últimas notícias

The top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee said today that special counsel Robert Mueller’s congressional testimony this Wednesday will be the GOP’s first, and perhaps final, opportunity to question Mueller about the way he conducted his nearly two-year probe, the conclusions he reached (or didn’t reach) on collusion and obstruction, and the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation.

Republican Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia spoke with Maria Bartiromo on Sunday Morning Futures about the strategy that Republicans have for questioning Mueller, which includes framing the Wednesday hearing as the end of the Trump-Russia saga, saying he hoped that Mueller’s testimony would be “the final episode of the Mueller report and a final episode to, hopefully, put this behind so that the president … can actually get to governing.”

The ranking GOP Judiciary member also said this was their first opening to actually grill Mueller on specifics about his investigation.

“The Mueller report is a one-sided report that has not been questioned from the other side,” Collins said. “This is our chance to do that.”

Mueller will testify in front of two committees back-to-back on Wednesday, beginning with House Judiciary and concluding with House Intelligence. Collins said the Judiciary Committee hearing would begin with an opening statement from Chairman Jerrold Nadler of New York, followed by an opening statement from Collins himself. After this, there will be an opportunity for Mueller to make an opening statement, and then an opportunity for Nadler, Collins, and other members to begin asking questions.

Mueller’s report concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 election through cyberattacks and other methods, but did not establish that any members of the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians in these efforts. Mueller did not reach a conclusion on obstruction of justice, but Attorney General Barr and then-Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein determined that obstruction did not occur.

Collins said that Republicans have “some great guys and gals that are going to ask some really pointed questions to make sure the American people understand this is not a vacuum that the Democrats have completely to say the president was doing something wrong.”

Collins hinted that Republicans would question Mueller about the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation, the way that the Justice Department and FBI conducted themselves, and the roles played by former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, former FBI lawyer Lisa Page, former FBI special agent Peter Strzok, and others, whom Collins referred to as part of a “corrupt cabal.”

“What we have seen and looking back at the reports, looking back at the timeline of investigations, I think they were looking into this whole issue of Russian interference for most of the time. I think what I want to focus on is how did we get there to start with and what evidence were they using,” Collins suggested.

Collins also pointed out that the Mueller investigation began as a look into Russian election interference in 2016, but Collins said that “it’s almost like [Democrats] forgot about that completely” and have shifted their focus to alleged obstruction of justice instead.

“Let me tell you, the Republicans have not forgotten about where this investigation started, and there’s going to be a lot about what he did say, what he didn’t say, and how this thing started,” Collins hinted. “And people are going to find out, hopefully, some answers this week on that.”

Earlier today, Nadler claimed on Fox News Sunday that “the president and the attorney general and others have spent the last few months systematically lying to the American people about what the investigation found.”

“They’ve said that it found no collusion, found no obstruction, that it exonerated the president,” Nadler said. “All three of those statements are absolute lies.”

Collins said thoughts of impeachment are “waning” and said he believed the Democrats would attempt to “revive” debate over the Mueller report and “make something of it” three months after the report was released, but Collins doesn’t think the public will respond to that.

“Everybody that has wanted to know about the Mueller report has looked into the Mueller report,” Collins asserted. “We see that people are beginning to tire of this.”

Collins ultimately downplayed expectations about any new major revelations coming out of the Mueller hearing.

“What we’re expecting is another round of what we already know. I’ve been telling some people before it’s like going back and finding a book on the shelf that looks new, and all of a sudden you begin to read it and you find out, wait, I’ve read this before,” Collins joked.

“It’s the Democrats’ time to make the case that they’ve not been wasting our time, and millions of dollars, and our committee hearings, and clown and farce hearings where they’re just harassing the president, going after things we have already known, and trying to make press release headlines instead of legislating,” Collins said. “This is what’s up for them this week.”

And Collins said it would become clear that Democrats were just using this as a chance to attack Trump ahead of the next presidential election.

“I can’t go back to this enough, this is a time that the Democrats have got to show on their end how much time they have been wasting of our committee and how we’ve not been getting things done because they simply don’t like this president who was elected by the people in 2016,” Collins said. “And they’re just trying to derail him for 2020.”