2016 ELECTION/ROBERT MUELLER/RUSSIA INVESTIGATION/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Robert S. Mueller III revealed the scope of a historic Russian campaign to sabotage the 2016 presidential election in a much-anticipated report made public on Thursday [4-18-19], and he detailed a frantic monthslong effort by President Trump to thwart a federal investigation that imperiled his presidency from the start. Mr. Mueller, the special counsel, laid out how his team of prosecutors wrestled with whether Mr. Trump’s actions added up to a criminal obstruction-of-justice offense. They ultimately chose not to charge Mr. Trump, citing numerous legal and factual constraints, but pointedly declined to exonerate him and suggested that it might be the role of Congress to settle the matter. The report laid bare that Mr. Trump was elected with the help of a foreign power, and cataloged numerous meetings between Mr. Trump’s advisers and Russians seeking to influence the campaign and the presidential transition team — encounters set up in pursuit of business deals, policy initiatives and political dirt about Hillary Clinton, the Democratic candidate for president. The special counsel concluded that there was ‘insufficient evidence’ to determine that the president or his aides had engaged in a criminal conspiracy with the Russians, even though the Trump campaign welcomed the Kremlin sabotage effort and ‘expected it would benefit electorally’ from the hacks and leaks of Democratic emails.”
–Mark Mazzetti, “Mueller Reveals Trump’s Efforts to Thwart Russian Inquiry in Highly Anticipated Report,” The New York Times online, April 18, 2019