Robert Mueller Is Done With His Investigation! So What Happens Now?
IT FINALLY HAPPENED.
Just about 22 months after Robert Mueller was appointed as special counsel into the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, he has reportedly presented his findings to the Attorney General, William Barr.
We’ve been waiting for this for so long, and the news is no doubt exciting. In just a matter of hours, we went from this beautiful thread:
Robert Mueller sweating in front of his laptop, staring at a Word doc containing only the words “The Mueller Report” and a blinking cursor
— Patrick Monahan (@pattymo) March 22, 2019
Mueller’s gonna dust the whole apartment and then iron a few things because he’s really been meaning to do that. https://t.co/JiajKE8Kzp
— Elaina Plott (@elainaplott) March 22, 2019
Mueller‘s gonna take himself out to lunch cause he can’t think in his own place and going outside will get the juices flowing. https://t.co/vQrbpY5UuR
— Wenzler Powers (@WenzlerPowers) March 21, 2019
Mueller’s gonna just do a quick rewatch of Russian Doll start to finish & then it’s DOWN TO BUSINESS. https://t.co/9T9ild56lI
— Rachel Klein (@racheleklein) March 21, 2019
–to this:
Congratulations to Robert Mueller, who now gets to binge-watch the last two seasons of Game of Thrones, eat an entire box of Mallomars, pass out on his couch, and not put on pants for an entire weekend
— andi zeisler (@andizeisler) March 22, 2019
Robert Mueller quietly closes all of his tabs
— Jacob Sugarman (@jakesugarman) March 22, 2019
But the news is also anticlimactic. Because Mueller’s completion of his report does not mean we immediately–or even, possibly, ever–get to see that report. That’s up to Barr. He gets to decide what to report to Congress, and whether it’s in the public interest for the rest of us to see some or all of it.
Here’s the letter from DoJ to the Hill re: the #mueller report pic.twitter.com/iNxfqFKTj8
— Katie Benner (@ktbenner) March 22, 2019
I am demanding the Mueller report be made immediately available for members of Congress and for the public. Anything short of full transparency will be detrimental to our country moving forward.
The American people deserve the truth. https://t.co/gyNDlHgZNY
— Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBooker) March 22, 2019
For many of us, Kenneth Starr’s investigation into Bill Clinton is our reference point for this sort of thing. That 453-page report was released in full and anyone old enough to remember that event (or who has listened to a podcast about it) might have an image of us all getting to tear into Mueller’s findings and peruse them at our leisure. That’s not necessarily the case, and it’s hard to know even how likely that will be. Watergate, for example, only resulted in Congress receiving a “road map” into the investigation at the time. (Nixon resigned before a report was released, and it wasn’t made public until last year.)
We don’t yet know what we or Congress will see, but we do know that Barr was appointed by Trump, who is known to value “loyalty” when vetting his nominees.
So Mueller may be done, but we still have a ways to go. No matter what is released, it’s then up to Congress to decide if any offenses are impeachable, and if they want to act on that.
For the rest of us, we may be eager for Mueller’s details, but’s not like they’re going to paint a different picture of Trump than we already have.
No matter what comes next, let’s not forget that Trump’s campaign manager, deputy campaign manager, foreign policy advisor, fixer, political strategist and national security advisor have been indicted, convicted, or plead guilty of serious crimes.
— Dan Pfeiffer (@danpfeiffer) March 22, 2019
i can’t possibly imagine that the mueller report will be any more damning than the voluminous public record attesting to the president being a big time crime doer who loves crimes
— Talia Lavin, партизанка (@chick_in_kiev) March 22, 2019
I wonder if the Mueller report will have anything REALLY explosive in it, like Donald Trump standing in front of reporters and asking Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails
— Ike Barinholtz (@ikebarinholtz) March 22, 2019
trump is a racist, corrupt bigot who molests women, is bad at his job and should be removed from office. and you don’t need the mueller report to know any of that.
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) March 22, 2019
In the meantime, have a great weekend and enjoy those “It’s Mueller Time” jokes flooding your timelines!
this is grim pic.twitter.com/eQyhx2Z4Ka
— tom schwartz’s transition lenses (@rachelmillman) March 22, 2019
(image: Alex Wong/Getty Images)
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