Mitch McConnell blocked a resolution to release the full Mueller report, 3 days after saying he wanted 'openness and transparency' about it

Authored by businessinsider.de and submitted by lobsterbash
image for Mitch McConnell blocked a resolution to release the full Mueller report, 3 days after saying he wanted 'openness and transparency' about it

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday blocked a resolution that called for Special Counsel Robert Mueller's full report into Russian interference in the 2016 election to be released publicly.

A summary of the report released by Attorney General William Barr says the investigation found no evidence that President Donald Trump colluded with Russia, but does not exonerate him of obstruction of justice.

Some lawmakers want the report to be made public as they believe it could show wrongdoing by Trump, reveal details of Russia's operation, and aid other investigations into Trump.

McConnell said before the summary was released that he wanted "as much openness and transparency as possible" about the report.

He cited national security when he blocked Monday's resolution, but the senate minority leader said he was " befuddled" as the resolution did not call for the report to be released "immediately."

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked a resolution that called for Special Counsel Robert Mueller's full report to be released publicly, three days after he said he wanted "as much openness and transparency as possible" about the report.

McConnell blocked the non-binding resolution in the Senate on Monday, after it passed unanimously through the House. He cited national security, and said that Attorney General William Barr is working with Mueller to determine what can be released publicly.

"To date, the attorney general has followed through on his commitments to Congress. One of those commitments is that he intends to release as much information as possible," he said.

Read more: Barr's summary of the Mueller report is out. Here are the key Trump-Russia questions we still don't have answers to.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who put forward Monday's resolution, said the resolution did not call for the report to be released "immediately."

"I'm sort of befuddled by the majority leader's reasoning in this regard because it is not in the words of this resolution," he said, according to The Hill.

Barr sent a four-page summary of Mueller's report into Russian interference in the 2016 election and Donald Trump's presidential campaign to Congress on Sunday.

According to Barr's summary, the report says that the investigation found that neither Trump nor his presidential campaign conspired or colluded with Russia, though it did not exonerate him of obstructing justice.

McConnell wrote in a Twitter statement on Friday, after Mueller delivered his report to Barr, that he appreciated Barr's intention to "provide as much information as possible" about the report.

"As I have said previously, I sincerely hope he will do so as soon as he can, and with as much openness and transparency as possible," he said.

lwoodjr on March 26th, 2019 at 14:15 UTC »

Remember how half a year ago we had a different Attorney General, who had recused himself from all this Mueller stuff? But then he left, and we got a new Attorney General, who is now the final decider of what Mueller stuff we get to see? Funny how that turned out.

0c34n on March 26th, 2019 at 13:49 UTC »

The double standard for Republicans here is WHOLLY UNACCEPTABLE. DEMS, PLEASE continue fighting. What is this garbage? Read this.

After the four year investigation of Clinton, the Office of the Independent Counsel delivered its 445-page report to Congress on September 9, 1998.[4]

For two days, the report sat unread in the Ford House Office Building as Democrats and Republicans in the House of Representatives debated what to do with it. On September 11, the House voted 363–63 to release the report to the public.[5] When the report was uploaded to the internet, it became a sensation, with twelve percent of adult Americans — 20 million people — browsing the web at once to browse the document. "It's probably the single highest number of people who have ever used the computer to access a single document," David Webber of the Frank Lutz polling company told CNN.[6]

latherer on March 26th, 2019 at 13:19 UTC »

This is why the house vote was 420-0.

House Republicans knew that McConnell would ultimately block everything so they, in essence, got a "free vote" to show how much they care without any meaning behind it.