Trusted as an honest broker. Yes, barr barr seems to have acted over the last four weeks including yesterday not as the attorney general of the United States but as the president s personal attorney. Barrs critics point to the report, things taken out of context during the initial fourpage summary and statements at his press conference. And the fact that the report went to the president s personal lawyers days, days before congress got a look. Ranking member collins says the subpoena is overboard and flies in the face of normal and proper congressional oversight. Hes hardly the first congressional floun come to the president s republican to come to the president s defense. Although the president is arguably his own best defender because hes tweeted about the report nine times since it was released yesterday. And despite trumps repeated claims of total exoneration, the report does not conclude anything of the sort. In fact, mueller specifically declined to zoexonerate the president of obstruction of justice and as Congressional Democrats note, there are still parts of the report we have not seen. So our big question today is what more will Congress Learn if it does get the unredacted Mueller Report . Young me, White House Correspondent kristin welker, National Security reporter matt zapatosky, editorinchief of law fair and analyst who has not slept in the last 48 hours or so, benjamin whitdis, and former House Intel Committee staffer mika youn. The president has been saying this since the summary came out from william barr. Today he tweets about the fact that he says that this is a crazy report. Heed that its a lot he said that a lot of people lied in is. Is it an zone radiation or a report exoneration or a report of lies . Whats the white house saying . I think its the result of the dueling results yesterday. The fact that you had the attorney general come out and say the bottom sideline no collusion, of course thats something that weve heard the president say quite a bit. And then you have the report itself, 400 pages that were made public an hour and a half after that remarkable press conference by the attorney general which essentially said, look, here are ten different examples of which President Trump walked up to the line of obstructing justice, but his own top advisers basically blocked him, thwarted him, saved himself from himself and from potentially crossing a number of legal and ethic at lines. So the white house knows the president knows that there were some very damaging revelations in the report. At the same time, they want to bottom line this. Thats why i think the president didnt answer questions yesterday from the press. They wanted to try to turn the page. We know this president. We know things get under his skin. This is the second phase of his acceptance i think of essentially what happened yesterday which is that a lot of embarrassing and damaging revelations came out of that report. So matt, youve been covering this, the report, for nearly two years. You are so good, you get these great numbers. You noted that while there were fewer redactions than expected, its amazing to look at the sort of the breakdown of what they represent. Almost seven out of every ten lines, lets put it that way, because theyre ongoing investigation. The rest about grand jury material, very little really, less than 10 , about classified information. 5 because of personal information. So what does this tell us when you look at the big picture of what this report represents . Yeah, that last category surprised me the most. I kind of thought that democrats and others would be so unsatisfied because there would be heavy redactions for people that bill barr defined as peripheral. Almost despite his performance in the morning where he says five times the president committed no collusion, he adopted the president s word, he then aired it out in this report. I mean, the redactions on the whole were relatively minimal and didnt get in the way of this compelling story of how the president , you know, repeatedly sought to crush muellers investigation. It was just remarkable how little was sort of taken out to interfere with the narrative. Thats not to say im not curious about whats behind all of those black boxes, but there is so much laid out. I was sort of sitting there thinking as im reading, man, if we didnt know all of this in leg roletime, if the post realtime, if the post hadnt reported in realtime, everyone learned this information today, what a different world wed be living in. Yes, theres some redactions. Im curious whats behind them. Im still stunned by the whole story that mueller laid out. Lets talk about the part of it that isnt there i want to look forward a little bit. When you look at those numbers, when you see whats missing, when you see that clearly Robert Mueller has decided theres still things out there that need to be investigated, that needed to be handed off to someone who wasnt the special counsel, how do you view this report . I view it very much as a referral to congress for further investigation. Look, there are a number of open questions in this report. Theyre clear that they couldnt get to them. And also part of muellers charge was a counterintelligence investigation. We havent seen any sign of what that is. That will be much more highly classified if it were released with greater redaction. Congress has a right to see that, too. Its not just a question of criminality here but of risk to the National Security of the nation. And the foreign intelligence questions still remain. So where do we go with this . Where do you see this going from a legal sense, benjamin . I think theres a big question facing Congressional Democrats which is whether they want to have a big fight over what i agree with matt are relatively marginal redactions that actually dont get all that much in the way of your ability to read the report, or do they want to focus on the substance of what the report says . Now the subpoena that went out today suggests that they are sort of spoiling for a fight over the process. And i actually think thats not the greatest idea in the world. I think the the monumental nature of the content of this report actually requires a lot of attention, and i think tractortrailers easy to use and i think it is easy to use process fights as a way of avoiding paying attention to the substance of what the document actually says. I think this say document that really calls for judgment from all kinds of actors, journalistic judgment, historical judgment, political judgment by voters and, yes, judgments by members of congress as to whether this is the kind of activity from a president that we should accept as a society. And i dont want to lose track of that by focusing on these process questions. One of the questions, though, is was that you . I was going to jump in on that. Look, i have confidence in the congressional committees ability to do both, to seek the full information that theyre entitled to and to focus on the investigation. Weve seen them take on other issues. You know how the process works. Help us to understand why you think that. So, the subpoena process, theyll send a letter over, house counsel, not the committee staff, can bring suit in court about this. This is a process that will run con correctly with concurrently with the investigations of the substance of the Mueller Report itself. I think that this isnt in place of but in addition to. And Congress Absolutely has the right to the full unredacted report here. One of the things we know, and you reported this, this longawaited response that the white house was going to give is not going to come out, but how big of a fight are they gearing up for over this, and what are they doing right now . Well, theyre gearing up for a political fight. And as you point out, the president s legal team is saying that longawaited counter report, we dont need to put it out. Again, theyre hanging their hat on the bottom line as it was laid out by the attorney general. So what does the political fight look like . This becomes a part of the president s reelection campaign. This is something i think that he will use to energize his base. You saw that again today on twitter. Hes trying to turn this into something that becomes a political strength instead of a weakness. How will it play remains to be seen. In terms of what congress does, in terms of what democrats do, theyre in a bind here. Bens talking about the challenges with that moving forward. Of course we know the i word has resurfaced and has gotten new focus. Impeachment. There are new calls for impeachment, but Democratic Leaders are saying, wait a minute, weve got to let this process play out. Were not there yet. They say they want to hear from mueller first. And again, they say they want to see the full and redacted report. Great of to you here in studio. Ma, ben, mieke, thank you all. That leads me perfectly to the next guest. Democratic congressman from california Eric Swalwell, a member of the intel and judiciary committees. And he is also, of course, a candidate for president. I want to pick up if i can on what kristen was saying. She said, look, democrats are in a bind. Weve seen in the moves to given, there the snufs thint they say theres enough for articles of impeachment. Where are you on that . Good afternoon, chris. First, i think first and foremost we need a president whos going to acknowledge what the russians did and assure the country were not going to see this happen again. 200 pages are you holding your breath for that, congressman . I hope republicans can join us and say regardingless of the criminality here, regardless of the obstruction issues, we dont want any campaign to ever do this again. And just because there was a failure of imagination by prior congresses to write laws to prohibit what this campaign did doesnt mean we should allow it and doesnt mean we shoot try and write laws now to prohibit this type of conduct going forward. Then theres the obstruction issue. And according to bob mueller, the president is a doubledigit obstructer. And hes going to have to be held accountable. The first weigh point is bringing bob mueller to testify. I think its going to be helpful to hear bob mueller lay it out. That report was 400 pages. Took me a couple of hours to go through it. Most folks that i know, you know, look, theyre just doing their jobs, picking up kids from soccer practice, putting dinner on the table, theyre not going to have time to read and digest it the way lawmakers are. They will listen to bob mueller if he comes before congress. I think thats the next step. Reading through the report we should remind people that you have a law degree so you read it with a practiced and learned eye, theres nothing that says to you right now we should pursue articles of impeachment . Oh, no, no. I would say theres nothing that says were we should go farther away from impeachment. I think its a conversation we have to have as far as how do you hold this president accountable, how do you set a standard for a future president that says were not going to tolerate this, that you cant fire your investigator and you cant lie. And as the report describes, that the president and his campaign and their lies and their obstruction materially impaired the investigation. In america, you dont get to bury the evidence so deep that if investigators cant find it you get off scotfree. There are ways to hold you accountable. Thats called obstruction of justice. So youre for impeachment. Thats what im hearing you so no, im for bringing bob mueller in and seeing what evidence is laid out by mueller, where that leaves the country. Will there be bipartisan buyin to hold the president accountable. Hes going to have to be held accountable one way or another. I know nancy pelosi said that, and i understand why from a political point of view people would say lets make sure that we have people on both sides of the aisle who are willing because why go down this road if its not going to do anything but divide the country. Theres an argument on the other side, and ive heard it from democrats that theyre concerned if you dont pursue impeachment, its sending a message to future president s you know what this kind of behavior is okay. The kind of behavior that you and an awful lot of democrats have found at least unacceptable and in some cases in your own mind criminal. Im closer to that latter group. Its understandable that if you see donald trump always jumping to conclusions, always believing that he can call someone guilty without evidence, that you would expect democrats to do the same to him. We believe in the rule of law, though. We still think there has to be order to this process and the most important thing is to get all of the documents, bring bob mueller in, and make sure the American People were not going to allow this in our election in 2020. Before you go, i want to ask about ythe world we live in. You got a threat against you and members of congress. You tweeted and said thank you to Capitol Police and florida Law Enforcement for protecting my staff and constituents. What can you tell us about this threat . And do you think that we are in a world where look, you would not be the first member of congress, sadly, who has been threatened. But are we in a different space now, a really different space . I hope not. And i am grateful to the Capitol Police, chris, for protecting me, my family, staff, and constituents. And im running for president because i want to have a conversation in this country about changing our gun laws. This threat is a tactic to have congress and our lawmakers do nothing. There should be space to have a respectful debate. But making a threat like this is the lowest form of communication. Theres no space for that. And also, by the way, if your response to a lawmaker proposing in our democracy to change gun laws and take the most dangerous hands out of the most dangerous people, if your response to that is to threaten to kill that lawmaker, you are proving why we need to have more restrictions on firearm possession in america. President ial candidate and congressman Eric Swalwell, thank you so much. I hope youre going to have a nice Holiday Weekend with your family. Thank you, you, too. Happy easter. Republicans are saying this is case closed. Does congress have the responsibility to pick up where mueller left off . We heard that from in of our guests. Pl 34 guests pl 3 [zara larsson wow] baby im not even in a gown and the only thing u have to say is wow make youre jaw drop drop say oh my drop drop drop make u say oh my god my drop drop make youre jaw drop make u say oh my god and you never felt this type of emotion make youre jaw drop drop say oh my drop drop drop make u say oh my god my drop drop make youre jaw drop make u say oh my god mno kidding. Rd. But moving your internet and tv . Thats easy. Easy . easy . Easy. Because now xfinity lets you transfer your Service Online in just about a minute with a few simple steps. Really . Really. That was easy. Yup. Plus, with twohour appointment windows, its all on your schedule. Awesome. Now all you have to do is move. That thing. [ sigh ] introducing an easier way to move with xfinity. Its just another way were working to make your life simple, easy, awesome. Go to xfinity. Com moving to get started. For lawmakers how you perceive Robert Muellers report might depend on the party you belong to. Of course some democrats see the special counsels findings as a roadmap to the president s impeachment. But republicans see the report as vindication. Now that we have the special counsels conclusions, the gop is ready to turn the page. In a Statement Issued thursday, minority leader Kevin Mccarthy said, it is time to move on. Americans deserve better than this partisan quest to vilify a political opponent. And how to minority leader whip steve scolis said, while washington democrats hoped for the special counsel to deliver a conclusion collusion, the report instead delivered a death blow to their baseless conspiracy theories. Matt gaetz represents the state of florida and is a member of the house judiciary committee, as well. Happy easter weekend to you. And i want to start with the what weve heard from the president. He released when william barr released his fourpage summary and since then he said it exonerates him, he said no collusion, then he called it a fabricated report with total b. S. , he put it more colorfully. Which is it . Is it a report that we should believe exonerates him, or is it totally unreliable . I think that you can look at the collusion facts differently than you look at the law review article that mueller writes on obstruction of justice. When it comes to the lack of Factual Development on criminal conspiracy with russia, i think we can see that there is no evidence dont we want a legal basis . Im not sure you make a law review article sound disparaging, but that was the point that he was appointed to get to the bottom of the law. Yeah. No, im cleaving out the difference between volume one and volume two of the report. Im not casting a pejorative. Im describing it. Volume one is more daysed on evidence. Volume two is more based on evidence. Volume two is based on conjecture. You have twice as many media references in vom s is in volum one. Volume one is based on more actual evidence collection. The other is more based on watching television and reading Mainstream Media print publication. Nonetheless you like the one thats more favor to him no, i think they come from very different places. Theres a different methodology used in the facture development of the lack of any conclusion any collusion evidence and then this like parade of potential obstruction charges. Even in those 11 circumstances that Eric Swalwell cited on your show, even really concedes that in even swalwell knows theres not a an okay instructive act. In all the circumstances even mueller doesnt find all the elements are met. The president was pissed. He thought it was an illegitimate investigation launched against him. He is the head of the executive branch. He thought the executive branch was doing things to hur