There are few people I know who have written more about the Mueller investigation than I have, and in all that time, I don’t think I’ve talked much about who might be indicted other than the people who actually were indicted or decided to cooperate to avoid being indicted. Late in the game, Jerome Corsi popped up on the radar, but that was a surprise to me. I suspected that Erik Prince and Steve Bannon were being very cooperative in a quiet kind of way. Really, the only person who I thought might get indicted but who didn’t is Donald Trump Jr., and that was mainly for lying to Congress.
I’ve been trying to impress on people that this has been a counterintelligence investigation aimed first at preventing future interference in our elections and only second on punishing Americans who may have played an active role in assisting foreign powers who messed with our 2016 election. Since the prime directive is to get the information on what happened, it was better to get people to talk than to try to throw them in jail. Only a handful of morons decided it was better to lie, and even most of them got a second chance.
What we want to know is what happened, how to stop it in the future, and whether the president or any key advisers are hopelessly compromised. Anyone who thought they could keep score on that by counting indictments did not understand this investigation.
So, we want to see the full counterintelligence report, not just some list of people who were indicted or not indicted. The report is “comprehensive,” as you might expect. It takes a long time to read. We might get to learn the key conclusions as soon as today.
Attorney General William P. Barr is expected to make public as early as today the principal conclusions of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with the Kremlin to influence the 2016 election, giving the public its first glimpse into the findings of the 22-month probe.
Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein were at the Justice Department Saturday morning, where they were reviewing Mueller’s report and working on a summary of conclusions to provide to lawmakers.
Barr announced Friday that Mueller’s work had come to an end and spent the afternoon and early evening in his fifth-floor office reading the special counsel’s final report — which one Justice Department official described as a “comprehensive” document.
Barr told lawmakers in a letter that he “may be in a position to advise you of the Special Counsel’s principal conclusions” as early as this weekend. A Justice Department spokeswoman said those conclusions would be made public, and officials said it was possible — though not certain — they would be revealed on Saturday. The spokeswoman declined to otherwise describe what was in the report.
Anyone who is crowing or despairing about the lack of indictments is reacting without enough information. Be patient. You’ll know soon whether or not this investigation will deliver the goods.
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