The Mueller Report - non-exonerating content only

Sorry everyone - the other thread was a bit derailed - let's just discuss the findings on this one!

Lawfare had a pretty good first analysis:

https://www.lawfareblog.com/what-mueller-found-russia-and-obstruction-first-analysis

jamie said:
Sorry everyone - the other thread was a bit derailed - let's just discuss the findings on this one!

 I wish you the best of luck in your endeavour. 

For those who want to read it.

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/5955249-Report.html

From the report and Mueller's findings - 14 other crimes are under investigation:

I think page 2 of the report explains the standard used by Mueller, which was not a "collusion or no collusion standard.

In evaluating whether evidence about collective action of multiple individuals constituted a crime, we applied the framework of conspiracy law, not the concept of "collusion." In so doing, the Office recognized that the word "collud[e]" was used in communications with the Acting Attorney General confirming certain aspects of the investigation's scope and that the term has frequently been invoked in public reporting about the investigation. But collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal law. For those reasons, the Office ' s focus in analyzing questions of joint criminal liability was on conspiracy as defined in federal law. In connection with that analysis, we addressed the factual question whether members of the Trump Campaign "coordinat[ed]"- a term that appears in the appointment order-with Russian election interference activities. Like collusion, "coordination" does not have a settled definition in federal criminal law. We understood coordination to require an agreement-tacit or express- between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference. That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests. We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.

So the standard required more than just they knew what the Russians were doing, so just "taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests" would not meet the standard Mueller used to find "coordination".

The Mueller investigation didn't find an explicit agreement.  So not prosecutable, but more than "we didn't know what the Russians were doing (or cheer them on".  I don't think that puts Trump in a very noble light, especially with respect to level of knowledge about actual Russian interference.

Big question - does obstruction conclusion rise to Nixon levels?

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-coan-mueller-report-nixon-trump-20190419-story.html

Lest it be forgotten, all of this took place in the context of one of the most serious law enforcement and counterintelligence investigations in the history of the United States. As the Mueller report explains, “The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion” on behalf of Donald Trump. The FBI and Mueller set out to discover whether Trump’s campaign was complicit, and Trump took extraordinary measures to thwart their efforts. Nixon’s obstruction of the Watergate investigation looks almost innocent by comparison.

Feedback on the obstruction points from 12 legal experts:

https://www.vox.com/2019/4/18/18484731/mueller-report-trump-barr-obstruction-legal-experts

jamie said:
Big question - does obstruction conclusion rise to Nixon levels?
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-coan-mueller-report-nixon-trump-20190419-story.html

Lest it be forgotten, all of this took place in the context of one of the most serious law enforcement and counterintelligence investigations in the history of the United States. As the Mueller report explains, “The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion” on behalf of Donald Trump. The FBI and Mueller set out to discover whether Trump’s campaign was complicit, and Trump took extraordinary measures to thwart their efforts. Nixon’s obstruction of the Watergate investigation looks almost innocent by comparison.

Feedback on the obstruction points from 12 legal experts:
https://www.vox.com/2019/4/18/18484731/mueller-report-trump-barr-obstruction-legal-experts

 Somewhere very hot Mr. Nixon is saying, "Yes!  I'm not the worst!"

A Lawfare contributor is reading through the report and posting notes as he goes:

https://www.lawfareblog.com/notes-mueller-report-reading-diary

And a piece about the report arguing that it supports an impeachment inquiry:

"The Mueller Report describes, in excruciating detail and with relatively few redactions, a candidate and a campaign aware of the existence of a plot by a hostile foreign government to criminally interfere in the U.S. election for the purpose of supporting that candidate’s side. It describes a candidate and a campaign who welcomed the efforts and delighted in the assistance. It describes a candidate and a campaign who brazenly and serially lied to the American people about the existence of the foreign conspiracy and their contacts with it. And yet, it does not find evidence to support a charge of criminal conspiracy, which requires not just a shared purpose but a meeting of the minds.

"Here is the other bottom line: The Mueller Report describes a president who, on numerous occasions, engaged in conduct calculated to hinder a federal investigation. It finds ample evidence that at least a portion of that conduct met all of the statutory elements of criminal obstruction of justice. In some of the instances in which all of the statutory elements of obstruction are met, the report finds no persuasive constitutional or factual defenses. And yet, it declines to render a judgment on whether the president has committed a crime.

"Now, the House must decide what to do with these facts. If it wants to actually confront the substance of the report, it will introduce a resolution to begin an impeachment inquiry."

I’m not sure how true this is, it’s the opinion of one law firm, but it seems legit.

When determining factors of Constitutional law, the first place I turn to is some guy is Bumble-****, Michigan who happens to have a law degree.

And Internet access.

.

ridski said:
I’m not sure how true this is, it’s the opinion of one law firm, but it seems legit.

 This was a ripoff of work done by Quinta Jurecic of Lawfare. 

https://www.lawfareblog.com/obstruction-justice-mueller-report-heat-map

Seventy-three years later, municipal planning offices across the nation are still dumbfounded by that merger vote in Bumble, Mich.

eliz said:
 This was a ripoff of work done by Quinta Jurecic of Lawfare. 
https://www.lawfareblog.com/obstruction-justice-mueller-report-heat-map

 Not a rip-off. I actually found this one from Quinta's twitter feed, as it was brought to her attention and she re-tweeted it. 

https://twitter.com/qjurecic/status/1119813638460715009

Lawfareblog then mentioned it in the revised version of the article you posted (paragraph 4.)

A substantive article which came out today, on "collusion".

Guide to the Mueller Report's Findings on "Collusion"

Intro:

Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s final report focuses only on whether crimes were committed. It addresses two Russian conspiracies to interfere in the 2016 election—one involving a social media influence campaign and the other involving the hacking and dissemination of stolen emails. The Report then addresses whether Trump Campaign associates knowingly entered an agreement with the Russian government to assist those conspiracies.

As many experts have noted, what’s missing from the Mueller Report is the Special Counsel’s counterintelligence findings. We don’t know what the Special Counsel’s Office or the FBI have assessed, for example, with respect to whether Trump associates engaged in reciprocal efforts with Russian agents without entering a criminal agreement to do so, whether Americans have been witting or unwitting Russian assets, and what leverage or influence Moscow may have over particular individuals.
…

Although the Mueller Report does not squarely address these questions of “collusion” that fall outside the scope of potential criminal liability, it can be mined for substantive information that provides some meaningful answers.

It's very detailed and informative, and worth reading the whole thing.

This hasn’t gotten a lot of attention, but an essay by David Cole, national director of the ACLU, called attention in the latest New York Review of Books to this reason (among the several) that Mueller gave for not making a judgment on criminality in the obstruction section:

He further reasoned that since he could not indict President Trump no matter how strong the evidence against him, it would be unfair to conclude in his report that Trump had committed a crime, because without a trial, Trump would not have an opportunity to clear his name. Thus Mueller’s reticence stemmed from a concern for fairness, not from any doubt about the evidence.

(Cole’s last phrase ends that excerpt on a suppositional note.)

From the Mueller report:

Third, we considered whether to evaluate the conduct we investigated under the Justice Manual standards governing prosecution and declination decisions, but we determined not to apply an approach that could potentially result in a judgment that the President committed crimes. The threshold step under the Justice Manual standards is to assess whether a person's conduct "constitutes a federal offense." Fairness concerns counseled against potentially reaching that judgment when no charges can be brought. The ordinary means for an individual to respond to an accusation is through a speedy and public trial, with all the procedural protections that surround a criminal case. An individual who believes he was wrongly accused can use that process to seek to clear his name. In contrast, a prosecutor's judgment that crimes were committed, but that no charges will be brought, affords no such adversarial opportunity for public name-clearing before an impartial adjudicator. 

This is all well and good, but the fact remains that only the President was protected from being indicted - not the rest of the campaign staff. The fact that Mueller indicted no one at all on the conspiracy charges is indicative that maybe there really was no there there.

Right?

drummerboy said:
This is all well and good, but the fact remains that only the President was protected from being indicted - not the rest of the campaign staff. The fact that Mueller indicted no one at all on the conspiracy charges is indicative that maybe there really was no there there.
Right?

 On obstruction of justice, only the President is the subject of whether to indict or not.  Mueller left it open for the reasons noted in prior posts.

nohero said:

drummerboy said:
This is all well and good, but the fact remains that only the President was protected from being indicted - not the rest of the campaign staff. The fact that Mueller indicted no one at all on the conspiracy charges is indicative that maybe there really was no there there.
Right?

 On obstruction of justice, only the President is the subject of whether to indict or not.  Mueller left it open for the reasons noted in prior posts.

 I'm talking about the Russian end of the investigation.

drummerboy said:

nohero said:

drummerboy said:
This is all well and good, but the fact remains that only the President was protected from being indicted - not the rest of the campaign staff. The fact that Mueller indicted no one at all on the conspiracy charges is indicative that maybe there really was no there there.
Right?

 On obstruction of justice, only the President is the subject of whether to indict or not.  Mueller left it open for the reasons noted in prior posts.

 I'm talking about the Russian end of the investigation.

 I know, but the indictment discussion (as in, "the President was protected from being indicted") is about the obstruction of justice side of the investigation.

Wasn't Cohen sent to jail because of something him and Trump conspired on? 

basil said:
Wasn't Cohen sent to jail because of something him and Trump conspired on? 

 I think it was because he lied about it.

STANV said:

basil said:
Wasn't Cohen sent to jail because of something him and Trump conspired on? 

 I think it was because he lied about it.

I thought it was at least partly for campaign finance violations, which he did together with Trump. Oh and by the way, Trump lied about it too.

So why isn't Trump going to jail?

basil said:
I thought it was at least partly for campaign finance violations, which he did together with Trump. Oh and by the way, Trump lied about it too.


So why isn't Trump going to jail?

 Don't assume he isn't.

STANV said:

basil said:
I thought it was at least partly for campaign finance violations, which he did together with Trump. Oh and by the way, Trump lied about it too.


So why isn't Trump going to jail?

 Don't assume he isn't.

I will bet you 25 cents that he won't. US is much more of a class-based society than people think.