On Sunday, March 24, 2019, Attorney General William Barr publicly circulated a four-page memo that purported to clear President Trump of all wrongdoing in any of the key matters Special Counsel Robert Mueller had examined during his nearly two-year long investigation. It was supposed to be a summary of the top-line conclusions from the Mueller Report, but at the time it wasn’t possible to judge whether Barr properly characterized the report’s conclusions because he didn’t release them. He held the actual summary conclusions a guarded secret for almost a month before producing a heavily redacted version of them on the 18th of April.
We now know that this did not sit well with Robert Mueller–at all. It appears Mueller took a brief moment to compose himself and then took considerably more time to compose an irate letter to Barr. The Department of Justice received his protest on March 27, three days after Barr issued his original memo. Using stark language “that shocked senior Justice Department officials” and left them “taken aback by the tone,” Mueller ripped into the Attorney General.
“The summary letter the Department sent to Congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of March 24 did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance of this office’s work and conclusions,” Mueller wrote. “There is now public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. This threatens to undermine a central purpose for which the Department appointed the Special Counsel: to assure full public confidence in the outcome of the investigations.”
He was clear that he felt Barr had misled the public and needed to quickly rectify the situation.
The letter made a key request: that Barr release the 448-page report’s introductions and executive summaries, and it made initial suggested redactions for doing so, according to Justice Department officials.
There was also a conversation on the phone. They spoke on March 28 for about fifteen minutes, and Mueller emphasized that it wasn’t Barr’s characterization of his investigation of Russian election meddling that pissed him off, but rather the bogus effort to exonerate the president.
In that call, Mueller said he was concerned that media coverage of the obstruction investigation was misguided and creating public misunderstandings about the office’s work, according to Justice Department officials. Mueller did not express similar concerns about the public discussion of the investigation of Russia’s election interference, the officials said.
Mueller reiterated his view that the public was being misled.
Throughout the conversation, Mueller’s main worry was that the public was not getting an accurate understanding of the obstruction investigation, officials said.
At that point, it should have been clear to Barr that Mueller has significant problems with how he had presented his work, but he wasn’t honest about this when he testified before the Senate on April 10th, claiming that he did not know how Mueller felt about about his conclusions on his report.
Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland got the date of the testimony wrong in the following tweet, but it’s significant that he’s calling on Barr to resign.
On April 20th, I asked Barr, “Did Bob Mueller support your conclusion?” His answer was, “I don’t know whether Mueller supported my conclusion.”
We now know Mueller stated his concerns on March 27th, and that Barr totally misled me, the Congress, and the public. He must resign. pic.twitter.com/rod404BbYo
— Senator Chris Van Hollen (@ChrisVanHollen) May 1, 2019
Senator Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was slightly less dramatic, but with the Attorney General scheduled to testify before the Senate again on Wednesday, he demanded that he bring along the letter the DOJ received from Mueller on March 27.
In light of Mueller's letter, the misleading nature of Barr’s 4/10 testimony & 4/18 press conference is even more glaring.
Barr must bring the letter with him when he testifies in the Senate tomorrow.
And it’s time for Mueller to testify publicly. Now.https://t.co/d3lObZSQBE
— Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) May 1, 2019
Barr will have a friendly forum on Wednesday because Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina will chair the hearing. You can read Barr’s prepared remarks here. He’s also scheduled to testify before the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, but he’s still haggling with Democratic Chairman Jerry Nadler about the format and may seek to avoid making an appearance.
It’s unclear why news of Mueller’s letter to Barr broke the night before is due to testify, but the timing is certainly no accident. Someone wanted to put Barr on the hot seat. On the score, I’m gratified to realized that more and more people seem to be embracing my recommendation that the House Democrats threaten to use their inherent contempt powers to arrest non-coorperating witnesses and put them on trial. Hell, if they’d taken my advice back in 2007, we might not even be having this argument today.