últimas notícias

Mr. Mueller relied heavily on Mr. Trump’s White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, who told investigators about how Mr. Trump tried to have him fire Mr. Mueller in June 2017. The report said that Mr. McGahn stopped the effort, “deciding that he would resign rather than trigger what he regarded as a potential Saturday Night Massacre,” a reference to Richard M. Nixon’s firing in 1973 of the special prosecutor who was investigating him. That order, which the top two Justice Department officials resigned over rather than carry out, helped undermine political support for Mr. Nixon among Republicans.

The stark difference between Mr. Mueller’s rationale and the impression Mr. Barr had created last month was a central takeaway from Mr. Mueller’s report. Mr. Barr had not explained why Mr. Mueller declined to decide whether the evidence met the standard for charging Mr. Trump. Instead, he cited a fragment of Mr. Mueller’s rationale in what appears to be a misleading way.

In his letter, Mr. Barr wrote that Mr. Mueller had cited “difficult issues” of law and fact preventing him from deciding the obstruction question. Mr. Barr portrayed that murkiness — though he was not specific — as the barrier to Mr. Mueller’s ability to draw a conclusion “one way or the other.”

In fact, Mr. Mueller’s report contained a subtle but important difference from that impression. The special counsel cited those “difficult issues” as preventing him from exonerating the president of illegal obstruction — not as preventing him from accusing Mr. Trump of that crime.

“If we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the president clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state,” Mr. Mueller wrote. “Based on the facts and the applicable legal standards, however, we are unable to reach that judgment. The evidence we obtained about the president’s actions and intent presents difficult issues that prevent us from conclusively determining that no criminal conduct occurred.”

Instead, Mr. Mueller decided it would be unfair to analyze the evidence for now because it created the risk that he would conclude that Mr. Trump committed a crime with no possibility of a speedy trial to resolve whether that was true.