JUSTICE DEPARTMENT/ROBERT MUELLER/RUSSIA INVESTIGATION/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “President Trump asserted on Monday [8-02-18] that he would be ‘totally allowed’ to take over Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe if he wanted to, in another thinly veiled broadside against an investigation he has repeatedly derided as a partisan ‘witch hunt.’ ‘I can go in, and I could do whatever — I could run it if I want,” Trump told Reuters. “But I decided to stay out. I’m totally allowed to be involved if I wanted to be. So far, I haven’t chosen to be involved. I’ll stay out.’ The extraordinary comment — apparently a reference to Trump’s executive authority to order Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein at the Justice Department to fire or replace Mueller — came as jurors continued to deliberate in the first trial brought as a result of Mueller’s probe. There was no verdict in the case on Monday, raising the defense team’s hopes after three days of deliberations. Trump also repeated the concerns raised publicly by his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, that speaking with Mueller’s team directly would expose him to perjury charges, even if he told the truth.”
–Gregg Re, “Trump floats possibility of taking over Mueller probe: ‘I can go in and I could do whatever, I could run it if I want’,'” Fox News, August 20, 2018 3:00 pm