a mr. mueller to look at that so that if nobody else, those who believe that the f.b.i. and the department of justice were playing politics, that they wanted clinton to win and trump to lose, that somebody can atisfy them, that that was looked at, there are some people who are never going to accept the mueller report, what i say, or what mr. barr does. but by any reasonable standard mr. mueller thoroughly investigated the trump campaign. you cannot say that about the other side of the story. hat i hope mr. barr will do is understand for the country's sake appoint someb

barr is the boss. mueller acts just as a prosecutor here, but if mueller wants to err on the side of divulging more of his work and barr decides to add -- to err on the side of divulging less, they could be having some difficulties there -- who trumps whom? >> the attorney general. the attorney general, correct me if i'm wrong, the ag is the boss. >> especially with mueller. mueller's likely to salute and say, okay, and never mention a word of it publicly. >> exactly. >> what do you make, harry of gloria's point of privilege and the pressure being on barr? >> it's kind of a bizarre process, actually, because you want to hear from the president's lawyer about what they think about executive privilege and once the cat's out of the bag on privilege, it is. i do think there's little that should be privileged here because we know about it already and it involves criminal conduct but it is unusual that barr rather than the white house counsel would be making the first calls. in general, barr is really taking

as attorney general. >> bill barr, one of the most respected -- >> reporter: like trump, barr is tough on immigration and supports executive power and the power of presidential pardons. before the official nomination, trump asked barr about his relationship with bob mueller. >> you know bob mueller. how well do you know bob mueller? i told him how well i knew bob mueller and the barrs and muellers were good friends and would be good friends when this is all over and so forth. >> reporter: back in june before his nomination. barr wrote this unsolicited memo to the justice department. in it he appears to criticize part of mueller's probe, calling it fatally misconceived. it was enough to leave many to wonder how he'd handle the final report. randi kaye, cnn, palm beach, florida. >>> the news continues and we turn it over to don lemon in cnn tonight. >> this is a special edition of cnn tonight. i'm don lemon. breaking news, the attorney general, william barr publicly releases his four page letter summarizing the principle conclusion of bob mueller's report. the news is huge. mueller did n

>> the only person who thinks it's bill barr's decision is bill barr. my understanding is that robert mueller presented both sides and the evidence on both sides. he had the humility not to want to make a determination on that, given the stakes for the country. and my sense is he intended for congress to debate that and congress to make that judgment. it's our constitutional responsibility. so the person who i think is in the wrong here is bill barr who gave himself the authority to make a determination when it seems that when mueller wants us to do is have that debate in congress. >> okay. let me ask you now, let's set aside the law for a moment and talk pragmatism and politics here. one thing we've noted at this network is that democratic candidates on the campaign trail for 2020, they're not getting asked a lot about -- or at all at times about the russia investigation. and cnn's most recent polling on voters' priorities, we'll put these numbers up on the screen but i'll read them to you since you can't see them, is the russia investigation ranks at

the question is, what does barr want to do? barr is ring fegs ad bette by these regulations. barr is bound by these regulations. but if the president of the united states said i want this fully released, i am rescinding the regulations that govern this, that could happen. it could happen. >> wow, so this could be in the president's hand. and we heard him say that sure, release the report. we all want transparency. the president has been uncharacteristically quiet since the report dropped. it is a wait and see approach leading into tomorrow will when we could get some of these findings. but given no more indictments. is this a huge victory for him politically? >> yes. he's exercised an incredible degree of self-control that is really uncharacteristic for the president. they've been cheering the one piece of information we have. no further indictments will be coming. that's a huge victory and the fact trump has not come out and celebrated that is unusual, to say the least. and maybe he knows a little more about what is in the report. obviously, he and his lawyers spent a lot of

as you pointed out, bill barr now says he is working. as a matter of fact, the justice department today is working on trying to find a way to release more of the mueller report to members of congress. one of the big things that they have to work on is to remove any grand jury information to make sure that that law is followed. but you can bet that members of congress have a lot more questions and we'll see mueller, barr and rosenstein on the hill before too long answering questions. >> and perez, we know you are following. now the question is how much of the full mueller report will be made public and when we the public might see it. do we have a sense of the timeline? we understand that teams are already reviewing the full report to look for classified information. is that a matter of days, a matter of weeks before portions at least can be made public? >> the timing right now all in flux and a bit uncertain here. the attorney general made it clear in the letter to congress that his goal is to release as much of the confidential report a

>> bill barr. >> i was going -- who disagrees with bill barr is bob mueller. because he prosecuted mike flynn for obstruction crimes lying to the fbi. full stop. there may have been other stuff but the notion as a prosecutor when somebody obstructs -- i'm not saying the mueller report says that. all we know is that it leaves the question open. which is itself interesting. mueller chose to do it that way. >> exactly. >> when flynn obstructed, mueller went to court and then ultimately won a convict then through a plea by saying the crime is lying, nothing else. >> we have to remember that barr is the one who wrote this 20 page memo outlying why the obstruction inquiry that mueller was going after was really misguided and why it was not appropriate for him to be going down that road. so for mueller to have left this conclusion to barr to be made is really, really -- it's interesting. i think that maybe in the full report we might get a better understanding of why he chose to do it that way. but it seems like you're leaving the fox in the hen house in this case. >

barr and mr. rosenstein did was very appropriate, somebody has to decide and the attorney general is not conflicted, he was not part of a campaign, so the big thing for me, guys, has always been, did trump work with the russians? and i told him to his face, almost two years ago, if you did, that's it between me and you and anything that follows you deserve. i will say that about any politician of any party. here's what we know two years later. after an exhausted examination of the facts in this case, by somebody that every american should trust, mr. mueller, the answer is no. >> what about, though, is there any daylight as democrats are suggesting between what the mueller report may say and what barr's memo says, and secondly, isn't there a question, though, because of the change in the statute in 1999, the purview that mueller had, that he may have been restricted in how far he could go and thus have to defer to barr because the special counsel is under the egus of the department of justice, unli

all the rul say here is that when barr hands his report when mueller hands his report to barr, it will be vy bare bones. all the rules say is that he submits a report saying who he prosecuted and who he declined to prosecrte. r, the rules say when william barr submits a report to congress, all he'll say is any time the justice department blocked a move by the special counsel. that's whathe rul say. clearly congress and the public expect to hear a lot more about what the mueller report says, but those --ut ifhey stick to the rules, that's all that's going to -- that's all tt's ing to happen, and clearly that won't satisfy anybody. >> that is a date to come no doubt, pete. we're waiting for reaction from the white house. kristen weller is there. ene president has talked about this in r days, he would likehe report public in som form. are we expecting a quick buttal here? >> we're expecting a quick response from the white house,id from the prt's legal team. we have not yet gotten those statements. we anticipate the statemes will acknowledge the fact that the special counsel's report has n

barr was mentioning. they are going to be given the opportunity to assert executive privilege on some of the information. the white house actually cooperated with this investigation, turning over literally hundreds of thousands of pages of information. the president has a right to say that is private presidential communication, therefore it should not be included. i think attorney general william barr will give them the opportunity to do that. of course, look, we are in a pretty remarkable moment in american history where there is now a report, we know it exists, the public may never see it. the statute, the law that created the job of robert mueller only really requires there to the report by the attorney general. a summary of the report. a report on the report, but the report itself may remain under lock and key for some time, perhaps permanently. this will set off a big scramble to find out what is in there beyond what william barr tells us. emily: bob bauer is still with us, former legal counsel to pr

barr's going to blame mueller. mueller is going to blame barr. trump is going to blame barr and it's going to be a stall toward the end of what the white house thinks is the game here. >> go ahead, aisha. >> i was just going to add that i think it's fair for the american people to get what's appropriate to be moved around in the public, but i do believe that we should make sure that congress has access to the full file, because congress still has an investigation and a job to do and i don't want to conflate and confuse the two. there may be some information about an ongoing informativesti that shouldn't be smacked all over the paper but that doesn't mean congress shouldn't have access to it. >> let's take a look again at what i summarized to use the word of the day from this letter. barr says i'm aware of the media reports and statements which he says, quote, mischaracterize his original letter as a, quote, summary. we can put this up on the screen. then he says it was not and did not purport to be an exhaustive recounting, but a summary of its p

that's what barr had done. people who worked with him, democrats, too, say he is a responsible and intellectual man who cares about the justice department. i kind of trusted him. >> i respect him but again what he did today, he put people, rod rosenstein and they made a decision, a legal decision that mueller says it was hard and complicated. they made it in 48 hours where they have hundreds of lawyers. >> here is the final point. this is a letter that talks a lot about what mueller found but barely quotes him. name check, rod rosenstein, acted oversight of the probe. it is only signed by one person. it is not the mueller report, it is signed by bill barr. as promise, i have a break down. final thought from you. >> he did not have to make the determination on obstruction. mueller was silent on it. they did not have the evidence to sustain an obstruction charge and then wash the hands and submit the letter. >> that would have handed off to congress which clearly he did not want to do. that's where the politics c

at least as far as this letter goes from the attorney general bill barr tonight, barr says he never exercised that power. he's notifying congress formally. there's never anything the special counsel sought to do that bill barr stopped mueller from doing. and that's fascinating. of course everybody would like to hear that from robert mueller as well as from bill barr but at this point it's only bill barr who is speaking on mueller's behalf. robert mueller is still at this point publicly silent as he has been from the very beginning. although we'll have more on that in a moment. here's more from the letter, though, quote the special counsel has submitted to me today a quote, confidential report explaining the prosecution or declination decisions he has reached as required by the regulations. quote, i am reviewing the report and anticipate that i may be in a position to advise you of the special counsel's principal conclusions as soon as this weekend. so this is the attorney general telling us that he has mueller's report and he is not handing the report over to congress, right? this letter from

i don't think the barr report, because we don't know the mueller report, the barr report told us anything yet. i will say something about the case that is really key, the president can't just fire everybody this time either. he couldn't use that. if he fires his attorney -- it was firing comey that triggered the special prosecutor and everything like that. he has to sit and wait for every single one of these cases to play out. he can't use his terrorist in any of the ways he's used it in the past. whether or not they go to trial soon or hit him the moment he leaves office, they will leave over into 2020 and continue to be the kinds of things that drives his presidency down. >> we know he tried to obstruct the new york case, he tried the nonrecusal move, unrecused. the he's endeavoring to obstruct those cases. >> he broke with precedent with a u.s. attorney, that's unusual for a u.s. president. what does one dovetail you have heard little from, maxine water, finance services. it has been reported they're working on the intelligence committee to get the deutsche bank statement as well. you'

other than that we got william barr's statement and william barr's statement, we can call it the barr report. it raises all sorts of brand-new questions we didn't have before about what exactly is going on here with this investigation, and what fruits it will be allowed to bear. first and foremost, question one, the special counsel's office decided not to make a traditional prosecutial judgment on obstruction of justice. well, why did mueller make that determination and was it a in fact, a choice? did mueller believe that he had a choice in that matter or did he believe he was strainconstray justice department policy? i mean, barr in his report describes this decision by mueller almost in wonder like who knows what this mueller guy was thinking? he decided not to do this part of his job, weird, right? so that has led to whole day plus of speculation and news reporting now as to what this crazy guy mueller must have been thinking when he did that. all we have here is barr's assessment of what mueller did. mueller was reportedly not consulted on the barr report and how barr characterize

barr tonight. specifically when he said i am now reviewing this material and considering what can be disclosed to congress and the public and i am consulting with deputy attorney general rod rosenstein on that and with robert mueller on that." it's interesting structurally that the special counsel himself would be consulted about what of his findings can be given to congress and to the public. i wonder if that was expected as far as you're concerned or if that struck you the way it struck me? >> i think it is striking but i think it's striking because throughout this process mueller and his reputation have been sort of the 800-pound gorilla inside the justice department. no one has -- one of the things we learned in this letter, for example, is no one objected to any major investigative move that mueller wanted to make. and i think barr has as best we can tell so far continued the tradition of as much as possible deferring to mueller's judgment on a lot of things. and i think the letter is another

barr was about statute. it's very problematic to bring an obstruction case in my view from making a personnel decision. if you fired a u.s. attorney somewhere, does that lead to an obstruction argument because you have a political difference with that attorney general who is not serving your agenda? what mr. barr said at the hearing was that nobody, including the president, can get a witness to lie. nobody including the president can can conceal information from a court. those are classic obstruction activities. mr. mueller apparently could not find sufficient evidence to conclude on his own that the president obstructed justice in a classic sense, and mr. barr said, alone with mr. rosenstein, having looked at the evidence we do not believe there is evidence to support a charge of obstruction of justice. and it is important but not dispositive that the underlying crime did not exist. you can actually obstruct justice even if there is not a crime, but the intent really does go to whether or not somebody's try

barr might have left out. our own julia aniesly suggestions he provided evidence to backup conclusions raising questions how much of that evidence the public will see. house democrats are told barr they want the report by next tuesday but barr has told the house judiciary chairman democrat of new york that he is unlikely to be able to meet that deadline. kasie hunt reports that the delay could result in a major con confrontation between democrats and the attorney general. earlier today nancy pelosi criticized barr's handling of the mueller report. >> no thank you, mr. attorney general. we do not need your interpretation. show us the report and we can draw our own conclusions. we don't need you interpreting for us. it was condescending and arrogant and wasn't the right thing to do. >> and again, in the meantime, in this period before we are able to see what we're allowed to see of the mueller report, republicans have launched an effort to unseat house intelligence committee chairman adam schiff, democrat of cal

what barr said to "the hill." once mueller punted to barr, he had to know what the outcome would be. >> is there method to why he did -- maybe he knows something that we don't? >> the only thing i can think of is the way the regs work is if mueller wanted to take a certain action then he was overruled by the a.g. that has to come out, that has to get reported to congress. perhaps some sort of softer, compromise -- that would have been calamitous for a lot of people. perhaps this was some way of softly avoiding that scenario. that's all i can think of. >> barr said he had not been denied anything he had asked for. that's what mueller says. >> right. and doing it this way may have allowed barr to say, i didn't have to overrule on anything. versus, can you imagine if mueller had recommended obstruction and then barr had overruled him and had to report that to congress? this would have been a completely different story. >> i agree, but at the same time that's not the mueller that we've all kind of been led to believe

attorney general bill barr

bill barr is not jeff sessions. this is a clear statement of trust in bill barr to make decisions that will keep the president, keep the white house from getting into an executive privilege fight that really the takeaway from that would be what are you hiding? or what are you trying to hide? instead, deferring or at least intends to defer to bill barr suggests that the president, you know, has nothing to worry about here. the justice department can take care of it. redactions can be easily done. he's fine because he has come away from this with exoneration being the central message that he wants out. he doesn't want it to be a fight about executive privilege. he wants exoneration. >> of course, the big question is how the president and bill barr are communicating but one way they're communicating is how the president communicates. he lays praise on bill barr. you're amazing. you're amazing. here he is. >> i have great confidence in the attorney general. i will say this. our new attorney general, bill barr, is a grea

but something that bill barr didn't go that far. he didn't say there was exoneration on collusion and i would expect he would have used that language in his letter if mueller had, in fact, used it. >> that makes sense. joyce vance, thank you so much for your very long day here on msnbc. i'm sure your week ahead will be equally as intense. we appreciate your insights. ashley parker, brendan bach, jeremy bash, katherine lucy, thank you to all as well. >>> in his four-page summary the attorney general says mueller didn't identify any actions that were, in his view, done with corrupt intent. back in 1974 president richard nixon argued that he wasn't guilty of obstruction because he lacked corrupt motive. nbc's presidential historian michael beschloss reminded us of that fact today on twitter and michael joins me now here on set. sir, it's great to have you and your perspective. >> thanks. >> thanks for being here. let's pull back a second. we've been talking a lot about the details, which i know are very, very, very important. but it's

barr also s

but bill barr didn't go that far. he didn't say there was exoneration on collusion and i would expect he would have used that language in his letter if mueller had in fact used it. >> that makes sense. joyce vance, thank you so much for your very long day here on msnbc. i'm sure your week ahead will be equally as intense. we appreciate your insights. ashley parker, brendan bach, jeremy bash, katherine lucy, thank you to all as well. >>> in his four-page summary the attorney general said mueller didn't identify any actions that were in his view done with corrupt intent. back in 1974 president richard nixon argued that he wasn't guilty of obstruction because he lacked corrupt motive. nbc's presidential historian michael beschloss reminded us of that fact today on twitter and michael joins me now here on set. sir, it's great to have you and your perspective. thanks for being here. let's pull back a second. we've been talking a lot about the details, which i know are very, very, very important. but it's still a momentous