Has concluded his investigation of russian interference into the 2016 election and related matters. It then continues. The special counsel has submitted to me today a confidential report explaining the prosecution or decoration decisions hes reached as required. Im a position to advice you of the special counsels principle conclusions as soon as this weekend. Thats obviously crucial. Separately, barr, continues, i intend to consult with Deputy Attorney rosenstein and potential counsel mueller to derm what information can be released to the public and Congress Consistent with the law including the departments longstanding practices and policies. I remain committed to as much transparency as possible, and i will keep you informed as to the status of my review. We have a team of reporters standing by. Evan perez is with us. Abbey philip live outside the white house. Laura jarrett, manu raju live on capitol hill. And i want to start with evan. Evan, a couple of crucial things. Youre being told there are no more indictments coming from the special counsel, but barr is saying we could see some of these crucial results or at least they could be given to congress as soon as this weekend. But hes not done reading the report itself at this time. Thats right, erin. Hes still working through the actual report, which sources have told our Laura Jarrett there at the Justice Department its a comprehensive report. Theres a lot of information in this. So the question is how much detail is barr going to be able to get into when he provides what we call the barr report essentially to members of congress . And this weekend is the first time hes going to be able to brief them on some of the principle conclusions of that report. How detailed will that be . Its important to underscore that big headline you just said, no more indictments. And thats an important thing for the president , right after 675 days of this investigation. After an investigation that has frankly clouded his Administration Since the beginning of his presidency. The president can begin to probably breathe a little easier that the idea his vindication is coming. He knows that so far from the Mueller Investigation, the Public Information thats been released by Robert Mueller, theres been nothing that comes close to what looks like collusion or conspiracy, which has at the focus of this investigation, the idea that there was somebody in the president s campaign who was colluding with the russians. None of that has come forward in any of the public court documents, indictments that have been brought. This has been a very comprehensive investigation. Its been a very fruitful investigation. 37 individuals and entities have been charged including 6 trump associates. But the essential question of russian collusion has not so far been proved in any public document. So the question is, erin, does that report that is now in the hands of bill barr, does it say anything about that . Did they find any proof of that . Thats the big question that remains unanswered at this point . Right, and obviously the crucial reason the American Public want to see this report. And to your point, we dont know what may have been passed off to other jurisdictions, you know, like the Michael Cohen and the Campaign Finance possible crimes and who knows what else there could be that could have been passed off. Evans going to be with us for the hour as news continue to break here. As we said bill barr is continuing to read this as we speak. Abbey, whats the response from the president . We know that the white house found out about this just about 20 minutes before everyone else did, and all they knew was mueller is done. What is the response that youre hearing now from the white house . Reporter thats right, erin. The white house at this moment knows about as much about this as we do match they found exactly the same information that we did about a half an hour before we did. And the president whos been down in florida all day hasnt said anything yet. As of right now, though, what we are hearing from aides privately is a sense of relief. This twoyear investigation is over, and oats now over with word that there will be no more indictments. The president has been saying repeatedly over the last several days no collusion, no obstruction, that this is all a witch hunt. And i think white house aides and the president s allies are already beginning this process of saying that the fact there are no further indictments to those points as evan just pointed out proves that the president was right about this all along. Thats the narrative that i think were about to hear from the white house and from the president s supporters. Hes down there in florida. We dont know when hes going to weigh in, but the white house has said that were not going to see him again tonight. Theyve called what we call a lid here, meaning that the president s not going to be in front of the cameras. But hes at his club where a lot of his friends are, where a lot of his aides are right at this moment. Hes surrounded by two of his tom legal team, two of his top secretaries. And i can bet theres going to be quite a bit of strategizing happening over this weekend. And particularly as members of congress where being briefed by the department of justice thats going to be a critical point. I think the white house is expecting leaks as that process continues, and i think theyll be expecting also to combat those leaks with their own narrative as this goes along, erin. The more they perceive perhaps vindication perhaps the president saying its illegal and the Mueller Report and a hoax. Lets go to john dean, garret graff and juliette kayyem. Also with us james trusty and a long time friend of Rod Rosenstein who of course has overseen this entire thing. John dean, anything surprise you here . Not so far. This has been right by the letter of the special counsels charter. Hes released the document. What im looking for is relief and understanding that theres no whiting or unwhiting likelihood that the president is an agent of russia. Thats when ill feel comfortable and no evidence he even hints of that. We dont know that yet. As i say if barr honors his word well know more soon. Now, garret, barr has said he wants to put out as much as he can. Barr is obviously very respected lawyer and when he became attorney general. Hes now reading the report as he speaks. And he did say from what he knew he thought some principle conclusions, hed be able to make those to congress as soon as this weekend. The report is comprehensive. When you put all that together, what do you take away from it, garret . So the challenge with the comprehensive phrasing is the extent to which it gets into noncriminally charged conduct, which presumably a comprehensive report would. But thats been one of these lightening rods as bill barr has been talking about it. Everyone is very concerned about the jim comey example from 2016 about Hillary Clinton and her emails, about sort of getting deep into the weeds why the Justice Department didnt pursue criminal charges in certain cases. But if mueller is supposed to tell a comprehensive narrative here, he is surely going to be talking about information that doesnt rise to the level of criminal charges. Particularly in regards to the president himself. And as john dean was just saying, we dont yet know that the president has gotten a full clean bill of health from Robert Muellers investigation here because one of the complicating factors is this Justice Department guideline that says the president cannot be indicted. So it is possible that the president might not be out of the woods legally yet, and certainly not politically yet depending on whats in this report. You have always said its the narrative here thats so important. But when john dean references things like unwitting agent, you can obviously a situation like this which could be part of this narrative in this report. Its not indictable, its not a crime but it would still be a pretty terrible thing. Absolutely from the p perspective of the United States democracy. Think of it in terms of four different buckets that are going on here. One is the criminal investigation that mueller just closed, and that was a significant investigation with lots of people in jail, lots of people who pled and lots of indictments still out there. Theres a criminal investigation not with mueller that is now in new york and elsewhere. Those will continue, those will raise news. The third piece as garret was just saying, the Counter IntelligenceNational Security piece. It does not need to rise to the level of criminal indictment, but it could still be pretty bad. It could show a president compromised. We dont know what well see over the next couple of weeks. And then theres what none of us can control, the political piece. The fight with congress, what is trump going to tweet . Thats what we should be thinking about the next couple of weeks. We resolved one or one was closed today. Lets just say the fat lady has not sung yet. And obviously there are so many questions but on this issue of indictments themselves, barr the informed congress tonight, the judiciary committees that mueller never tried to indict the president. Now, of course that would be against Justice Department policy. But even though it was against policy mueller could have felt the president committed an indictable crime and felt like in any other situation he would have moved forward with an indictment. But in his letter today barr says mueller had never promised an action, and he was clear there were no such instances during the special counsels investigation. It was very black and white. How big of a deal is that, james . Yeah, that last part is a bit of interesting process here. Theres a secondary requirement that the department of justice report to congress under the special counsel law if they have one of these fundamental disagreements. Its effectively having congress over see the process of special counsel by making sure that an attorney general or Deputy Attorney general doesnt basically squash their investigation. So he made that point to say theres no second report coming out. There were no fundamental disagreements between doj leadership and special counsel. That doesnt mean they didnt have disagreements that were kind of more amicable or they were more collaborative in their approach to it. So, john, the roreport was submitted without a sit down with the president. Instead it was submitted written answers which were lawyered up and vague where they needed to be. Does this prove to have been a great decision for the president . Well, it may. Again, were shooting a little bit in the dark here as to what actually is concluded in the report. But i think that probably was a smart decision on any count because this is a president who is often very challenge bid by telling the truth. So filtering it through liars and doing it in a written form is unt as safe a way you can do it. So i think theyre probably celebrating that fact tonight. So barr writes he may be in a position to advise congress of the principle conclusions as soon as this weekend. Im just curious to your take away from that given that barr has not finished reading the report. So presumably barr has been briefed on this investigation since hes stepped into office, that hes been probably kept uptodate. Remember Rod Rosenstein was closely involved and monitoring this investigation when he was the person overseeing the investigation. And so barr probably has a pretty good idea of what is going to be in this report. I would sort of add one thing that we havent talked about so far to juliettes very smart analysis of the different buckets. Theres also the obstruction question, which is, you know, weve seen sort of all of the other aspects of muellers investigation come out in Court Charges at some point. The gru, the Internet Research agency, Paul Manafort, michael flynn, other cases. But we havent seen sort of this core question, the original sin that begat the Mueller Investigation in the first place, which was the firing of jim comey and sort of the actions that grew out of that. Which again focus on the president , wouldnt have necessarily led to criminal charges understand the Justice Department guidelines, but that collectively might be the biggest part of this report that we havent seen and that we just have no idea where mueller is heading. Now, james, we dont know what mueller as part of his mandate it included any links or coordination between the russian government or individuals associated with the campaign of President Trump, any matters that arose or might arise directly from the investigation. Obviously that is stuff that could be handed off. He could be handing things off. Is the president in the remit of this to get to bottom line and comprehensive report, is the president s historical relationship with russia, his monetary interactions with russia, if in any sense he was ever seen as a trusted person by russian assets, is that within the scope . And if so, is that ever going to see the light of day . Because if youre not going to indict someone but still put it in there its pretty damning . We may be guessing with some knowledge of a bottom line but no substances behind it. Scope can change. When special counsel gets appoint said theres a clear mandate. But over the course of the investigation rosenstein was in a position to approve or reject some of the changes of that investigation. And thats when you might start seeing handoffs. We dont fully know what the scope is. Im hoping that the process becomes a little fully more illuminated as well. But youre right, theres certainly opportunity for factual assertions to be put in this report that make it at least politically harmful if not legally harmful. Shes at all Justice Department. Laura, youve been doing so much reporting on this. Youre now reporting hes in his office, the attorney general bill barr, reading the report as we speak. So tell me what you know about him and what hes going to do next. We know he started right away this afternoon digging in the details, pouring over it. And were told just a few close advisers have actually seen this. Just a few officials are going to be the ones that actually review the confidential report that mueller delivered just earlier this afternoon. Were told the white house has not seen that report. Still tbd whether they do get to review the principle conclusions before those go to congress. My colleague pamela brown has of course reported that they do expect to receive some awareness of the substance before that goes to the hill. As for those principle clonclusions in a letter to lawmakers this evening, the attorney general bill barr says he expects to be able to provide those principle conclusions as soon as this weekend. And i am told those principle conclusions which you could essentially think of as a summary or distillation of the core findings of the Mueller Report. But thats barrs distillation that that will be made public as well. So its not as if that is only going to the hill. And then as a second step barr outlines hes also going to be in consultation with the Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein as well as mueller himself trying to figure out what else from the report can be made public. But we should think of that as certainly a ways off. The principle conclusions are the thing we should look for next, erin. Thank you very much, laura. Juliette, principle conclusions. How much is that really going to give us . We already know, for example, no more indictments. So i would expect thats one principle conclusion. Ive been saying people who want everything and im watching some of the tweets on the hill, so theres a lot going on here. There are cases going on. There are investigations still going on. I am much more sympathetic to barr taking his time and protecting those investigations then because we know a lot of what animated mueller was of course grand jury testimony and other things that we ought not to see because those cases are still going on. So i think this idea, sort of im sort of not there with a lot of the critics of the Trump Administration. On the other hand, to the extent that barr wants the Justice Department to be relieved of being viewed as political, he should explain, and i kind of like what i heard when he said he was going to consult with mueller, why certain materials would not be released and provide as much information as he can. So maybe im splitting the difference here, but i do think just given whats going on in the indictments and Counter Intelligence and all that stuff, i never anticipated that we would see the document that barr is seeing. Barr, on the other hand, has an obligation. And he seems to be given a little bit of a nod to it by invoking mueller, that he needs to explain why it is hes not releasing certain information so that the conspiracy theories go away, and then this just becomes a political impeachment or whatever else fight or a legal fight with the white house. Barr should get the Justice Department out of this. And it sounds like he wants to. John dean, though, do you think were going to end up seeing all of it . In a sense barr is saying principle conclusions as soon as this weekend. It certainly does add to at least the perception that he wants full transparency, which he indicated during his confirmation hearing. He wanted to the extent he could consistent with the regulations. Barr seems very much like an establishmentitarian. He wants to do it in a way that will not harm the department of justice and his own career