Mr. Mueller, the special counsel, relied on statements from the president’s own advisers to detail how Mr. Trump tried to install loyalists atop the Justice Department to oversee the inquiry, fired the head of the F.B.I. But Mr. Mueller, in a report released Thursday, declined to reach any conclusion about whether Mr. Trump illegally obstructed justice. Mr. Mueller’s rationale for demurring for now stood in stark contrast to Attorney General William P. Barr. Mr. Mueller noted that Mr. Trump would lose immunity when he left office, and that his investigation had preserved evidence for that moment. Mr. Barr, however, pronounced last month that the evidence Mr. Mueller gathered was insufficient to charge Mr. Trump with obstruction, regardless of the constitutional problems with charging a sitting president.

Source: New York Times April 18, 2019 20:07 UTC