Further clarification, signed by DOJ and Mueller team spokesperson. Shoots down Democratic narrative.
DOJ spokeswoman Kerri Kupec and Mueller spokesman Peter Carr insist “there is no conflict between” Barr and Mueller statements on the role DOJ policy against indicting a sitting president played in Mueller’s decision re: obstruction. pic.twitter.com/YMMyeSf6sc
— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) May 29, 2019
Mueller had previously told Barr three times that he wasn’t making his decision/non-decision based on the policy.
Via RedState:
In his statement this morning, Robert Mueller said “if we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so.” He also said that, because of Office of Legal Counsel guidance, his team did not have the option of charging a sitting president with a crime.
This is the opposite of what he told Attorney General William Barr and several other DOJ officials at a meeting which took place on March 5th.
Barr was asked about why Mueller had failed to come to a conclusion on the question of obstruction of justice during his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 1st. He said, “We were frankly surprised that they were not going to reach a decision on obstruction and we asked them a lot about the reasoning behind this. Mueller stated three times to us in that meeting, in response to our questioning, that he emphatically was not saying that but for the OLC opinion he would have found obstruction.”
Barr made a similar remark at the press conference he held prior to the public release of the redacted Mueller Report. He told reporters, “We specifically asked him about the OLC opinion and whether or not he was taking a position that he would have found a crime but for the existence of the OLC opinion. And he made it very clear several times that was not his position.”