robert mueller says his work is done. if there's another chapter in the russia investigation, it will be written not by special counsel, but by the lawmakers elected to represent the american people. catherine herridge outside the justice department. catherine? >> we heard from the special counsel, a lot about the olc opinion, the office of legal counsel housed here at the justice department. it acts like an internal lawyer for the government, specifically the attorney general and others in the justice department. what mueller said today is that based on his opinion or the regulations, he would not indict a sitting president but this did not stop him from gathering evidence that could be used for further action. >> under longstanding department policy, a president cannot be charged with a federal crime while he's in office. that is unconstitutional. even if the charge is kept under seal and hidden from public view that so is prohibited. the special counsel's office is part of the department of justice. by regulation, it w

let's remember who robert mueller is. a man who volunteered for combat in vietnam as a marine and came back and became a prosecutor and prosecuted murder cases and led the fbi after 9/11. he has a circle of people to draw on who he decided to consult on this decision is unclear. >> look who joined me, tom winter nbc political reporter and somebody who has been following this throughout. have you gotten any indication at all of what we might expect to hear? we just saw the picture of that podium which in and of itself is just dramatic. >> sure. it's more of what it is not going to be than what it is. based on what i am hearing, this not going to be to correct the report that came out asand thiss going to address any other news report or any thing that we've seen. this is going to be a significant or a substantial statement, chris. that's the best we know at this point. but as far as the specific information, we don't have that yet. >> okay. so, here's where we are right now. we are now just about a little more than half an

yes, and it was in direct response to robert mueller. we have had time and time again from president trump he had been exonerated. robert mueller stood up and said actually that is not the case and i expect the words that have been ringing in the president's is, that phrase, if we were confident that he didn't commit a crime, we would have said though does said so. they did not say that about the president, there are still questions to be asked and of course, growing question — make pressure from congress to ask those questions. potentially what he referred to their is a dirty word of impeachment. it is also worth pointing out, robert mueller, if he was erecting the record, was also speaking about the us attorney general william barr you might became out and gave his own summary of the report and they seemed to be some frustration by robert mueller about just how he some frustration by robert mueller aboutjust how he interpreted it and the way to put out first. we have had a response from william barr as well. the us attorney general h

robert mueller has put innocent people behind bars. i salute you, c-span, for putting anything on that's the truth. he tried to destroy president trump. mueller put people behind bars illegally. andtrying to prove my case get a present on so pardon. that's presidential pardon -- get a presidential pardon. host: how long did you serve? caller: they said i threatened to kill the warden. complaint and got death threats and stuff. the fbi knew about it and wouldn't help me. they said i threatened to kill the warden at work to keep me behind bars. host: robert mueller was the former fbi director, announced as special counsel in may of 2017. two years later, the first public comments on the investigation. kathleen in fort worth, texas. caller: how are you doing? host: doing fine, thank you. caller: good. just a quick comment. we've had 2.5 years of an incredibly extensive investigation into trump in regards to collusion. mueller did everything he could to try to prove that trump did collude. this is not new. this has gone on for years and ye

"what robert robert mueller bay did was return a referral. it's up to congress all this president accountable. we need to start impeachment proceedings. it's our constitutional obligation." capri? >> capri: i think putting words in the mouth of law enforcement officials is dangerous. i recognize that kamala harris is obviously a former attorney general, a very large state. but i do think, politically, it's going to become increasingly more difficult for nancy pelosi in particular to send off the cries from -- from the impeachment crew. you have five committees that are dealing with everything under the sun. jerry nadler in the house judiciary committee, it's obvious they are taking this as a message from mueller that this is a "pass the baton" moment that they have an obligation to continue investigation. i think some of these 2020 folks are using more pointed and incendiary language to basically take it one step further and say, "we need to jump on the gun for impeachment." one other quick thing i want to note, though, because of the discrep

robert mueller today? >> we, look, i think if mr. deniro said that a few weeks ago, i think that that sentiment makes sense but i think today we did hear from robert mueller and heard from him in a very powerful way. i think the most important thing we heard from him, remember he's deing with a several hundred page report and what does he choose to pluck out in his press conference today? he plucks out the fact he said look, if i could clear the president, i would. i have the raw legal power to do so. if i thought he was innocent. he pointedly does not do that. and then second, he said, i couldn't indict him. i didn't have the power to. and so because of that, he says it would be unfair to do what mr. deniro says which is to label mr. trump a criminal when mr. trump has no way to defend himself and look, i understand it's frustrating for a lot of people. and it's frustraing for for me, too. at least i can understand what mr. mueller is saying here and at the same time, i think what the ultimate implication

but if you actually listen to robert mueller and read the mueller report it is clear that the mueller team believes at the very least that there are two or three instances where obstruction is on the ta suggesg about russia. if you were to say to robert mueller, what's the single reason you held the press conference, my guess would be he would say to focus on russia. >> he led and closed with it. >> that's critical. >> is congress going to call robert mueller to testify? >> yeah. i think they'll ask him. it's odd to me why congressman nadler seemed to wishy-washy on this. i think they'll call him. they won't get what they want. he'll answer in a very limited, controlled way. i think there will be a lot of frustration and mueller knows that. his concern is i get up there. i've got the democrats yelling at me because i'm not talking enough. i've got the republicans yelling at me because i talk too much. he's going to be in the middle of this and i think he doesn't want to be in that position. a lot of people get called who don't want to be in that position. >> last question before we ge

with robert mueller. so his answer there does not seem true. >> it's the second exchange there that's so crucial. of course he had already received that letter over about a week before from robert mueller detailing his issues with how barr portrayed the report. telling that lawmaker, no, i don't know why members of mueller's team are frustrated as had surfaced in media reports is not what he had heard from the special counsel himself. now there barr goes on to say he believes members of mueller's team would have wanted more of the report to come out. according to the post that's the conversation that bill barr and robert mueller had. what makes all of this more fascinating is the personal relationship between the attorney general and the special counsel because bill barr did not know the president very well before the president picked him to be attorney general. but he does have a relationship going back with robert mueller. they talked about that. he talked about it under oath during his testimony before

mueller based on robert mueller's conflicts of interest? >> it's all of the above and maybe to back up. the reason i wrote "the new york times" piece is because i know people all across the country are watching this and disspir and they're scared and you know, i'm watching my beloved justice department have the go through this with this leader at the helm which is just a horrible thing for the department to go through. but i do think in the end, america's a lot stronger than trump. it's a lot stronger than barr. these are people who are determined to destroy parts of the rule of law. and i think the system is going to hold. and that brings me to your question. the very fact that we're watching barr testify and say such pro prosperous things is actually the system working in a way. it's him having to articulate his reasons and his reasons like what we heard in that equip make no sense. the mueller report did not say this was all false all the accusations of collusion and stuff. it said applying that beyond a reasonable doubt a very high stan

did robert mueller layout a case for impeachment today? >> i think robert mueller laid out a case in which we've seens house continue to investigate and ask questions about second volume. kennedy: nothing has changed, ned, what happened? >> we saw a political hack try to tell us an uncharged person was not innocent, turning entire premise of our legal system, on its head, now we say you are guilty until you can prove yourself innocent, that is absurd, mueller could have said we found evidence to charge, we just didn't have the authority to change or he could have said our investigation led to us believe that president obstructed our investigation, he did not say either one. >> he could have been within his right. >> right. kennedy: i would have been much more satisfied if he had done that, ifs implication is a that president behaved in a way that almost rises to threshold of impeachment. >> his equivocation telling us all we need to know, this was a political hit job, with one of two purposes, maybe potential impeachment of president of un

criticizing robert mueller's investigation. president trump claims that mueller would have brought charges against him if he thought he committed a crime, but mueller said explicitly the opposite yesterday. mueller did not even consider charging president trump because of justice department guidelines. mueller said that responsibility falls on congress, which of course begs the question this morning, what will congress do now? >> a growing number of house democrats and 2020 presidential candidates, including one right here on our show, are calling for impeachment proceedings, but continues to resist, though she says nothing is off the table. the spotlight is also now back on the attorney general, william barr. a lot of people are accusing him of misleading lawmakers and the public about the mueller report. mueller's version clearly different than the attorney general's. joining me discuss congressman mike quigley. thank you for being with us. before yesterday you were not on the list that nancy pelosi and others are keeping of

not robert mueller himself. we basically have, you know, the pictures and the video that our team got of him going in and out of his office all that time. so this is hugely significant. the fact that they are telling us from the justice department that he is going to make a statement. he is not going to take questions, obviously begs a very big question in terms of the content. why does he feel so compelled to come out to say whatever it is that he's going to say, especially given the back and forth that you've been talking about with our colleagues over whether or not he should or will testify, not just privately, but more importantly, publicly before the house judiciary committee. >> you know, we have not heard his voice, words come out of his mouth, dana, but as you know, he did submit not one, but two letters to the attorney general following attorney general barr's characterization of the mueller findings, which mueller in those letters, we now know, says hey, wait a second, you're not saying what i said in

but robert mueller knows. and now according to this new reporting from nbc news tonight, the judiciary committee in the house is negotiating with mueller directly to range his testimony where upon he can presumably tell us that and everything else he knows. here's the flip side, though, which i think is the worrying part here for attorney general william barr and for the white house. over the last 24 hours or so you've seen ed he linheadlines one. "republicans turn against robert mueller." the attorney general calling mueller snitty. based on a false accusation and illegitimate. this today from emmet flood, the president's russia lawyer, deriding robert mueller. saying what mueller turned in was some sort of law school exam paper. all that mueller's investigation produced was a bunch of political statements in that report. emmet flood sneerg at mueller's report in his findings by calling the report from mueller a "prosecutorial curiosity." we're watching republicans in congress and the white house and the pres

what changed by robert mueller coming out? >> the main thing is the mueller report started to come to life. it is one thing to read it on the page. it is another thing to see the man behind it get up, explain it. there is such a power to that. the more people understand about the report and the more it comes to life and get s dimension and detail, the bigger impact it's having. we saw robert mueller for ten minutes. see the impact it happend. imagine that can be greater if and when he testifies. >> nancy pelosi is counting. nancy pelosi is counting right now on how many democratics are shifting their position in her caucus. a few are. reas listen to what she said? >> i think it's, like, 35 of them out of 238. or maybe 38 out of 238 have said they want to be outspoken on impeachment. many of them are reflecting their views as well as those of their constituents. many constituents want to impeach the president. we want to do what's right and what gets results. >> joe lock hart. she's talking 35 to 38. it doesn't include at least

elizabeth: the democratic still subpoena mueller, the question, why done robert mueller get into the use of steel dassier in his probe -- steel dossier in his probe, and use of fisa warrants, the question is, when did robert mueller and his team know there was not enough prosecutable evidence, was this a perjury trap, did they wait long enough to say let's trip up the president? >> robert mueller knew within 100 days of his investigating, starting that there was no russian collusion with team trump, when he didn't ask to renew fisa warrant. he did not ask to extend it, because he knew there was nothing there. that point forward, liz, it was all about having this team of rabid, democrat trump haters, i have served with robert mueller he is a decorated marine, an honorable man, i don't recognize this man who spoke today, i don't recognize someone who said in america you have to prove your innocence, if you can't you should have some go through impeachment, that is unrecognizable from the man i served with. elizabeth: robert mueller is a man of distinguishe said russiae will not come on

robert mueller has been undermined. mueller needs to testify right away to tell -- share with the nation his findings and to interpret the report, which is incredibly damning. and bill barr has some serious explaining to do beginning tomorrow morning before the senate judiciary committee. >> kerry -- carrie cardero, for everyone who was confident that the attorney general was a straight shooter, what are they saying now? >> i think as far as the attorney general goes, once he gave his press conference on the 18th when he released his report, he really did a loft dama -- lot of damage to himself at that point, because it was clear when the report came out and reall re -- we all read it that it was different from his four-page summary he had released days before. but this goes to a whole new level that just three days after the attorney general sent his summary letter, the special counsel and his team were immediately so disturbed by the way that the attorney general characterized their lengthy investigation and their rep

in front of you is robert mueller's 400-page report. short of him reading all 400 pages, that would constuitute a statement. what do we have here? >> bob mueller and his team spoke in detail through this document. most of which in redacted form is available to us. >> most people haven't read it. >> that's an important point. i think it's probably of interest to bob mueller. he's probably coming out today with a keen sense of hasn't ingested the important parts of his finding. but this is a justice department press release of a very unusual nature. we've literally never seen one like this in the trump era. and, so -- >> what does that mean? >> number one, it tells us this is a justice department press conference not an independent statement. if bob mueller goes to congress or writes a post on medium or says what he says in any forum, he can speak as a human citizen bound by the rules. this is bill barr's justice department putting out to us that this justice department employee, special counsel robert mueller, will speak from the seventh

and it is a scathing evaluation of robert mueller and his investigation. and in this letter, they are accusing the special counsel of playing politics. they are also turning an eye toward the fight with democrats. the ongoing ones and upcoming ones saying just because the president did not assert executive privilege over this report doesn't mean that he won't do so in the future. with the russia investigation still on president trump's mind -- >> people say how do you get through that stuff, how do you go through the witch hunts and everything else. and you know what we do? we just do it, right? and we think about god. >> reporter: new cnn reporting reveals his white house sent attorney general bill barr a letter last month blasting the special counsel claiming its report suffers from in-extraordinary legal defects and accusing robert mueller of playing politics and straying from his commission, alleging his team failed in their duty to act as prosecutors and only as prosecutors. the white house lashing out at the zrk for a onspecial counsel. flood said th

we didn't hear either of those words from robert mueller today. certainly didn't hear total exoneration. robert mueller said the opposite of what the president said which is that there's still potentially more to be done. it just isn't going to be done by the office of the special counsel. >> peter, all of those points so interesting. joining us by phone is former acting solicitor general of the yi united states who helped write the original legislation that enabled this investigation. neil, your take away. >> i think two things. it was classic mueller. just by the book. exactly sticking to what the report said but number two, what he chose to pull out of the report and emphasize. the idea if he could clear the president, he would. that the office of special counsel has folks of the highest integrity and the like he couldn't charge the president under doj guidelines. all of that taken together is a very damming portrait of the president. what this is all about is one thing, the next step. what mueller is saying between the lines is that next step

robert mueller also said this. we did not, however, make determination as to whether the president did commit a crime. so you can't just hang it on the first part of the sentence -- ashley: but they will. stuart: low of the day, minus 331 points. next, stephen moore. we are talking mueller and interest rates. stuart: got to keep an eye on your money today. low of the day for the dow, we are minus 374 points. that's 1.5%. look at that nasdaq, down 1.25%. you are down all across the board today. in part, this is a reaction to what robert mueller had to say in his announcement 43 minutes ago. i want to bring in stephen moore, heritage foundation guy, knows a lot about this. my interpretation of what mueller had to say was that he had opened the door to house democrats to pursue an impeachment charge based on obstruction of justice. that's my reading. that's why the market's down so much. what say you? >> well, that wasn't exactly my reading. i'm not a lawyer, and i'm not familiar with all the legal mumbo-jumbo but i w

mueller has said this is what isaid, robert mueller has said this is what i said, this is what i meant, now it is up to others to act. wendy olson, interesting to talk to you. thank you very much. thank you. the philippines is due to ship 69 containers full of rubbish back to canada today. the disagreement started back in 2014, after the philippines found out canada had delivered household waste, rather than recyclable plastics. president duterte accused canada of turning his country into a "dump site" and the philippines recalled its ambassador in the escalating row. let's speak to howard johnson, who's there now. where is this going, do you think? well, it looks like today this container full of rubbish, 69 containers, will be shipped out around midday onwards. what we are expecting to see if a container ship come up from manila, they will start to load the containers on around midnight is expected to be the midnight is expected to be the midnight forgetting this stuff out. it is expected to then go on to china which is a transshipment and then on to canada where they said they will

that is what robert mueller did. and the idea that he didn't know that he was transgressing the department of justice's own regulations is, of course, not credible. therefore, we learned that he is a political hack, lou. it's sad to say this. as a former marine combat veteran, robert mueller disgraced himself and his career by becoming a political activist on his last day working as a public servant for the americans. lou: i love the wags on radio and television -- [laughter] yesterday trying the i say that -- trying to say that mueller, my gosh, he opened up the door to impeachment, their going to go after -- they're going to go after the president, it's a sure thing. and then, and then someone started counting things up like votes and started listening to what nancy pelosi and others were saying about mueller, and they expressed frustration, they expressed disappointment. because they know he made a damn fool of himself in that nine minutes and forty seconds in which he basically said the 448-page report is his tes

it's from robert mueller himself. that scathing rebuke in mueller's letter to barr after mueller did that four-page summary where mueller says, you mischaracterized our report. it failed to capture the nature, contents and substance -- >> will you continue to work with the attorney general going forward if you think he should resign? >> i absolutely have an obligation to work with him. i will continue to work with him and the department of justice. i'm a member of the judiciary committee. i believe in the rule of law not the rule of trump. we'll work together >> i don't think you will get a chance to question robert mueller yourself because lindsey graham said he's done with this. i expect robert mueller to testify before congress. likely the house side, probably the house judiciary committee. we are not sure yet. what i want to know is if you could ask robert mueller one or two questions, what would they be? >> i am still hopeful that we will have the opportunity in the senate judiciary committee to question robert m

jerry nadler said if he had to subpoena robert mueller he would subpoena robert mueller but jerry nadler after robert mueller's comments yesterday did not weigh in on that specifically. we do know that democrats want him to come still. the speaker nnandi pelosi said it yesterday and adam schiff, stenny heuer, the majority leader said it yesterday and the reason it was put into context by pelosi herself saying it would be useful. i was texting back and forth with a member of the house democratic caucus says the power of these images, even if it's just robert mueller reading verbatim from the report carries so much more weight in the democrat's views than just the 440-page report in and of itself. democrats want that. they want that testimony. they want it to be public. that's what they are going form. the question is how far are they willing to go to get there? we don't know the teens that just yet. brianna? >> phil mattingly on the hill. thank you so much. >> the host of "the lead kwnd "and "state of the union" is here to discuss. first of all, let's talk broadly about what we saw this m

special counsel robert mueller expressing frustration. in a letter and phone call to attorney general william barr shortly after barr released his initial four-page summary of the mueller report march 24th. this was the same memo which barr cleared president trump of obstruction, mueller expressing frustration, specifically over the lack of context and substance in that memo, saying it caused public confusion. and this new development is now shining a light on barr's back-to-back congressional testimony last month. let me jog your memory. take a look. >> reports have emerged recently, general, members of the special counsel's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter, and it does not adequately or accurately necessarily portray the report's findings. do you know what they're recognizing with that? >> no, i don't. i think -- i suspect they probably wanted more put out. >> did bob mueller support your conclusion? >> i don't know whether bob mueller supported my conclusion. >> hmm, nbc'

are you going to subpoena robert mueller? that's a key thing that democrats in the house are going to have to answer. i don't think there's a clear way forward right now. >> there was a statement from congressman adam schiff. he says we look forward to mueller's testimony before congress. while i understand his reluctance to answer hypotheticals or deviate from the carefully worded conclusions he drew, there's a great many questions he can answer that goes beyond the report. that seems to me to indicate that he's talking about the intelligence community, not necessarily the judiciary and going into that separate track of counter intelligence. >> i think that's right. i do think that's a very good question because robert mueller, yesterday, seemed to be addressing this identify of testifying in public. he seemed to be saying -- you may want the drama but i've got no new information. jerry nadler seemed to say we actually heard a lot from robert mueller. i think he did answer a couple of important questions that a lo lot of mem

and what for robert mueller? >> asha, if you were robert mueller watching that yesterday, what are you thinking this morning and what questions do you think you have to answer to congress and the american people? >> i think robert mueller watching that yesterday would find that what barr did at the hearing was just more of what he did in his initial letter and then later in his press conference which was to confuse and obfuscate and misstate and mislead about the law. i think that mueller could come in and clarify those things. i think mueller is an incredibly under stated person. he's not going to editorialize in person any more than in writing. he can certainly clarify the nature and context of his findings which is what he believed barr had not done accurately >> david chalyan, now almost 24 hours later, what do you think is the thing that sticks with everyone after this barr testimony? >> we have to get some other version of the story that's being told of the march 5 meeting that barr had with mueller. that's

frustration there from robert mueller. but mr barr has been hitting back today as well. the us attorney—general has told cbs news that as far as he is concerned robert mueller could have come to a conclusion about the question of crime despite his suggestion that that was not possible. i personally felt he could have reached a decision. in your view, he could have reached a conclusion? right, he could have reached a conclusion. the opinion says you cannot indict a president while he is in office, but he could have reached a decision as to whether it was criminal activity. but he had his reasons for not doing it, which he explained, and i am not going to argue about those reasons. but when he didn't make a decision, the deputy attorney—general rod rosenstein and i felt it was necessary for us as the heads of the department to reach that decision. what is really frustrating the white house is that the ball has now been firmly passed to congress. this suggestion by robert mueller that really there are still questions there means now congressional committees can start to

he ate robert mueller's lunch. if the intention of robert mueller and the team of prosecutors was to make the case for obstruction or lay out the evidence for obstruction, they failed. william barr got in the way. did mueller blow it? >> i think you are right about the ate his lunch thing. i think mueller expected to take the high road and say based on legal opinion it wouldn't be fair to say he's guilty of obstruction, so i won't make the call. in the report he makes the call, in my view, with a number of instances of what i believe he made the case for obstruction. he decides, i will take the fair road and not do it. he gives barr this opportunity to walk in there and do exactly what mueller thought it wasn't fair to do which is to be the judge and jury and say there is no case >> i want to hear more about apparently barr said he was dissatisfied in their conversations that he didn't reach a conclusion. but mueller lays it out saying why would i reach a conclusion when the conclusion is baked in. you can't charge

>> well, he would subpoena robert mueller. and, again, from supreme courts down to lower courts, they've all said that, "a," congress has the right to investigate, "b," they have the right to issue subpoenas, and, "c," they have the right to hold people in contempt. and so i think those are all rights that now we have to exercise because at this point we know that the president has already challenged the power of the purse by declaring an emergency with regard to spending money on a border wall, and now he's challenging it on a right of oversight. and he's not the king. he's the president. and the president is accountable to the people and to the representatives, namely in congress. >> and congressman khanna, the standoff that we're seeing here is something that we really haven't seen. there was a very kind of a brief version of this during the nixon investigation, but what was -- what was so unique -- is so unique about the trump administration is it seems impervious to political pressure. because it was, in fact, political p

robert mueller did 400 pages and laid it all out. the attorney general made his decision based on mueller's information, everybody eats forgetting that. the entire decision was based on mueller's report and the information he laid out. he couldn't make a determination, so it goes to the next step in the process, and they confirmed there was no obstruction. reporter: was mueller's statement today fair? press sec. sanders: mueller's statement -- reporter: you just laid out what this administration has been doing to prevent russian interference at the core of this whole thing in the first place. reporter: why haven't we heard any of that from president trump himself? press sec. sanders: he literally had his entire team that is working on this process. he instructed our team to go out and layout what we are doing to protect from not just russian interference, but any interference from any government or otherwise. he said it a number of times. there was interference and that we are taking steps from it happening again. you guys constantly

robert mueller said, that's not our case to make. over to you, congress. >> the one thing we have to remember, though, is he said his report is his testimony. he's nothing saying anything today different than that. in his report se he hhe says, h not want to preempt congressional ability to look into this. he does not have the ability to charge. and he is not exonerating. that's his testimony. so his testimony is his report. and i think we have to be careful not to say what he said today is different than what he said in his report, because he said twice, this is my testimony. but he also said importantly, that there is a process that doesn't concern me, mueller, to get the underlying documents. and i think that's interesting, that he acknowledges that that is a process. >> but to jake's point about the president's tone, because that is different. it's very different to say, you know, there's insufficient evidence, therefore case closed. the president was watching this in the residence. i would be really interested to know who was ar

it is thanks to robert mueller, he says his only public statement. kristin fisher has the latest from the white house. mike emanuel has more on the impeachment push from a growing number of democrats the first here is katherine herridge with the bottom line for mueller. >> robert mueller's covered the same ground as the rest report on alleged collusion and obstruction but the special counsel chose to emphasize what shook washington. >> if we had confidence that the president did not commit a crime we would have said so. >> reporter: breaking his silence robert mueller made clear he and his team did not exonerate donald trump or charge him with the crime of obstruction saying he was constrained by existing regulations. >> long-standing policy, a present president cannot be charged with a federal crime while he is in office. that is unconstitutional. >> reporter: without using the word impeachment or naming congress mueller said regulations didn't allow his team to gather evidence for future action. >> the constitution requires a process other than the

mueller's team wrote for public consumption for congress's consumption and that was what robert mueller was trying to convey in this letter to barr in late march, that he could release the summaries to clear up the misunderstanding about the findings while the redaction process was ongoing, anderson. >> has the white house had any reaction to this? this story broke in the washington post a short time ago. >> the white house has not had a reaction. i reached out to the white house and they say they likely will not comment at this time. that doesn't mean that the president himself will be tweeting. we do know though that before the mueller report was released, anderson, that there were communications between the white house counsel's office and the department of justice and during the time of these communications bill barr would have already received that letter from mueller and so it remains to be seen whether this was ever conveyed to the white house as well, robert mueller's displeasure. >>> joining us, cnn senior legal analyst jeffrey toobin and david gregory and maggie haberman and e

from robert mueller himself. the three takeaways from mueller today, one if his 22-month-long investigation had found that the president had not committed

robert mueller said i can't do anything here. >> robert mueller said he was not empowered to charge a sitting president. but he also was not -- into how is that different from what i just said? >> i don't think mueller -- i don't think -- well i guess -- i think the idea that mueller is saying, i read that as nothing can be done here. >> by the department of justice, the ones who run the rule of law. >> then we agree. then we agree. but i think he was also saying in the same breath i am not exonerating the president of any crimes. >> then it takes us to congress. the fact that more candidates are now coming out saying we should move forward with impeachment, does that impact nancy pelosi in any way. >> i think the pressure is on. it is on in a big way. they are not in seg right now. i guess they will be back next week into we need mohamed break. we need their schedule. just want to point that out. >> for the past three years. i think the two things you can take from -- at least i took from the mueller statement yesterday is one that if the president held any other title, he would have

he said that robert mueller was conflicted. this after a couple of weeks ago he said robert mueller was an honorable man. his reading of the special counsel report was that it was in favor of him. he said that president obama never confronted russia on election interference when, in fact, we know the president at the time directly confronted vladimir putin in a way that this president has not. you will remember this president stood next to vladimir putin and accepted his denial of interference in the election. >> and just had that call with him and didn't bring it up. >> repeatedly. oddly enough he does confirm a story which the navy had contested and that is that u.s. navy made an effort to block the name of the "u.s.s. john mccain," which is named after both john mccain's father and grandfather, the first two father and son pair to hold the rank of four star admiral. he said the president, they thought they were doing me a favor. the president apparently confirming -- >> is that someone in the what u.s. did that. >> on direct

they thought he would select robert mueller. ultimately he did not. then with the golf club dispute, that was robert mueller wanting to get a partial refund for his membership because his family was moving away and he didn't want to be a member of the golf club anymore. there was no major explosive dispute here. >> a business dispute as the president calls it. >> so he is continuously trying to undermine robert mueller's credibility here. in the end we have a 448-page report that lays out in extreme detail ten instances of president trump's obstruction as well as his campaign's myriad interactions with the russians during the campaign. >> as you talk about the president's attempts to attack robert mueller, we have some sounding of that. harry, we'll have you listen to it and get your take on the other side. >> i think mueller is a new never trumper. he's somebody that dislikes donald trump. he's somebody that didn't get a job that he requested, that he wanted very badly. and then he was appointed. and despite that, and despite $40 million, 18 trump ha

>> best thing we can do is look at what robert mueller actually said. i don't think he did himself or nancy pelosi any favors but one thing he said that was crystal clear was read the report, it speaks for itself. what does the report say? it said they were not able to find any evidence of collusion, nor did they charge the president with obstruction. that is preclear. based on that it is time to move on. the real question now becomes the political one for nancy pelosi and how she navigates that pressure on her left flank for impeachment. >> let your clip of what he said yesterday. >> we concluded that we would not reach a determination one way or the other about whether the president committed a crime. long-standing department policy, a present president cannot be charged with a federal crime while he is in office. >> a lot of people say yesterday was an impeachment referral. >> mister mueller could have explicitly laid out a direct case for an impeachment proceeding as kenneth started in his report. he didn't do that. he laid out the fact that he foun

a shocking new story about robert mueller and the mueller report and what apparently robert mueller believes was the botched handling of his findings and his report on his investigation by trump administration attorney general william barr. now, i say this is shocking. that said, we had seen some rumblings along these lines soon after mueller turned in his report at the end of march, right? newly appointed trump attorney general william barr then started serially releasing multiple statements of his own, that he characterized as summaries of mueller's findings, peppered with his own fulsome musings on the fundamental innocence and good character of president trump, right? but on april 3rd, you might remember that there was some inklings that something like this might be going on behind the scenes. on april 3rd, "the washington post" and "the new york times" both reported that some personnel from the special counsel's office were known to be, were expressing shock and anger at the way barr was presenting mueller's findings. and the way he was substituting his own assertions about mueller's in

robert mueller wanted to exonerated —— if robert mueller wanted to exonerate the president he would have said so. instead he made clear the obstruction of justice instead he made clear the obstruction ofjustice which he found substantial evidence of is a serious crime which goes to the core of our justice system serious crime which goes to the core of ourjustice system and that the constitution points to congress to ta ke constitution points to congress to take action to hold the president accountable. that is exactly what we will do. donald trump's press secretary sarah sanders has just been answering reporter's questions on what robert mueller had to say. what we heard from the white house was, no collusion, no obstruction. what we are hearing today is no collusion, no conspiracy. does the white house now acknowledged that the report did not specifically say no obstruction? we have been very clear that the entire purpose of the investigation was to determine whether or not there was collusion. he determined there was no collusion, he further determined he did not have enough informatio

lou: the radical dems, they're frustrated and disappointed in robert mueller. and yet some members of the national left-wing media were saying this really is an open, open charge to go ahead and impeach the president. facts, opinion. what's happening in the national left-wing media? we'll have all of that and much more right after this break. stay with us. ♪ lou: robert mueller today took 9:40 n which he announced his resignation of special counsel, the closing of the special counsel office and to announce his return to private life of and, of course, recast the purpose of the creation of the special counsel's office that he led for two years. mueller would have us believe it was all about russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. it was not. if it were, mueller would have been investigating the role of the intelligence community and its 17 agencies that apparently didn't realize what was happening in the months of campaigning leading up to election and all of that russian interference. if it were, why would the president's firing of dirty cop j

robert mueller is closing the door. is he closing the door, obviously, on his role as special counsel. >> that's right. it was robert mueller's last day as special counsel and we heard from him the first time and the last time on this investigation. he spoke for ten minutes but made one thing clear, he was not exonerating president trump. >> today special counsel robert mueller chose his words carefully. >> i'm speaking out today because our investigation is complete. >> reporter: breaking his silence on the investigation after two years to clearly say he did not clear president trump of obstructing justice. >> if we had confidence the president did not commit a crime, we would have said so. >> reporter: mueller did not declare the president was innocen innocent, in the more than 400 page report or in front of cameras. >> we would not reach a determination one way or the other about whether the president committed a crime. >> reporter: mueller explained he never had the power to make that decision due to department of j