background. the reporters made it very clear in the report that it was based on evidence, including but beyond what michael conhad to say, citing two law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of the matter. buzzfeed also continuing to back the accuracy of their reporting. but looking into what the special counsel is disputing here, remaining confident in the accuracy of what they are putting out there. overall, though, as other agencies try to track down this information. it seems no one was able to confirm or corroborate what was laid out in that report. daniel. reporter: yeah, not as of yet. but michael cohen s lawyers did not dispute the account and it will be interesting when he comes to test on capitol hill because he s definitely going to be asked about this. and, you know, he democrats want to know from the horse s mouth if this is actually true, if president trump instructed him to lie about the timing of all of these dealings and you
direction. daniel. your thoughts on that question as well from a reporter s perspective? . reporter: i think they wanted to fix certain details of the story without discussing them in a specifics. so buzzfeed is under pressure to try to adjust their reporting, if anything is incorrect. also the special counsel was not very clear in saying whether the story was true or not. and you have a lot of senators and congressmen readin this story and saying if this proves to be true, this is very serious for trump. even republicans say that it could lead to some consequences if proven accurate and these reporters have done very good work in the past on this issue of the trump tower in moscow. daniel, let s point forward a bit. you point out the history, their
with ewho ten special counsel released this vague statement disputing the piece and we really urge the special counsel to make clear what he is disputing. as to a lot of questions certainly have been raids for more, though, on mueller s response our colleague sarah murray has the latest from washington. reporter: the special counsel s office open friday, taking an extraordinary step and disputing a report in buzzfeed news, that report has said president donald trump has convinced his long-term personal attorney michael cohen to lie about the moscow deem. we very rarely hear from the special office. here s what peter carr said in a statement, buzzfeed s description of specific statements to the special counsel s office and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding michael cohen s congressional testimony are fought accurate. they are fought backing away from their story. they say we are continuing to
it is incredibly rare to hear mueller s office respond but a spokesperson weighing in on this buzzfeed report that the president directed michael cohen to lie, essentially throwing water on this report. why do you think the special counsel felt the need here to speak out? reporter: you are right. it is incredibly rare. they have been the most tight lipped operation of their sort in history. that s why i think there is more here than simply trying to acquit themselves of any suggestion they are the source. buzzfeed suggests they are not the exclusive ones and people are sort of pointing towards fbi, stny. these are people on the case before mueller came. i think again they are that the public reaction lurched in a certain direction perhaps in terms of really contemplating impeachment on the assumption
border that america has. so it s really a manufactured crisis. the president did, of course, back off calling this a national emergency wisely. but the fact that the government, it s made it actually ironically even harder to come one a resolution to shut, to reopen the government. so just tremendously disturbing way to start the new year, for the president to begin his third year in office. right. and he hasn t showed very much empathy for the federal workers, who are hurting right now. i want to turn to this buzz feed article. they are standing by the story, despite the statement from the prosecutor s office that it s not accurate. buzz feed is pointing out the statement didn t say there s nothing do it. but the interesting thing here is the special counsel has been mum for two years. all of a sudden, why this story caused them to say something? well this story is deeply consequential.