We begin today’s roundup with analysis by Ashley Parker, Ellen Nakashima ,
Devlin Barrett and Carol D. Leonnig at The Washington Post on what’s reportedly inside the Mueller report:
Revelations that special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s still-confidential report may contain damaging information about President Trump ignited a fresh round of political fighting on Thursday, ushering in a new phase of the nearly two-year-old battle over the Russia probe.
Members of Mueller’s team have told associates they are frustrated with the limited information that Attorney General William P. Barr has provided about their investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether Trump sought to obstruct justice, according to multiple people familiar with the matter.
While Barr concluded the special counsel’s evidence was not sufficient to prove that the president obstructed justice, some of Mueller’s investigators have said their findings on obstruction were alarming and significant, one person with knowledge of their thinking said.
Natasha Bertrand and Peter Nicholas at The Atlantic:
In the wake of Attorney General William Barr’s memo, however—in which Barr, in consultation with Rosenstein, concluded that Trump did not obstruct justice—Trump’s allies are characterizing Rosenstein as a nonpartisan professional whose input legitimized the “no obstruction” finding. Legal experts, however, have questioned the appropriateness of Rosenstein weighing in, given the role he played in former FBI Director James Comey’s firing. That episode has been at the center of Mueller’s obstruction inquiry, which ended after nearly two years without Mueller making a final determination as to whether or not the president committed a crime. According to Barr, Mueller concluded that the obstruction question touched on “difficult issues” and chose not to resolve it. Mueller therefore left the findings to two political appointees, Barr and Rosenstein, to interpret, despite the original purpose of his appointment—to make findings free from political influence.
Here’s Jonathan Chait’s take on Republican attempts to discredit the full report:
Whether the unflattering information in the report contains evidence of noncriminal misconduct with Russia — remember, collusion is not a crime — or centers entirely around obstruction of justice remains to be seen. [...] Republican messaging in recent days has made it blindingly obvious the Mueller report is not a document Trump fans would enjoy reading around the fireplace. Republicans have gone from supporting its full release — which House Republicans supported last week in a unanimous vote — to cautioning against it as a distraction. Representative Devin Nunes, who has largely directed Trump’s defense in Congress and the right-wing media, appeared on Fox News last night and introduced a new term: “Mueller dossier.”
Susan Glasser adds her analysis at The New Yorker:
President Trump may have thought that he was done with the Mueller investigation, but it is not yet done with him. A barrage of news that came out in the course of a few hours on Wednesday reinforced how much the Democratic House of Representatives—impeachment or no impeachment—will keep up its aggressive scrutiny of the President. [...]
One way or another, we will ultimately know what’s in the report; what happened behind the scenes in the Mueller probe; what, if anything, there is to claims that Trump and his team knew about the Russian hacking in 2016; and what the President did or didn’t do to shut down the investigation of it. “It is going to come out,” Schiff said, perhaps the one certainty in this otherwise uncertain moment.
Switching topics, The New York Times takes on Senate Majority Leader’s latest Trump enabling move:
In a bid to speed confirmation of President Trump’s nominees, Republicans voted Wednesday to cut the debate time for lower-level judicial and administration picks from 30 hours to two. Ordinarily, such a rule change requires the backing of a two-thirds supermajority. But the Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, detonated the so-called nuclear option, lowering the threshold for passage to a simple majority — a move Mr. Trump had been clamoring for. Only two Republicans joined with Democrats to oppose this latest erosion of the minority party’s ability to “advise and consent.”
This may sound like parliamentary arcana, but the impact should be clear to anyone unnerved by the Senate’s newish practice of ramming through Supreme Court picks with a bare majority — another Trump-era innovation by Mr. McConnell.
On a final note, don’t miss this editorial at USA Today on how the administration’s border solutions just don’t make sense:
An even dumber idea that Trump has been threatening to implement is shutting down the U.S.-Mexico border. The main problem with this is that it would be devastating for the economies of both countries, something the president seemed to recognize Thursday when he said he'll delay closing the border for a year to give Mexico time to reduce the flow of immigrants and drugs.
Instead of arbitrary, capricious policies designed to draw attention and whip up emotions, the single best thing the United States could do would be to help the Salvadoran, Honduran and Guatemalan governments reestablish control and order over their countries. This is admittedly easier said than done, but it is the surest way to stem the flow.