A former federal prosecutor familiar with Barr's thinking said the attorney general believed the obstruction case was complicated by the fact that the questionable actions taken by Trump, such as firing his FBI director, were authorized under the powers of the presidency.
At least one faction within the office says their intent was to leave the legal question open for Congress and the public to examine the evidence, the U.S. official who has spoken to them said. It's not clear how Mueller himself feels about the matter.
On Thursday morning, the Justice Department issued a statement saying that Barr had decided to release the "bottom-line findings" and conclusions of the Mueller report immediately, without attempting to summarize it. The statement said he did so with the understanding that the report would be made public once confidential information in it had been redacted.
"The Department continues to work with the Special Counsel on appropriate redactions to the report so that it can be released to Congress and the public," said the statement issued by the department spokesperson, Kerri Kupec.
Mueller told Barr and his deputy Rod Rosenstein four weeks ago that he would not be making a decision about obstruction — news that came as a surprise to them, Justice Department officials said. Barr's letter said Rosenstein agreed with his decision that there was no case that the president had obstructed justice.
It's also unclear whether Barr coordinated his March 24 letter in advance with Mueller. Many longtime observers of Mueller are puzzled as to why he didn't render his own judgment on a core matter in his investigation.
The DOJ policy that says a sitting president can't be charged with a crime wasn't a factor in the dispute within Mueller's team, according to one senior U.S. official in a position to know. Rather, lawyers disagreed about whether they could prove that Trump had criminal intent as he took a variety of actions that seemed designed to shut down the investigation, from firing FBI Director James Comey, to ordering the dismissal of Mueller, only to back off when his White House counsel threatened to quit, according to The New York Times and not confirmed by NBC News.
The official who has spoken to members of Mueller's team says they described the evidence on obstruction as compelling and said it includes more information than has been made public.
According to a senior law enforcement official who has spoken to members of Mueller's team, Mueller team members say it includes detailed accounts of Trump campaign contacts with Russia. While Mueller found no coordination or criminal conspiracy, the official said, some team members say his findings paint a picture of a campaign whose members were manipulated by a sophisticated Russian intelligence operation. Some of that information may be classified, the official said, so it's not clear whether it will be released in a few weeks when Barr makes public a redacted version of the Mueller report......
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