If U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton had a chance to question Robert Mueller at Wednesday’s hearings on Capitol Hill, he would have asked the former special counsel why he called the Russian cyber attack on the 2016 presidential election one of the worst of his career.
“This is a man who fought for our country as a Marine in Vietnam, served in the Justice Department, and led the FBI,” Moulton said. “Yet he said of all the heinous crimes he’s seen in decades of public service, that was one of the worst.”
In his opening remarks before the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees, Mueller said during his 50 years of service to the nation, he has seen a number of challenges to democracy.
“The Russian government’s efforts to interfere in our election is among the most serious,” Mueller told Congress.
In a conference call with reporters after the hearing, Moulton said he didn’t expect to learn anything new from the testimony.
“But the important reason for having the hearings is most Americans have not read the report and don’t realize how serious the stakes are … how the president has refused to do anything about it, and how serious a federal crime obstruction of justice is,” he said.
In response to a question from Politico, an online news service, Moulton said he disagrees with his colleague, U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch, who represents the 8th Congressional District. The Boston Democrat has said impeachment would hand President Donald Trump the election next year.
“That’s not what history tells us,” Moulton said. “But even more importantly, even if it were political suicide, the oath every one of us took was to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not the politics of our party … it’s the right thing to do.”
Lawmakers, he said, are not doing enough to make it clear to the American people that the single most important conclusion of the Mueller Report is the president has failed to respond to the Russian interference or prevent it from happening again.
During his testimony, Mueller dismissed Trump’s claims of exoneration in the federal probe of Russia’s election interference, telling Congress he did not clear the president of obstructing his investigation.
In the opening minutes of the hearing, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, asked Mueller about Trump’s claims of vindication in the investigation.
“Did you actually totally exonerate the president?” Nadler asked.
“No,” Mueller replied.
In hours of sometimes halting and stilted testimony, reliant on terse one-word answers and a steely determination to remain outside the partisan fray, the former special counsel also rejected Trump’s assertions that the probe was a “witch hunt” and hoax.
When Rep. Adam Schiff, the Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, asked, “Your investigation is not a witch hunt, is it?”
“It is not a witch hunt,” Mueller said.
The televised Capitol Hill appearances, Mueller’s first since ending his two-year Russia probe last spring, unfolded at a moment of deep divisions in the country, with many Americans hardened in their opinions about the success of Donald Trump’s presidency and whether impeachment proceedings are necessary.
Republicans and Democrats took divergent paths in questioning Mueller.
Still, Mueller did not offer crisp sound bites that could reshape entrenched public opinions.
He frequently gave single-word answers to questions, even when given opportunities to crystallize allegations of obstruction of justice against the president. He referred time and again to the wording in his report or asked for questions to be repeated. He declined to read aloud hard-hitting statements in the report when prodded by Democrats to do so.
Trump’s GOP allies tried to cast the former special counsel and his prosecutors as politically motivated.
Before the hearing began, the president tweeted: “So Democrats and others can illegally fabricate a crime, try pinning it on a very innocent President, and when he fights back against this illegal and treasonous attack on our Country, they call It Obstruction? Wrong! Why didn’t Robert Mueller investigate the investigators?”
Moulton is one of two dozen candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for president in 2020, including New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, Montana Gov. Steve Bullock, Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, former vice president Joe Biden, South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, California billionaire Tom Steyer, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, California Sen. Kamala Harris, former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, former Maryland Rep. John Delaney, Miramar, Fla., Mayor Wayne Messam, former Pennsylvania Rep. Joe Sestak, author Marianne Williamson, and former tech executive Andrew Yang.
Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.
