hormone levels if she wants to defend her titles our sports correspondent explains . this was a verdict as much to do with human rights as a fanatic's cost as a menu was appealing against a rule that would force her to take medication to reduce her testosterone level and still be allowed to compete in women's competition she lost her appeal against the rule of the court of arbitration for sport in liaison such discrimination is a necessary result of all kinds of oceanus means of achieving the ideal believes of objective of preserving the integrity of female atlantics in sounds like you dance international competition studies from four hundred meters to one my. athletics while governing body the. maintains it is striving for fairness it said it was plays that the regulations were found to be unnecessary raise the ball and proportionate means of achieving the legitimate time of preserving the integrity of

fame that takes the idea has been criticized for its handling of the issue which included the suggestion that women with rice testosterone should switch to compete against men so many responded to the verdict immediately on social media sighing sometimes it's better to react with no reaction but later she released a statement accusing the i w f of having always targeted base specifically for a decade has tried to slow me down but this is actually made me stronger she's yet to indicate if she's prepared to consider medication in order to remain a champion i hundred metres she's a multiple olympic and world champion but can't now defend a title at this year's world championships in doha unless she takes the chemical route she can switch to long distance and did win gold in a five thousand meters at the south african athletics championships last week but the treatment has been questioned by the united nations human rights group by the south african government who called it a gross violation of human rights. spall tries to adjust to gender issues simone

use words when collecting an award last year underlined the need for compassion and respect along with science and competition just a role girl you know i grew up in a dusty place of i really you know appreciate you know the support the love you know also for appreciating you know us for being who we are so we can be the best that we can be lee wellings london. we're getting is founder julian assange has been sentenced to fifty weeks in jail for breaching bill conditions in the u.k. there were protesters outside the courtroom in london for the forty seven year old made an appearance songe was given asylum in the ecuador embassy for almost seven years before he was evicted last month will face a separate hearing on thursday to determine whether he should be extradited to the u.s. that he has the latest from london. where there was plenty of support outside court

here for julian our son's well inside his defense lawyer handed out a letter from julian assange in which he apologized unreservedly for disrespecting anybody who felt they'd been disrespected in the way he conducted himself over the last few years he said that he had acted in the best and only way that he thought possible now what he meant by that was outlined by his lawyer in a series of mitigating factors that he hoped would relate to reduced sentence but the underlying thing being that gina science has always been acting through a genuine fear that he'd be sent home to the united states if britain extradited him to sweden and when he lost his appeal against that extradition that was when he sought asylum in the ecuadorian embassy now his lawyer pointed out that julian assange heads a consistently offer to cooperate with the swedish investigators and he was actually questioned in the embassy by swedish officials and soon after that his

lawyer said that was when the allegations were dropped but the judge here said that julian assange had not like his lawyer had claims been held in prison like conditions that he had been free to leave the embassy at any time to cooperate with justice stress nobody should be above the law and sentence him to fifty weeks in jail now on thursday mr assange extradition hearing for that request by the united states will begin but that process is likely to be extremely long and drawn out according to most legal observers. forces loyal to libyan warlord khalifa haftar out of detained two turkish nationals walk on alto not and never met dimia they were taken from southern tripoli accused of being spies and charged turkey denies on monday turkish president of egypt tell you about a one described as advance towards tripoli as a plot against libya's people that are now reports that u.s. troops who recently left libya in early june in every april that sees me have

returned nama of their head is joining us now live from tripoli mahmoud what more do we know about this. well rob it's kind of contradictory because the spokesman of the very you and the recognized government stated today that the government of national accord is working on bringing back the african forces to libya to corporate corporate with a government of national accord in terms of fighting get tourism we know that. earlier on on the beginning of april military a u.s. military detachment left libya because. because of security alerts but now the government of national called spokesman is stating that the government is working on bringing them back but at the same time an african source

has just deny that we spoke with africa actually we. can tack to african sources and they denied that the said that the military the u.s. military detachment left on april seventh but meanwhile we know that. president trump called have to. area on april and he kind of congratulated him for his military campaign in libya but at the same time this is contradictory because if for the u.s. africa command is with the. government this is the u.n. recognized government to accord. but the same time. the u.s. president is supporting the war a lot of money for have to on his move towards the capital tripoli but so far we know that the government. officials have been traveling since the beginning of this

offensive in tripoli. trying to talk to foreign ambassadors a little gain support against the move on the capital tripoli by have to his forces who are my word thank you very much. at least fifteen security personnel have been killed in central india after the victor with the vehicle was hit by an improvised explosive device police say the attack was carried out by maoist rebels in gets italy district still ahead on al-jazeera celebrations in japan as emperor navigator assumes the throne that day after his father advocates. hello the seasonal rains showing itself again is sporadic is on and off but you see

a sort of lion here in the cloud that is the seasonal front which is currently offshore also taiwan get some of the rain and it has down to was luzon but the feet of more she's back into china are developing more green stuff in this case that's right in sichuan and just touch you know the new nine and it feeds into vietnam as well as this is the area you'll see increased cloudiness potential showers thunderstorms hong kong might just be involved by the end of friday shanghai is not at the moment significant whereas in the bay of bengal the massive cloud here as you can see and you might get that white disk that's a circulating tropical cyclone which is getting worse it's getting stronger both is potential for rainfall and therefore damage on the strength of the wind so much a sudden in these going to be covered in in krakow that's not the problem but this thing when it makes landfall anywhere from andhra pradesh up towards bank that will cause significant at least potential damage probably actual damage ahead of it the temperatures are well risen for this time the air force to not go slightly higher

up in are just down as well quite weather in most of the middle east at the moment despite the clouds the temperatures are on the rise. fly cats are airways and experience economy class like never before qatar airways going places together.

you want to know does it out of mind of our top stories this u.s. attorney general william bar is set to testify before the senate judiciary committee in just a few minutes hearing comes amid revelations that special counsel robert muller complained about how his report into russian meddling in the twenty sixteen election is being portrayed. in. the may day labor rally in paris is turning violent with police firing tear gas to disperse protesters police a far left and i guess groups among the demonstrators and intending to cause trouble. alone take on the world eight hundred meter champion caster semenya has lost her appeal against new to starts to win rules and if less takes shall not have to take drugs to reduce her home on levels if she wants to defend her titles.

dozens of protesters are expected on the streets of venezuela opposition leader as called for more demonstrations against president nicolas maduro president but bhutto is threatening to prosecute those involved in what he's called an attempted coup latin america editor of the sea and human is monitoring developments from the cuban capital. it was perhaps his boldest move yet opposition leader one wide all appearing before dawn in front of a crack us air force base surrounded by some twenty five soldiers appealing to the military to join him by his side was leopoldo lopez perhaps than israel's most famous political prisoner he announced he'd been released to house arrest by security forces who turned against president meet last mughal commitment to defend freedom at with tyranny everyone out onto the street. opposition supporters answered the call but were pushed back by security forces dozens were injured in clashes between pro and anti-government groups. after he and lopez took part in

a march why god disappeared from sight amid nagging rumors that he would be arrested but come nightfall he issued a new call from an undisclosed location for venezuelans to rise up again. we will continue calling on the armed forces to take part in the final phase of operation liberty to rescue our dignity that is why on may one we will go back onto the streets nationwide gathering in the areas we have already designated. president maduro responded on nationwide television surrounded by army officers whose continued support he depends on. this was truly a fake a minor a simulation and that's why eighty percent of the military and police who joined them in the beginning had left them by newt. but amid reports that his support may be cracking u.s. secretary of state might bump ale said had been about to step down and go to cuba

but was dissuaded by russia another key ally maduro says that's rubbish and adding more fuel to the geopolitical crisis president donald trump is again pointing the finger. he is warning about unless it immediately withdraw what he calls military help to the mcdougall regime he will slap on what he is now describing as a full and complete embargo as well as height will be economic and financial sanctions. in venezuela though and mother who are both planning to mark international workers day with a major show of strength on the streets one to try to force the president from power the other to try to maintain it. newman. have. you're watching all jazeera and i want to take you straight to capitol hill and the hearing of the senate judiciary committee where u.s.

attorney general william bar is set to testify in a couple of minutes so far we've heard from the chairman of the judiciary committee senator lindsey graham this is ranking democrat dianne feinstein who is also making her opening remarks the hearing is coming amid revelations that special counsel robert mueller has complained about bar has represented his report into russian meddling in the twenty sixteen election let's listen and positive messages in an effort to get michael cohen not to cooperate and then turn to attacks and intimidation to deter the provision of information or undermine cohens credibility finally while the march letter to congress and the april press conference left the impression there were no remaining questions to examine this report notes several limitations moller faced while gathering the facts that congress needed to examine

. more than once the report documents that legal condition can scuse me conclusions were not drawn because witnesses refused to answer questions or failed to recall the events in addition numerous witnesses including but not limited to jared cushnie sara sanders rudolph giuliani michael flynn steve bannon and john kelly all stated they could not recall events the president himself said more than thirty times that he could not recall or remember anough to be able to answer written questions from the special counsel the special counsel also recounted that quote some associated with the trump campaign deleted relevant communications or communicated during the relevant period

using applications that featured encryption or do not provide for long term retention of data and quote based on these gaps the muller report concluded and i quote again the office cannot rule out the possibility that the unavailable information would have shed additional light on or casts a new light on events described in the report and quote and contrary to the conclusion that the special counsel's report did not find evidence of communication or coordination between the trump campaign and russia the moller report explicitly states and i quote a statement that the investigation did not establish particular facts does not mean there was no evidence of those facts volume two page two let me conclude with

this. congress has both the constitutional duty and the authority to investigate the serious findings contained in the mahler report i strongly believe that this committee needs to hear directly from special counsel mahler about his views on the report in his march letter i also believe senator should have the opportunity to ask him about these subjects in questions directly i have requested this to our chairman to authorize a hearing where special counsel muller and i hope that will happen soon thank you mr chairman thank you before we receive your testimony mr barr we have the letter from mr muller sent to you on march twenty seventh twenty nineteen now put that in the record now. before jurors.

or variants are. ptolemy in psalms for the testify about it is it is the turn of the whole truth and nothing but for god yes. sorry about that. thank you mr chairman and ranking member feinstein members of the committee. during my confirmation process. there were two concerns that dominated as i think you will all agree the first was whether i would in any way impede or curtail special counsel muller's investigation and the second whether i would make public his final report as you see bob mueller was allowed to to complete his work as he saw fit. and as to the report even though the applicable regulations require that

the report is to be made to the a.g. and is to remain confidential and not be made public i told this committee that i intended to exercise whatever discretion i had to make as much of the report available to the public and to congressional leaders as i could consistent with the law this has been done i arrived at the department on february fourteenth. and shortly thereafter i asked to it to be communicated to bob mahler's team. that in preparing the report. we requested that they make it so we could readily identify sixty material so we could quickly process the report to due to all the public six the sixty's grand jury material that cannot be made public it's pretty evident by statute and i wanted that identified so we could read back that material and prepare the report for public release as quickly as we could when i

arrived at the department i founded and was eventually briefed in on the investigation i found that the deputy attorney general and his principal associate deputy head cal o'callahan were in regular discussions with the counsel's office had been. and they communicated this request and had discussions about that both the timing of the report and the nature of the report on march fifth. i met with bob at the suggestion of the deputy and the principal associate deputy bob mueller met with bob mueller. to to get a readout on what his conclusions would be. on march twenty fifth. and at that meeting i asked i reiterated to

two special counsel moller. that in order to assure to have the shortest possible time before i was in a position to release the report i asked that they identify sixty material. where i receive the report on march twenty second and we're hoping to have that easily identified the sixty material unfortunately it did not come in that form and it. quickly became apparent that it would take about three or four weeks. to identify that material and other material would have to be redacted so there was necessarily going to be a gap between the receipt of the report and getting the full report out publicly. the deputy and i. identified four categories of information that we believe required were daksh and i think you will all know of them but they were the grand jury material the sixty material information that the intelligence community

advised would reveal sensitive sources and methods information that if revealed at this stage would impinge on the investigation or prosecution of related cases and information that would unfair li affect the privacy and reputational interests of peripheral third parties we want to bat redacting this material in concert with the special counsel's office we needed their assistance to identify these sixty material in particular the redactions were all carried out by d.o.j. lawyers with special counsel lawyers in consultation with intelligence community. the report contained a substantial amount of material over which the president could have asserted executive privilege but the president made the decision not to assert executive privilege and to make public as much of the report as we could subject to the redactions that we thought required now as you see the report has been lightly

redacted the public version has been estimated to have only ten percent redactions almost the vast bulk of those redactions relate to are in volume one which is the volume that deals with collusion and that relates to existing ongoing cases volume two has only about two percent redactions for the public version so ninety eight percent of volume two dealing with obstruction is available to the public we have made a version of the report available to congressional leaders that only contains redactions of grand jury material for this version overall redactions are less than two percent for the whole report and for volume two dealing with obstruction they are less than one tenth of one percent so given the limited nature of redactions i believe that the public publicly released report will allow every american to

understand the results of the special counsel's work. by now everyone is familiar with the special council's bottom line conclusions about the russian attempts to interfere in the election in volume one the special counsel found that the russians and cage gauged in two distinct schemes first the internet research agency a russian entity with close ties to the russian government conducted it descend from asian and social media operation to so discord among americans second the g.r.u. russian military intelligence hacked into computers and stole e-mails from individuals affiliated with the democratic party and hillary clinton's campaign the special counsel investigated whether anyone affiliated with president trump's campaign conspired or coordinated with these criminal schemes they concluded that

there was not sufficient evidence to establish that there had been any conspiracy or coordination with the russian government or the ira. as you know volume two of his report dealt with obstruction and the special counsel considered whether certain actions of the president could amount to obstruction. he decided not to reach a conclusion instead the report recounts ten episodes and discusses potential legal theories for connecting the president's actions to elements of obstruction offenses . now we first heard that the special counsel's decision not to decide the obstruction issue or to meet at the march fifth meeting when he came over to the department and we were frankly surprised that that they were not going to reach a decision on obstruction and we asked them a lot about the reasoning behind this and the basis for this. special counsel

mahler stated three times to us in that meeting in response to our questioning that he emphatically was not saying that but for the oh well say opinion he would have found obstruction. he said that in the future the facts of the case against the president might be such that a special counsel would recommend abandoning the o l c opinion but this is not such a case. we did not understand exactly why the special counsel was not reaching that a decision and when we pressed him on it he said that his team was still formulating the explanation. once we heard that the special counsel was not reaching a conclusion on obstruction the deputy and i discussed and agreed that the department had to reach a decision we had the responsibility to assess the evidence as set forth in the report and to make the judgment. i say this because the special counsel was

appointed to carry out the investigative and prosecutorial functions of the department and to do it as part of the department of justice the powers he was using including the power of using a grand jury and using compulsory process exists for that purpose the function of the department of justice in this arena which is to determine whether or not there has been criminal conduct it's a binary decision is there enough evidence to show a crime and do we believe a crime has been committed we don't conduct criminal investigations just to collect information and put it out to the public we do so to make a decision and here we thought there was an additional reason which is this was a very public investigation. and we had made clear that the results of the investigation were going to be made public and the deputy and i felt that the evidence developed by the special counsel was not sufficient to establish that the president committed a crime and therefore it would be irresponsible and unfair for the department to

release a report without stating the department's conclusions and thus leave it hanging as to whether the department considered there had been criminal conduct. so the deputy attorney general and i conducted a careful review of the report with our staffs and legal advisers. and while we disagreed with some of the legal theories and felt that many of the episodes discussed in the report would not constitute obstruction as a matter of law we didn't rest our decision on that we took each of the ten episodes and we assessed them against the analytical framework that had been set forth by the special counsel and we concluded that the evidence developed during the special counsel's investigation was not sufficient to establish that the president committed in obstruction of justice offense. let me just talk a little bit about this march twenty fourth letter and. letter i think on the

twenty eighth which i received on the twenty eighth. when the report came in on the twenty second and we saw it was going to take a great deal of time to get it out to the public. i made the determination that we had to put out some information about the bottom line. the body politic was in a high state of agitation there was massive interest in learning what the bottom line results of bob miller's investigation was particularly as the collusion former government officials were confident confidently predicting that the president and members of his family were going to be indicted there were people suggesting that if it took any time to turn around the report and get it out it would mean that the president was in legal jeopardy. so i didn't feel that it was in the public interest to allow this to go on for several weeks without saying anything and so i decided to simply state what the bottom line conclusions were which is what the

department normally does make it bought by now are a determination is there a crime or isn't there a crime. we we prepared the letter for that purpose to state the bottom line think lucian's we use the language from the report to state those bottom line conclusions i analogize it to announcing after an extended trial with the verdict of the trial is pending release of the full transcript that's what we were trying to do notify the people as to the bottom line conclusion we were not trying to summarize the four hundred ten. page report. so. we released that i offered bob mueller the opportunity to review that letter before it went out and he declined.

on thursday morning i received i received it probably was received at the department wednesday night or evening but on thursday morning i received a letter from bob the letter that's just been put into the record. and i called bob and. so but you know what's the issue here are you suggest and i asked him if he was suggesting that the march twenty fourth letter was inaccurate and he said no but that the press reporting had been inaccurate and that the press was reading too much into it and i asked him you know specifically what his concern was and he said that his concern focused on his explanation of why he did not reach a conclusion on obstruction. and he wanted more put out a mat issue. he wanted he argued for putting out summaries of each volume of the executive summaries that had been written by his office.

and if not that then other material that focused on the issue of why he didn't leach the obstruction question but he was very clear with me that he was not suggesting that we had misrepresented his report. i told bob that i was not interested in putting out summaries and i wasn't going to put out the report piecemeal i wanted to get the whole report out and i thought summaries by very definition regardless of who prepared them would be under inclusive and we'd have sort of a series of different debates and public discord over each traunch of information that went out and i wanted to get everything out it wants and we should start working on packard and so the following day i put out a letter explaining the process we were following and stress saying that the march

twenty fourth letter was not a summary of the report but a statement of the principal conclusions and that people would be able to say bob mahler's entire thinking when the report was made public. so i'll end my statement there mr chairman and glad to take any questions thank you very much as to the actual report itself was there an occasion where. you wanted to something was redacted from the report that mr muller objected to. i would say objected to my understanding is. the categories were defined by. me and the deputy i don't think that i have no i don't believe work with him during the really bright the those degrees were executed by d.o.j.

lawyers working with his lawyers i think there were maybe a few judgement calls very few. as to whether or not something as a preventable matter should be treated as a reputational interest or something so there may have been some occasions of that but but as far as i'm stand it you did not want to hurt somebody his reputation unless it really affected the outcome is correct so was there any disagreement about sixty material not that i'm aware of any disagreement about classified information not that i'm aware of so. the conclusions in your face four page summary you think accurately reflect his bottom line collusion is that correct yes and you can read it for yourself if you got any doubt as to obstruction of justice were you surprised he was going to let you decide. yes i was surprised.

i think the very purpose of the function he was carrying out to the prosecutor of investigated and prosecuted function is performed for the purpose of people do not yet actually indict you know. i can't remember off the top of my head it was a lie. so he actually has the ability and died if he wants to he's used that power during the investigation is that correct that's correct and the other thing that was confusing to me is that the investigation carried on for a while as additional episodes were or looked into episode involving the president and so my question is who was why were those investigated if at the end of the day you aren't going to reach a decision on. so did you consult the turner jonah rosenstein about the obstruction matter constantly so was he in agreement with your decision not to proceed forward yes i saw the group and what not not to proceed forward right up truckin right

ok so very quickly give us your reasoning why you think it would be inappropriate to proceed forward on obstruction of justice in this case. well. generally speaking an obstruction case. typically has two aspects to it one there's usually an underlying criminality that right there was there an underlying crime here now so usually there is usually but it's not it's not necessary but the typical case sort of the power of democratic case is an underlying crime and then the person implicated or people implicate or concerned about that criminality being discovered taken inherently malignant act as as a supreme court has said to to obstruct that investigation so let's draw on

documents what people are worried about that he thought call me to stop the russian investigation that's one of the concerns people have let me tell you a little bit about homey. i do not have confidence in him call me any longer that was chuck schumer november the second twenty six thing i think he comey should take a hard look at what he has done and i think it would not be a bad thing for the american people if he did step down bernie sanders january that think twenty seven thing the president ought to fire call me a mate lee and he ought to initiate an investigation that is. congressman nadler nov fourteenth two thousand and sixteen did you have a problem of the way call me handled the clinton e-mail investigation yes i said so at the time ok so given the fact that a lot of people come and should be fired did you find that to be persuasive act of

obstructing justice. no i think even the report at the end of the day came to the conclusion if you if you read the analysis that. a reason that loomed large there for his germination was his refusal to tell the public what he was privately telling the president which was that the president was not under investigation. as to where we go forward as as to how we go forward would you recommend that this committee and every other committee of congress do our best to harden our infrastructure against future russian attacks absolutely if you think russia is still up to it yes you think other countries may get involved in our elections in twenty tona yes so you would support an effort by congress working with the ministration to harden our electoral infrastructure yes is that one of the takeaways of the moeller report yes. do you share my concerns about the

pfizer warrant process yes the share my concerns about the counterintelligence investigation how it was opened and why it was opened yes you share my concerns that that professional lack of professionalism in the clinton e-mail investigation something we should all look at yes do you expect to change your mind about the bottom line conclusions of the muller report no do you know bob mueller yes you trust him yes how long have you known him thirty years roughly you think you had the time you needed yes i think it the money needed yes you think he had the resources needed if you think he did a thorough job yes and i think he feels he did a thorough job and had adequate evidence to make the calls do you think the president's campaign in two thousand and sixteen was thoroughly looked at in terms

of whether or not they colluded with the russians yes and the answer is no according to our that's right he could miss about obstruction you did is correct that's right you feel good about your decision absolutely thank you very much. chairman. mr attorney general the special counsel's report describes how the president directed white house counsel don mcgann to fire special counsel moeller and later told him again to write a letter quote for our records and quote stating that the president had not ordered him to fire moller the report also recounts how the president made repeated efforts to get mcgann to change his story knowing that mcgann believe the president's version of events was false the special counsel found and i quote substantial

evidence and quote that the president tried to change mcgann's account in order to prevent further scrutiny of the president towards the investigation special counsel also found that mcgann is a credible witness with no motive to lie or exaggerate given the position he held in the white house here's the question does existing law prohibit efforts to get a witness to lie to say something the witness believes is false. yes and lott lied to the government yes and what law is that obstructions that change the obstructions statute and you don't have it i guess before you well not sure which what which one they were for going to hearers who it was probably fifteen twelve c two. so all these

things in effect constitute obstruction. well you're talking in general terms you're not talking what i'm talking about as if it clee yes you're correct in the sense that substantially the special counsel and his report found substantial evidence that the president tried to change mcgann's account in order to prevent and this is a quote further scrutiny of the president toward the investigation and quote special counsel also found mcgann is a credible witness with no motive to lie or exaggerate so what i'm asking you then is that a credible charge under the obstruction statute we felt that we felt that that episode the government would not be able to establish obstruction. the if you go back and you if you look at the. the episode where.

mcgann the president gave mcgann an obstruction in an instruction mcgann's version of that is quite clear and each time he gave it which is that the instruction said go to rosenstein raise the issue of conflict of interest and muller has to go because of this conflict of interest so there's no question that that that the whatever instruction was giving mcgann had to do with conflict of it muller's conflict of interest now the president later said that what he meant was that the conflict of interest should be raised with rosenstein but the decision should be left with rose inside on the other end of the spectrum. it appears that mcgann felt it was more directive and that the president was essentially saying push rosenstein to invoke. a conflict of

interest to push moller out. wherever it fell on that spectrum of interest the new york times story was very different the new york times story said flat out that the president directed the firing of mahler he told mcgann fire moller now that there's something very different between firing a special council outright which suggests ending the investigation and having a special counsel removed for conflict which suggests that you're going to have another special counsel so the fact is that even under mcgann's and then as the report says and recognizes there is evidence the president truly felt that the times article was inaccurate and he wanted mcgann to correct it so we believe that it would be impossible for the government to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that the president. understood that he that he was instructing

make gand to say something false because it wasn't necessarily false moreover mcgann had weeks before already given testimony to the to this special counsel and the president was aware of that and as as the report indicates it could also have been the case that what he was it that he was primarily concerned about press reports and making it clear that he never outright directed the firing of mahler so in turn a so in terms of the request i asked mcgann to memorialize that fact we do not think in this case that the government could show corrupt intent beyond a reasonable doubt. just to finish this but you still have a situation where a president essentially tried to change. the lawyers account

in order to prevent further criticism of himself well that's not a crime so you can in this situation instruct someone to lie no it has to be well to be obstruction of justice the lie has to be tied to impairing the evidence in a particular proceeding gannett already given his evidence and i think i think it would be he plausible that the purpose of mcgann memorializing what the president was asking was to make the record that the president never directed him to fire and there is a distinction between saying to someone go firearm go fire moller and saying have him removed based on conflict. and what would have different results what would

that conflict be whether the difference between them is if you remove someone for a conflict of interest then there would be another xoom a billion other person appointed yeah but you have to have it in this kind of situation and identifiable conflict that made sense or else doesn't that just become a fabrication well this now we're going to shift from the issue of writing the the memo or somehow putting out a release later on and the issue of the actual direction to mcgann so the question on the direction to mcgann. has a number of different levels to it. and first as a matter of law i think the department's position would be that the president can direct the terminations or the replacement of a special counsel and as a matter of law the obstruction statute does not reach that conduct putting that

aside the next question would be even if it reached the conduct could you hear establish corrupt intent beyond a reasonable doubt what makes this case very interesting is that when you take away the fact that there were no underlying criminal conduct and you take away the fact that there was no inherently malign obstructive act that is the president was carrying out his constitutional duties the question is what is the impact of taking away the underlying crime. and. it's not as the report suggests that one impact is well we have to find some other reason why the president would obstruct the investigation but there's another impact which is if the president is being falsely accused which the evidence now

suggests that the accusations against and were false if he and he knew they were false and he felt that this investigation was unfair propelled by his political opponents and was and was hampering his ability to govern that is not a corrupt motive for replacing an independent counsel so that's another another reason that we would say that the government would have difficulty proving this beyond a reasonable doubt times thanks and press. senator johnson and i wrote you about text messages between peter struck and lisa page that appeared to show the f.b.i. may have been tried to use common intelligence briefings for the trump translation team as intelligence gathering operations i hope you will commit to answering the latter in writing but also providing committees requested review

but my question yes senator. have you already task any staff to look into whether spying by the f.b.i. and other agencies on the ground campaign was properly predicated and can congress expect a formal report on your findings. yes i do have people. in the department helping me review. the activities over the summer of two thousand and sixteen and. i suppose it depends on what conclusions you come to but is there any reason why congress wouldn't be briefed on one on your conclusions. it's a little early for me to commit completely but i envisioned some kind of reporting at the end of this the clinton campaign and the democrat national committee hired

fusion g.p.s. to do opposition research against candidate trump fusion g.p.s. then hired christopher steele former british intelligence officer to compile what we all know was a steel dossier that reportedly used russian government sources for information the steel dossier was central to the now debunked collusion narrative now here's the air irony the modern report spent millions investigating and found no collusion between tromp campaign and russia but the democrats paid for the document created by a foreign national with a reported foreign government sources not trump but the democrats that's the definition of collusion despite the central status.

steel dossier to the collusion narrative the model report failed to analyze whether the dossier was filled with dissent from asian to mislead u.s. intelligence agencies and the f.b.i. my question moller spent over two years thirty million dollars investigating russian interference in the election in order for a full accounting of russian interference tam's shouldn special consul have considered on whether the steel dossier was part of a russian disinformation and interference campaign. i don't. special counsel mothers put out his report and i have not yet had anyone go through the full scope of his investigation to determine whether he did it grass or look at all into those issues one of the things i'm doing in my review is try to assemble

all the existing information out there about it not only from hill investigations and the but also to see what the special counsel looked into so i really couldn't say what he actually looked into but but you think in other words if you had looked at all that information right now you're telling me you could have said yes or no to my question if i had looked at it and you're going to you're going to attempt to find some of this information and surveil yes. similarly shut in the special counsel have looked into the or origins of the f.b.i. as investigation into alleged collusion between the trauma campaign and russia. the origins of that narrative yes. i don't know if he viewed his charter that broadly and i don't know whether he did or not that's something that i

am reviewing and again will look at whatever the special counsel has developed on that you know in volume two of the report the special counsel be trying to make a traditional prosecutorial decision instead the special counsel laid out two hundred years old pages relating to a potential obstruction and alice's and then dump that on your desk in your press conference you said that us a special counsel whether he would have made a charging decision or recommended charges on obstruction but for the office of legal consuls opinion on charging sitting presidents and that the special counsel made clear that was not the case so mr barr is that an accurate description of your conversation with the special counsel yes he reiterated several times in a in a group meeting that the he was not saying that but for the o l c opinion he would have found obstruction you know if the special counsel found facts sufficient to

constitute obstruction of justice this would he have stated that fine if he had found that i think he would state yes was it special counsel mahler's responsibility to make a charging recommendation. i think the deputy attorney general and i thought it was the but but but not just charging but to to determine whether or not conduct was criminal the president would would be charged could not be charged as long as he was in office you know do you agree with the reasons that he offered for not making a decision in volume two of is a report and why or why not. i'm not really sure of his reasoning i really could not recapitulate is

analysis which is one of the reasons in my march twenty fourth letter i simply stated the fact that he did not reach a conclusion didn't didn't try to words in his mouth. i think that if he felt that he shouldn't go down the path of making a traditional. prosecutive decision then he shouldn't have investigated that was the time to pull up ok there have been a number of leaks coming out of the justice department f.b.i. during high profile investigations inspector general found that during the department's investigation of every plane ver mishandling highly classified information there was a culture of on authorized media contacts during the russian investigation that leaks continued leaks undermine the ability of investigators to investigate further leaks to the papers while congress's questions to the department go on answered is

on acceptable why what are you doing to investigate on authorized media contacts by the department and f.b.i. officials during the russian investigation we have multiple criminal leak investigations underway thank you sir les. thank you. so much trouble or your testimony here and in the other body impaired before the house appropriations the name or night. you have asked about media reports of trades and special counsel his team is frustrated that your march twenty fourth liner didn't adequately trained the report's findings. in the congress when i believe as congressman chris as if you knew what those numbers a special council team are concerned about you testified in response no i don't

you then said you merely suspected it would've preferred more information was released with the letter now we know contrary to what you said they were night. on march twenty seventh. robert muller wrote to you expressing very specific concerns that your march twenty fourth letter from here testifying on a per night at your march twenty fourth letter failed to capture the. quote mr maule or the context nature and substance of course of his report. and or died it really struck me stronger wrote the church letter threaten to undermine the central purpose for which the department pointed the special counsel sure full public confidence in the outcome of the investigation. why did you test find it for

night that you didn't know the concerns being expressed mahler's team would have backed you heard those concerns directly from mr paul or two weeks before. well as i said i talked directly to to bob muller about his letter to may and specifically asked them what exactly are your concerns are you saying that the march twenty fourth letter was misleading or inaccurate or what he indicated that it was not he was not saying that and that what he was concerned about and my question well i'm i'm i'm getting to the question which is the question from crist was reports have emerged recently press reports that members of the special counsel's team are from are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march twenty fourth letter in that they don't adequately or accurately portray the report's findings.

i don't know what members he's talking about i don't i and i and i certainly am not aware of any challenge to the accuracy of the findings mr are you seeing of learn the filibuster rules even better than senators do i question was why did you say you were not aware of concerns when weeks before your test when it mr moore and i expressed concerns to you that's a very simple well answered a question and the question was relating to an identified members who were expressing frustration over the accuracy relating to findings i don't know what that refers to at all i talked.