Who were the winners and losers, and what did we learn from former special counsel Robert Mueller's testimony on Capitol Hill? Senior Fellow Bruce Wolpe gives his key takeaways.
Democrats did not accomplish what they wanted to, which was to have a dramatic day of damning testimony that would change opinion among their colleagues on impeachment proceedings and, more importantly, change opinion among the American people. There is no critical mass for impeachment of the president. Today has actually made that harder. The hearings and investigations in several House committees will continue – and they will prove embarrassing to the White House – but all that will be part and parcel of the general wall of noise they want to generate for the elections next year.
The Judiciary Committee Democrats failed on the key issue of obstruction of justice by failing to pursue a particular line of questioning. They wanted Robert Mueller to say that, while he could not indict the president, had he been presented with the facts on obstruction of justice uncovered, he would have sought an indictment of any other individual. Mueller was not directly asked that question and Mueller did not volunteer on that point. A big miss by the Democrats.
Mueller stuck like a Night Watchman at the crease to his report, defended everything in it and not going beyond it. From the report, we already knew Donald Trump was not exonerated. We already knew there was no criminal conspiracy with the Russians. The furthest Mueller was able to go was to say that Trump was "generally" untruthful in his written answers, but nothing more. He did not editorialise or expand on what we already knew from the report. Mueller defended against angry attacks on how he conducted the inquiry from Republicans, but he did not change any Republican minds on the investigations.
We can say that today changed nothing. Those who believe in impeachment still do. Those who do not want to proceed have not changed their view. Public opinion will not change, and a majority of the American people do not want Trump removed from office. Republicans have not retreated an inch on their view that this was an investigation run amuck, a "witch hunt" and "hoax".
Mueller's performance was subpar. He did not seem as sharp as he had in the past, and as a result he was less effective than he might have been. Those who were looking for a strong special counsel were disappointed.
What was clear from his testimony was what the Russians did in the 2016 US presidential election – and that they are a clear and present danger in the 2020 election. That is helpful.
