(upbeat music)
- The long awaited Mueller report is out.
What we now know aboutthe Russia investigation.
We're at the White House for reaction
and on Capitol Hill to seehow lawmakers are responding
to the Special Counsel's finding.
All this and more tonight on Faith Nation.
Well after nearly two yearsthe public finally gets
it's first look at the findingsof the Russia investigation.
Welcome to Faith Nation, I'm John Jessup
- And I'm Jenna Browder.
Well 10 instances of potential obstruction
and no collusion, thatis the Mueller report
and this is it in a nutshell.
- Light reading.- Whoo, yeah.
- Well after two years,some 500 witness interviews
and search warrants,thousands of subpoenas,
and 34 indictments, thePresident declaring, game over.
- City News NationalSecurity Correspondent,
Eric Philips, joins us now.
Eric, is it game overlike the President says?
- Well as I'll explain in just a moment
it's not quite game over just yet.
Attorney General, BillBarr, says he and attorney
Deputy Attorney General, Rod Rosenstein,
disagreed with some of SpecialCounsel, Bob Mueller's,
legal theories onobstruction, but even still
under Mueller's ownframework they still found
that the President did not commit a crime.
- There was in factno, fact, no collusion.
- [Eric] The nation's toplaw enforcement officer
boiled down 400 pagesin just over 20 minutes.
- The Special Counsel didnot make a traditional
prosecutorial judgment.
- [Eric] The MuellerReport, "does not conclude
the President committed a crime,
it also does not exonerate him."
- The report recounts 10episodes involving the President
and discusses potential legal theories
for connecting thoseactivities to the elements
of an obstruction offense.
- [Eric] Those 10 episodes recounted
in the redacted release.
From the President'sefforts to seize control
of the Russia investigation,to President Trump's endeavors
to force the SpecialCounsel's removal which were,
"mostly unsuccessful becausethe persons who surrounded
the President declinedto carry out orders."
- President Trump faced anunprecedented situation.
- [Eric] The weight of thatcloud revealed in the release
with the President cursing stating,
"This is the end of my Presidency"
at the appointment of SpecialCounsel, Robert Mueller.
- The President was frustrated and angered
by his sincere beliefthat the investigation
was undermining his presidency.
- [Eric] Detailed in thereport the Russian Intelligence
hacking campaign, andRussian effort to sow
social discord through disinformation
and social media operations.
- The Russian governmentsought to interfere
in our election process.
- [Eric] But any linksbetween the Trump campaign
and Russia were deemedinsufficient evidence
in bringing charges.
- The Russian operatives whoperpetrated these schemes
did not have the cooperationof President Trump,
or the Trump campaign.
- [Eric] The redactedreport was shared directly
with the White House before its release.
- No one outside the department has seen
the unredacted report with the exception
of certain sectionsthat were made available
to IC, the intelligencecommunity, for their advice
on protecting intelligentsources and methods.
- [Eric] The White House did not choose
to use executive privilege to issue
any further redactions then those
that had been sanctioned by the DOJ.
- Given the limitednature of the redactions
I believe that thepublicly-released report
will allow every Americanto understand the results.
- [Eric] For some lawmakersa different version.
- These members of Congresswill be able to see
all of the redactedmaterial for themselves
with a limited exception.
- [Eric] Capping off the DOJ's release
Attorney General, Bill Barr's,tease of more drama ahead.
- I have no objection to BobMueller personally testifying.
- The fight to come now liesin the halls of Congress.
The House JudiciaryCommittee has oversight
over the Department ofJustice and could still decide
based on those 10 episodesdetailed in the release,
that the President's actions constituted
an obstruction of justice.
So as they say, John and Jenna,
we'll be watching and waiting.
- And joining us now
is President Trump'sattorney, Jay Sekulow.
Jay thank you so much for being with us.
- Sure.
- Jay, the report seemsto leave open the door
to questions of obstruction of justice.
Mueller investigators notingthey were unable to say
definitively that the Presidentdidn't commit obstruction.
Do you believe the releaseof the Mueller report today
closes the door on that question?
- I sure do and the Department of Justice,
the Attorney General said,no collusion or obstruction
under Department of Justice guidelines
on how to bring a case.
And it was important thatwhat Bob Mueller said was,
while he said they didn'texonerate the President,
which by the is not thejob of a prosecutor.
They didn't have, sothey didn't accuse him
of violating the law either.
So when you have a situationlike that it's a declination.
So this was a long way of saying the case,
in 400 pages, was declinedand the overarching issue here
was of course, and thecritical overarching issue
was in fact this issue of Russia collusion
or conspiracy in the courts,
the outcome there was unequivocal.
- Jay, can you tell us howthe President is feeling?
- Pleased, I mean he waspleased three weeks ago
when the Attorney Generalissued a summary letter
of the principle conclusionof Bob Mueller's report
and he's pleased today thatthis is now behind the country
and behind him and, youknow, I think that after
an extensive investigation like this
that enough is enough.
- Jay, you and your team got a chance
to see the report Tuesday,and I believe Wednesday.
There's been--- Yep.
- Some criticism over that.
I just wanna know, why did, did you press
to have an advanced view?
- Well we have that right under
the Office of Government Ethics guidelines
that govern the Department of Justice.
Our client, the President, wasthe subject of the inquiry,
the report was about ourclient and we put in a request
to be able to review the redacted report.
We didn't have any interaction
with the Department of Justice,we didn't talk to anybody
within the Department ofJustice about the report,
we didn't offer suggestionson editing or redacting,
we simply reviewed itand that was appropriate
under OGE guidelines.
- Jay, do you think Mueller should testify
before Congress about this report?
- You know that's a questionthe Department of Justice
has to answer because BobMueller at the end of the day
was an employee of theDepartment of Justice,
there's Article II issuesthere in separation of powers
and that's a questionthat I'm happy to say
the President's lawyers don't make,
the Justice Department does.
- Jay, the Russia investigation is over,
but the President is still facing
multiple investigations from Congress.
What's your take on those investigations?
- Presidential harassment,that's what this is.
I mean this idea thatthese subpoenas are going
all over to the banks and to tax returns,
information that clearly underboth separation of powers
and constitutionally they don't have
the authority to get,nevertheless they're trying.
So look, I think it'sPresidential harassment there.
It'll be very interestingto see what happens
in the days ahead, but Ithink we play by the law
and the law is clearand we're gonna insist
on the law being followedand that means whether
it's at the House, or theSenate, and in any case
if there's an issue that wethink is worthy to litigate
we will litigate it.
- The Democrats, they willhave their investigations,
but what about theinvestigations Jay into the way
this whole Russia probe started?
Barr, he testified last weeksaying that spying did occur.
- Yeah, and that's avery serious accusation.
We have evidence, we've seenit, you've talked about it,
of what was going on hereagainst the President,
this Operation CrossfireHurricane, these FISA warrants,
the Bruce Ohr, Nellie Ohr, Peter Strzok,
Lisa Page issues, thoseare all significant,
they're all serious and Ithink at the end of the day
what happens is you have tofind out why this happened
because it can never happen to another
President of the United States.
- And Jay, just a reflectivequestion for you finally.
You argue--- Sure.
- Cases of course beforethe Supreme Court,
international religiouscases, how does this case
stack up in terms of, ofdifficulty and stress level.
I think we're both wondering if you gained
a few more gray hairs?
- What, what stress?
Fortunately my genes are good on hair
so my family doesn't havemany gray hairs in my family.
My father when he passedaway at 83 years old
was barely salt and pepperand I had uncles that were 90
and still had black hair.
I've got a few more grayhairs I'll tell you that.
My wife says that's like a joke, but I do.
Look, it's the stress of, look my faith
played a big role in allowingme to move this forward
and I relied on thatconstantly, God was gracious
we got a great victory.
I felt like in a sense Iwas training my whole life
for that moment.
- Well, Jay Sekulow, with great genes,
we thank you so much for being with us.
- (chuckles) Thank you guys.
- Well the Trump administrationwants to investigate
how the Russia investigation began.
The Vice President releaseda statement saying,
"Now that the special counselinvestigation is completed,
the American people have the right to know
whether the initialinvestigation was in keeping with
longstanding Justice Department standards,
or even lawful at all.
We must never allow ourjustice system to be exploited
in pursuit of a political agenda."
And for more from theWhite House we turn to
Senior WashingtonCorrespondent, Jennifer Wishon.
Jennifer what are you hearingfrom the administration?
- Jenna, the White House callsthe Special Counsel's report
a total victory for the President.
This is the exoneration theysay they've been predicting
from the start and todayinside the East Room
surrounded by woundedwarriors, President Trump said
he's having a good day.
- It was gold, nocollusion, no obstruction.
(clapping and cheering)
- [Jennifer] On Twitter apresidential victory lap.
The President declaring, game over.
- The results are in.
- With videos designed totell the mainstream media,
he told them so.
- There was no collusion.
- No collusion.
There was no collusion.
No collusion.
No collusion.
There is absolutely no collusion.
- [Jennifer] Now on offensethe President's legal team
calls the investigationpolitically motivated abuse
launched by former FBIDirector, James Comey.
- This should never happen
to another President again, this hoax.
- And now feeling likethe cloud has been lifted
over this White House thePresident and the First Lady
are heading south to Mar-a-Lagoto enjoy the Easter holiday.
- And Jennifer the WhiteHouse is working to make clear
they compiled with this investigation,
what are they saying on that front?
- Yeah, so the WhiteHouse is saying, look,
not only did the SpecialCounsel not find enough evidence
to charge this Presidentwith obstruction of justice,
but the report spells outjust how well he cooperated
handing over documents and giving them
the information they wanted.
Here's what Senior Advisor,Kellyanne Conway had to say.
- The Department ofJustice made very clear
that every request that they issued
was actually responded to and fulfilled.
That should make people feelvery good about democracy
and it should make them feel really great
that a campaign that Imanaged to a successful end
did not collude with any Russians.
We're accepting apologies today too
for anybody who feels thegrace in offering them.
- Asking for apologies,I don't, I'm not sure
they're gonna get those though Jenna.
- Jennifer, you know,one thing we did learn
from the report was Sarah Sanders.
She said she had a slip of the tongue
when briefing the presson James Comey's firing.
What did she say and wasshe essentially lying
to the media there?
- Yeah, so Jenna this wasthe day that Sarah Sanders
told the press corp that they had heard
from countless membersof the rank-and-file FBI
who had lost confidence inJames Comey as their director.
It's a sentiment that she doubled down on
in a subsequent interview, but then she,
when the Special Counselasked her about that she said,
it was a slip of the tonguemade in the heat of the moment
and actually those particular comments
were based on nothing.
So I think that is alla synonym for the fact
that she did, on thatoccasion, lie to the media.
- Alright, Jennifer Wishon for us
at the White House, thank you.
- Well no sooner then the findings
of the Russianinvestigation were released,
House Democrats demanded tohear from Special Counsel,
Robert Mueller, himself.
Congressmen Jerry Nadler released a letter
calling for Mueller to appear before
the House Judiciary Committeeno later than May 23rd.
At a press conference thisafternoon he doubled down
with that request.
- The report concluded therewas "substantial evidence",
that President Trump attemptedto prevent an investigation
into his campaign and his own conduct,
page 76, page 78, page90, page 157, Volume two.
That is why I have formerly requested
that Special Counsel Mueller testify
before the House JudiciaryCommittee as soon as possible
so we can get some answersto these critical questions
because we clearly can't believe what...
- Well, for more reactionfrom Capitol Hill
we now turn to CBN's Abigail Robertson.
Abigail, we've receivedthe redacted version
of the Mueller report,but Democrats are saying
they want more.
- That's right John, asHouse Judiciary Chairman,
Jerry Nadler said, he is going to subpoena
the full Mueller report,and as we just heard,
he wants Robert Mueller up on the hill
as soon as possible to testify.
Now both these ideas had a lot of support
from other Democrat lawmakers,
like Senator RichardBlumenthal, take a look.
- As you can see there are redactions here
that are deeply troubling.
I wanna see the fullreport and I want to see
all of the evidenceunderlying it, the documents,
and testimony, and I wantto hear from Bob Mueller.
- Now many Democrats haveechoed those sentiments,
but meanwhile Republicanslike Senate Majority Leader,
Mitch McConnell, arepraising the Attorney General
for his transparency.
- The Attorney General ismaking this as open as possible.
I don't have, it really gets down
to whether you trust himor not, I trust Bill Barr.
I think it's rather laughable to see them
turn their guns on him and, but that's,
that's all they're left with frankly
is to go after him, it's just some kind
of ad hominem attack.
- Now as of right now it'sunclear when Nadler plans
to issue that subpoenafor the full report.
- Abigail, CongressionalDemocrats seem to be rallying
around one word when they talk about
Attorney General Barr's press conference
and that wordy Abi seems to be, spin.
- Yes, that is true.
So before Attorney GeneralBarr ever spoke today
Democrats were urging him tocancel the press conference
that announced the releaseof the redacted report
saying that, for him tohold this press conference
was inappropriate and theyclaim that it was designed
from the beginning toshape public perceptions
of the report before anyonecould have a chance to read it.
Now obviously, as wesaw, the Attorney General
went ahead and had the press conference
and this immediately ledto a chorus of Democrats
in both the House and Senatecalling Attorney General Barr,
a spin doctor, saying this isall just political propaganda
being fed to the Americanpeople and that they wanna see
the full unredactedreport without any spin
from a presidential appointee.
Now this isn't necessarilysurprising that we're seeing
so many Democrats use this messaging,
and use the word, spin,because when big things
like this happen bothRepublicans and Democrats,
they work hard to geteveryone in their party
repeating the samemessage and in this case
that's that the AttorneyGeneral is spinning this story
to really get it to stick.
And on the Republican sidewe're seeing many of them
repeat the same message that there was
no collusion being found.
- Great point Abi, andfinal question for you.
General Barr I believe saidtoday that he will be testifying
before the House Judiciary Committee,
when we will hear from him speak next?
- Well right now he'scoming to the hill May 2nd
so get your popcorn ready and as we said,
Democrats are also hoping that in addition
to Attorney General Barrthey will get a chance
to hear from Robert Mueller.
They say their not satisfied right now
with the redacted report.
They have dozens of questionsfor both of these men
and Nadler said earlierthat he wants to follow
their own evidence wherever it leads
and he also neither did notrule out possibly proceeding
with impeachment againstPresident Trump today.
So this is, this is far from over.
Back to you John and Jenna.
- CBN's Capitol HillCorrespondent Abigal Robertson.
Well joining us now are Tom Bevan,
President of RealClearPolitics,
and CBN News Chief PoliticalAnalyst, David Brody.
Gentlemen thanks for being with us.
- You bet.
- Tom I wanna startwith you and maybe David
you can weigh in in justa moment, but big day.
I'd love to hear your initial thoughts
on the long-awaited document release.
- Well we knew that this wasn't really
gonna move the needle.
I mean Trump supportersare claiming vindication,
Trump critics areclaiming damnation, right,
this is proof that he isguilty of all the things
that they thought.
So not really surprisingthat way, but I think,
you know, I always tryand take these moments
when there, when thereis a frenzy like this
to sort of step back andtry and remove yourself
from the frenzy and takethe long-view look at this.
What, how are we gonna remember this event
six weeks from now, six monthsfrom now, six years from now?
And I think after all the hyperventilation
that's gone on and continues to go on,
it's gonna be the bottom line, which is,
you know like the President,don't like the President,
he's right about the fact,there was no collusion,
there was no conspiracy,there are no more indictments,
this is dead as a legal matter,no obstruction of justice.
And that's, and that nowturns to the political aspect
and that's up to the Democratswhat they wanna do about it.
- Yeah, and David, do you think
any of the points will stick?
You know, Sarah Sanderslying to the press,
or any other points, Don McGahnbeing told to fire Mueller,
will any of these points stick?
- It's 24/7 news cycle stuff.
I think eventually, like Tom said, I mean,
at the end of the day, aswe like to day quite a bit,
no collusion and ultimatelyno obstruction of justice,
technically no charges being brought.
And that something Donald Trump will say
not only repeatedly now,
but more importantly in the 2020 election
when it heats up.
I have to tell you I thoughtone real interesting part
of this report, Mueller madethe obvious point that look,
if you're going to obstruct justice
normally you're trying tocoverup an underlying crime,
and Mueller goes on to say,we didn't find any evidence
of an underlying crime, in other words,
no Russian collusion.
So it's hard to obstructsomething that didn't
necessarily happen in the first place.
- You heard Jay Sekulow,we just had him on,
it sounds like thePresident's team is ready
to fight back againstDemocrats and their inquires
and their subpoenas.
How hard do you think they'll fight this?
- Well I think, they'regonna fight it for sure,
and as Jay said, presidential harassment
though I have to tellyou I think Democrats
are gonna be the onesthat, the question is,
how much fight do they have left in them?
You know look, you know,fight at your own peril here,
you know, because I gotta tell ya,
I think ultimately you have to wonder
when do you stop diggingyour own grave at some point?
And, I don't know, I don't see them,
they're gonna continueit, there's no doubt
that Democrats will continue it for sure.
- Tom, let's talk aboutBarr's performance.
Some Democrats are callingfor him to step down
saying that with 900 redactions
he withheld too muchinformation and lost credibility
defending the President'sactions at that press conference
ahead of the documents release.
There's no way it's gonna come to that.
- (laughing) No, I mean whenit, since when does the media
oppose, and Democrats, sincewhen do the oppose people
holding press conferencesto give more information.
I mean the report came outafter and every single channel
has been talking about it all day long
as if like a 30-minute press conference
is going to somehow spin thisand set the framework for it
when we've had just wall-to-wallmedia coverage for today
and probably tomorrowand beyond and beyond.
And I just don't think, Barr said today
that he has no problem with Bob Mueller
going up and testifying.
So I'm not sure what Democrats,when they're attacking
the Attorney General of theUnited States in this way,
I think it's a bad lookfor them to really sort of
politicize this in that way.
They're gonna certainly, to David's point,
they're gonna continue on.
Jerry Nadler came out with a statement,
Adam Schiff just cameout with a statement,
they're gonna push ahead.
I mean they think there was collusion,
they think there was obstruction,
and it seems like they'regonna push full steam ahead
in their investigations.
And we'll see where that leads them.
I think there's a potentialpolitical backlash
to that as well.
But attacking the AttorneyGeneral of the United States,
and politicizing inthat way, I don't think
did them necessarily any favors
because at the end of the day
he released the report, weall got to see it, most of it.
Congress is gonna getto see even more of it.
he's open to Bob Mueller testifying,
so I'm not sure what their real gripe is.
- Yeah, the report, it shed light into
the President's mindset.
You know what was makingnews earlier today was,
when he first learned aboutthis Special Counsel report
he used some expletives,not happy about it at all.
Tom, what does this revealabout President Trump's style,
and the way he handles crisis situations?
- Yeah, I mean, that's what'smost interesting to me,
we learned some new details,sort of behind the scenes,
about conversations that weregoing in the White House,
and look, you could tellclearly this is how Donald Trump
became a successful business man,
he barks orders and people do them
and he kept callingpeople back and saying,
did you do this yet?
Now, in the politicalrealm, and he's obviously
a political novice, you know, he had,
he had members of his staff who thought
that Trump's orders were pushingeither ethical boundaries,
or legal boundaries, ormade them uncomfortable,
all of these people inthe Executive Branch
serve at the pleasure of the President.
He can hire them, fire them,
for any cause, anytime whatsoever.
And so when you're in that position you,
you know, it's up to you to decide whether
you wanna execute that order or resign,
those are sort of your two options
and it seemed like Don McGahn actually was
going to resign and got talked out of it.
But that was certainly one of
the most interesting insights
that the Mueller reportprovided is Donald Trump,
that's how he operates,for better or worse,
as a political noviceinside the White House.
Basically, you know, barking orders
and pushing some of these boundaries.
- And by the way you can make the argument
that he can thank DonMcGahn that this didn't
get any worse.
I mean if--- Because if it did
he might not have beenable to say, game over.
- That's exactly right.
I mean Don McGahn in away kind of saved Trump
from some potential evenmore legal jeopardy.
- So David, we have investigations,
we have counter investigations,
not to mention we have a2020 presidential campaign
where candidates might usesome of this information
as ammunition, so what's next?
Where do we go from here?
- Well, you know, Steny Hoyer,
the House Democrat Minority Leader,
just came out a few minutes ago and said,
when he talked about impeachment he said,
it's not worthwhile at this point.
So I mean I think they'regetting the message.
You know, Nancy, wealready know Nancy Pelosi
doesn't wanna go downthe impeachment road,
but the fact that Hoyer said this
after the report's been released,
I think that's significant,
I think that gives you a sense inside
the leadership of theDemocrats in Congress.
- Yeah, and this question for both of you.
Media coverage, what have you made,
what do you make ofwhat we've seen so far?
Is it fair?
- You mean of the report itself?
- Un-huh, yeah.
- I mean I think the media quite honestly
has done the Americanpublic a great disservice
for the last 2 1/2 years andhere they are on television,
this very day, pattingthemselves on the back actually
and saying, well a lot ofstuff we see in the report
was actually, was aproduct of good journalism.
The media has been sort of,they took all of these dots,
they connected them tosupport one narrative,
and that is the President was guilty
of treason and collusion.
And we found out in the end that wasn't,
that's not true, that'snot where the facts
actually led us.
And so I think, I thinkthe media coverage of this
has been pretty bad all around.
- Yeah, and I have totell you when I just did
a quick search of the NewYork Times, Washington Post,
and CNN headlines this afternoon, if you,
and they're up on, on my Twitter account,
you can actually see it for yourself,
there's no mention of thefact that the Mueller report
came to a conclusion of no collusion,
nothing about lack of evidence
on obstruction of justice at all.
Instead it's about Sarah Sanders
and it's about all the(mumbles) censoring stuff
and how do you not have anyof that in your headlines?
I think that speaks volumes.
- Alright, David Brophy,Tom Bevan, thank you both.
- Thanks.- Thank you.
- Well new details abouthow firefighters worked
to save relics in theNotre Dame Cathedral fire
when we come back.
- Well the story tonight notabout the Russia investigation,
France is honoring themen and women who fought
to preserve the Notre Dame Cathedral
during that devastatingfire earlier this week.
- That's right, FrenchPresident Emmanuel Macron
declared today to be a daylong tribute
to the more than 400 firefighterswho battled the blaze
for nine hours.
According to Frenchofficials the cathedral
was just 15 to 30 minutesaway from total collapse
had it not been for thefirefighters bravery.
One of those, the Chaplainof the Fire Brigade.
As the roof began to collapsehe ran into the cathedral
to save a precious relic,the crown of thorns
believed to be worn by Jesus.
- (speaking in foreign language)
- Once we got permissionwe rushed to the cathedral
and during this time we arrived and we saw
that the other team was already there.
They've already broken theprotection of the reliquary
and they found anattendant who had the code
and he managed to takethe crown of thorns out.
- So far nearly one billiondollars have been pledged
to help rebuild the cathedral.
What a great save on Easter weekend.
- Yeah, so brave my goodness.
- Well, that's gonna do itfor tonight's Faith Nation.
- Have a great evening and we will see you
back here tomorrow.
