a crime. which is consistent with language from his report but still leaves open the question what would mueller have done if not for the olc opinion. i spoke with congressman lu earlier tonight. congressman, your exchange with mueller produced clearly one of the more surprising responses from him of the day. were you surprised by his first answer this morning and then by his walk back later in the day? i was not surprised by his first answer because special counsel mueller himself who always brings up the olc opinion saying that he was instructed he could not indict a sitting president, and i simply walked special counsel mueller through the three elements of obstruction of justice. i showed that they were all met and then i asked him basically is the reason he didn t indict donald trump because of that opinion and he said yes. it was perfectly logical and made perfect sense. when he walked it back, he seemed to lay the blame on you for the way you frame the question rather than
the issues, they would have been surprised today because special counsel robert mueller directly contradicts donald trump and attorney general bill barr. appreciate your time. thank you. a lot to talk about, i ll only do this one, former top obama advisor david axelrod and nia mallika henderson and gloria boringer and jeffrey toobin and corey cordero and kirsten powers and former trump campaign strategists and cnn political commentator david urban. if democrats were looking for, you know, we heard nothing from democrats other than if all he does is read from the report, that will be great. of course, he did read from the report. listen, i think what ted lu said was interesting. we ll have to wait a few days and see what the american people say. the reality is the last poll i saw was the wall street journal nbc poll last weekend that said 21% of americans
heard the president ordered corey lewandowski to tell jeff sessions to limit your investigation so that he, you stop investigating the president. i believe the person looking at these facts could conclude that all three elements of the crime of obstruction of justice have been met, and i d like to ask you, the reason again that you did not indict donald trump is because of olc opinion stating you cannot indict a sitting president, correct? that is correct. well, as you might imagine, that made news, unwelcome news to mueller that walked back his remarks a short time later. i want to go back to one thing that was said this morning by mr. lu who said and i quote you didn t charge the president because of the olc opinion. that is not the correct way to say it. as we say in the report and as i said at the opening, we did not reach a determination as to whether the president committed
mueller wanted his old job back, mueller was asked about that today. so you don t recall on may 16th, 2017 that you interviewed with the president regarding the fbi director job? i interviewed with the president about the fbi director job? about the job and not me applying for the job. so your statement here today is that you didn t interview to apply for the fbi director job? that s correct. the president called attention to a moment early on that had democrats buzzing because it went to the heart of the case they were trying to make the special counsel would indict the president on obstruction of justice charges or not for the obstruction of justice charges barred the president from being indicted. that happened with ted lu. it s a recap of what we heard. we heard the president ordered former white house counsel don mcgahn to fire you. the president ordered don mcgahn to cover that up and create a false paper trail and now we ve
directed him to do. those being the payments to stormy daniels, hush money in effect. if this were true as well, why is this particularly significant? there is a lot to unpack here. the first thing i would say is we are seeing reaction from democratic lawmakers. the thing i would ask them to do is slow your roll. these talks of impeachment and removing the president and obstruction of justice. they are skipping an important step. that s the investigation. we have mentioned this is buzzfeed reporting. we haven t independently confirmed it. they have to understand as well they have to investigate. congressman lu had it right saying they should hold hearings. folks should realize there are additional steps here. let s talk about the investigation. michael cohen is on record now admitting to lying. at the end of the day we are going to have two people who are liars telling a different story. we have michael cohen and the president. at the end of the day it comes down to what s in the rep