Donald Trump team sees gold in Mueller investigation findings

Democrats targeting the White House have been crushed by the probe into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 poll.

US President Donald Trump returns to the White House on March 24, 2019 in Washington, DC after spending the weekend in Florida. — Trump declared he had been completely exonerated after his campaign was cleared of colluding with Russia in the 2016 election campaign. (Photo by Eric BARADAT / AFP)

President Trump’s advisers have begun crafting plans to use special counsel Robert Mueller’s findings as a line of attack against Democrats ahead of the 2020 election, according to a person familiar with the matter, seeking to turn an investigation the White House long viewed as a liability into a political advantage.

Mr. Mueller didn’t find that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. He left unresolved questions about whether the president obstructed justice in trying to influence the probe’s outcome, according to a summary of the special counsel’s report provided to Congress on Sunday by Attorney-General William Barr. Mr Barr said he and Deputy Attorney-General Rod Rosenstein had determined there was insufficient evidence to establish the president had committed a crime.

Mr Trump on Sunday described the Mueller investigation as an “illegal takedown that failed,” but told reporters the probe’s findings were a “complete and total exoneration” of him and his campaign.

He was briefed on the contents of Mr Barr’s letter in his private quarters at Mar-a-Lago, where he told advisers: “This is very good,” according to an aide. On the flight back to Washington on Sunday evening, he watched TV and made some calls while reading Mr Barr’s letter, the aide said.

The Mueller investigation has hung over Mr Trump’s presidency for nearly two years. The finding that there was no collusion was seized on by Mr Trump’s advisers as a potential cudgel against Democrats who, since taking over control of the House in January, have mounted their own investigations into the president and his associates. The Trump campaign plans to conduct polling in the coming weeks around the extent to which the Mueller investigation would be an effective tool against 2020 Democratic presidential hopefuls, according to the person familiar with the plans.

“You better believe we’re going to bludgeon them,” said Bryan Lanza, a deputy communications director on Mr Trump’s 2016 campaign, of Democrats who have said they would continue to investigate the president in the wake of Mr Mueller’s findings.

At campaign rallies over the last two years, Mr Trump has frequently attacked the investigations into him and his associates.

In El Paso, Texas, last month, Mr Trump told supporters: “No president should ever have to go through what we’ve gone through in the first two years. It’s a hoax, it’s a disgrace and it should never be allowed to happen again.”

The probe obtained guilty pleas from five Trump advisers and indicted dozens of Russian intelligence officials. Paul Manafort, Mr Trump’s former campaign chairman, is set to serve about seven years in prison for crimes including bank fraud, while Michael Cohen, the president’s former personal lawyer, will begin a three-year prison sentence in May.

The Trump campaign on Sunday evening began fundraising off Mr Mueller’s findings. Brad Parscale, the president’s campaign manager, said in a statement that Mr Mueller’s report had caught Democrats “in an elaborate web of lies and deceit.”

The campaign also sent supporters a video titled “Collusion Hoax” that invited them to text the word “WITCHHUNT” to a campaign phone number to sign up for alerts.

The campaign expects Mr Mueller’s findings to bolster the president, a person familiar with the discussions said — particularly among independent voters, who had largely backed the investigation.

A Washington Post-Schar School poll in February found that more than 70% of Democrats approved of the way Mr Mueller was handling the investigation, while a similar share of Republicans disapproved. Among independents, 52% had a favourable view of the special counsel, while 29% didn’t.

The Republican National Committee, meanwhile, sought to undercut the House Judiciary Committee’s wide-ranging investigations into any obstruction of justice, corruption and abuse of power by the Trumpadministration. “Now Democrats are saying the Special Counsel’s investigation wasn’t enough and that they must continue their baseless fishing expeditions in Congress,” the party wrote Sunday in an email to supporters.

The president continues to face legal scrutiny on several other fronts. In addition to the congressional investigations, which have sought documents from more than 80 agencies and associates of the president, Manhattan federal prosecutors are investigating matters related to hush-money payments they said Mr Trump directed his former lawyer Michael Cohen to arrange during the 2016 election, as well as to probe the president’s inaugural committee. Mr Trump has denied directing his lawyer to break the law.

“This is hardly over for the president,” said John Carlin, former assistant Attorney-General for the Justice Department’s National Security Division who served as chief of staff to Mr Mueller when he was FBI director.

Based on Mr Barr’s letter, the report “does not exonerate the president but strongly spells out the facts consistent with the Nixon precedent that Congress must now make its own determination,” said Mr Carlin, now a partner at Morrison & Foerster, a law firm.

During the Watergate scandal, lawmakers led their own investigations into former President Nixon’s conduct and pursued impeachment only as Mr Nixon’s own party began to abandon him. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) has said she doesn’t favour impeaching the president, though other Democratic lawmakers have spoken in favour of pursuing it.

Mr Trump spent the weekend in Florida, in part golfing with friends and advisers including musician Kid Rock, his acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.).

Mr Mueller on Friday afternoon delivered his report to Mr Barr and Mr Rosenstein, both of whom were nominated by Mr Trump.

On Friday evening, Mr Trump attended a fundraising dinner at Mar-a-Lago, his luxury resort, for the Palm Beach Republican Party.

Afterward, but before the findings of the report were released, Mr Graham spoke with the president. “He was in a good mood. Just imagine your whole life has been under scrutiny, you’re accused of something you don’t think you did,” Mr Graham recalled in an interview. “He just said, basically, ‘Thank God it’s over’ — that part of it.”

Returning to the White House on Sunday evening, Mr Trump proclaimed the U.S. “the greatest place on Earth.”

WSJ