robert: mueller finally speaks now?but what i'm robertta cos welcome to "washington week." robert mueller defends his report and his decisions. >> if we hon haddence that the president clearly did not commit a crime we would have so. we did not however make a determination as to whether the president did commit a crime. >> there's no crime. there was no charge because he had no information. >> impeachment calls grow lder but speaker pelosi won't be pushed. >> msty cuents want to impeach the president, but we want to do what is right and what gets results. robert: and the president launches a trade war with mexico, next. ♪ announcer: ts is "washington week."

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provided by otska, ku and patricia you win committed to bridging cultura differences. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. once again from washington, moderator robert costa. robert: robert mueller's investigation is complete. he formerly shuttered the special council's office this eek, but the debate over his conclusions continues inside the justice department, on capitol ll and across the nation. mr. mueller after years of silence stepped forward on wednesday to defend his team's work and offered what he hopes are his final remarks on this front. >> russian intelligence officer who are part of the russian military launched a concert attack on our political system. the releases were design and timed to w interfereh our

election and to damage a presidential candidate. robert: on president trump in possible obstruction of justice, he said this -- >> if we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so. we did not, however, make a determination as to whether the president did commit a crime. robert: the president fired back. >> i think he is a total, conflicted person. i think mueller is a true never trumper. >> attorney general bill barr raised questions about mueller's legal analysis telling cbs news that he "disagreed with a lot of it." he add that it did not reflect the department's view. inting me tonight yamiche alcindor for the pbs newshour. devlin barrett,in "waon post." susan page, washington bureau chief fory. "usa to and gerry seib executive editor

for the washington journal. susan, what wascaost signi about mr. mueller's statement? >> first of all that he spoke at all. for two years, mueller had been this blank canvas on whichot people projected their hopes and their fierce about where this investigation will lead. and he finally spoke. that's very compelling because he's never done it before. but his message was interesting in that it was one of -- folks, i'm done here. whatever youecide to do is up to you now. you know, this investigation has been sort o two roads for a long time, a legal criminal investigation, and then the political road. i think those two roads he now merged. and mueller is saying i'm not driving further down the road. whatever happens will ben the political role.

i don't know that congress will take that for as answer.: robeid he offer any clarity on o -- on obstruction justus. >> he sin -- insists heco won't ider the question. na's the basic contradiction of work because why do you investigate the president if not to reach a decisio in that report? e beliefs that justice department policy does not permit him to reach a decision on that.us democrats would like him to reach a decision because that would help their cause. t what he laid thought week was a very emphatic, i'm not going there and you can't me. e robert: susan, who is the audience for mr. mueller? susan: i think the audience -- of course, we were all consumed. he had a message directed at americans across the country that got less attention.

he started with it and in just nine minutes. he started and finished by talking about russian meddling.p not abosident trump's role, about russia's role. and the fact is, the that has gotten not -- hasn't been as inflammatory as i as it should be is remarkable because the impabble of russian meddli our election which is going to continue has much more far-reaching long standing consequences than even president trump. --ert: and it's so important will congress act on russian meddling? susan: the house has passed some legs aimed at -- legislation aimed athat. but there hasn't been a concerted national campaign to harden our elections systems that you would have expected. >> i think o onef the interesting unobserved part is that this increase the pressure on mitch monnell to move

interferenceo stop by the russians. he's gotten away by sitting on it for months andth m but one of the things that bob mueller wanted to do is turn up e heat on congress to act in thatse s bob mueller seemed conflicted on the obstruction of justice. there was a huge wink involved there. which is to say we didn't find that the president didn't find obstructio of justice and now it's time for others to do something about it.s now iour turn as you said. and that was the other takeaway from it. the third pointe i would m is that the president was pretty conflicted too because he wants to say bob mueller exonerated me, complet exonerated. oh, by the way, he was a never trumper and deeply con flibblingted. either he' -- deeply conflicted. eithere's honorable or conflicted. >> how is he playing at the white house? inside the west wing? what's the mood?

yamiche: it's one of president trump still feeling ary at the fact that the mueller investigation ever happened. we saw his tweet this week, i had nothing to do with russia helping me win the election. and quickly backtracked. that's not what i meant. i won it by melf. bob mueller says we should really be concerned abo the elections susan is really right when you think about he started and ended his mest.ge with t that was a message to the american people. i will add from the pol oical poin view, i think if you look deeply at what robert mueller said, there was for democrats he was sayg this report is my testimony. i take that to mean, democrats i know y're going to try to do oversight. if i have to come to congress, i'm not going to goeyond report. robert: is he going to go to congress based on your nversation with house democrats? >> i'm not sure. i think if you listedam schiff from the house intelligence community he sounds

like he might subpoena mueller. but jerry nadler says what are you going to do, are you goingt ubpoena mueller? i heard much of what i wanted to hear. he basically ttopped att point. i will say if you're a republican listeni to bob mueller, you have to make it very clear that he said if i thought i cld clear the president i would have. i think that's the political message to republicans. he's making it crystal clear, i'm not giving him a pass. i'm not exonerating him which is what the president has bee saying over and over again. and robert mueller is saying that's nothat i'm saying. robert: your d.o.j. sources expect him to g to capitol hill even to he -- even though he wants this to be his final word. >> i think part of the message is that he will beti h witness. it's a question for the house democrats -- which is worse. robert: how does bill barr handle it? >> mueller has said he doesn want to go.

first of all, mueller is not a d.o.j. employer. barr can't make him do anything. it'sonversation between mueller and nadler and some others in the house. and i think t challenge for democrats is, do you want a hostile witness or no witness? whichs better/worse for what you're trying to accomplish which is toureep public pre on the president and give these gevestigations some o and some fuel. one of -- one of the things that has beengo annoy is that he says closed case but he doesn'te give kind of crisp answer thatould say yes, you should impeach. which is the message that mocrats heard but that's not exactly he said. >> he's debating the attorney general about the meaning ofnis eport. >> i don't think he wanted to do this at off. i think he wanted to go a

without saying a word. people nic where most run toward a television camera and mueller runs away as fast as he can. heelt he hado close the book in some fashion and this is the fashion by which he did it.: ro the house democrats want to open the book, a growing number of them on the question of impeachment. what are the pressures? >> the pressure is that there's still a minority tha stillant to impeach the president. but they are loud and they're people that a savvyith the media. they are people who have a lot of energy behind them. and by t way, you have now democrat who are running for president who ae m and more -- them are saying we should look into impeachment should impeach. there's this idea that nancy pelosi she still has a handle on her caucus as of today. when democrats comes back and c the congrees back that could be a different story. robert: whas your read on

speaker pelosi? susan:e'in a bind. 55 house democrat who is support either an impeachment, 'em paneling an impeachment committee or starting an impeachment of some sort. but she's got 51 democratpe whos fl seats. there is demo overlap between -- there is no overlapth between e two seats, they are entirely separate fro the 55 democrat who is support some kind of impeople ych inquiry. impeachment is risky for the president, but risky for democrats who got elected regained control with a promise to deal with things like health care. robert: is it a riskyusiness fo pelosi? >> it's risky business. they look at their districts and say people are going toad be if we move to impeachment that's not a very s usefulategy from

our point of view. there's another risk involved, by the way, and i wrote a column sayingt the top, maybe president trump wants president trump to impeachment. i thought i was being facetious. i think nancy pelosi think this is way too. what would happen? he would be impeached by democrats in the house. he would not be convicted in the ousenate. he then say, i was vindicated and the democrats overreach and spent their time in this rather tha dealing wit the country. robert: don mcgahn could be in the battle. is there more on the intent front? >> it's not just mueller who is a problematic witness for the d houseocrats or a nonexistent witness for them. it's mcgahn a number of former white house officials that ty do not want 100 miles of a

hearing room. ou know the democrats hav approached the problem with the notion of, you know, we need a high profiles hearing if i mueller or mcgann or someone else. weeed -- mcgahn or someone else, we need live tv. they're searching for a witness. and right now theon't have one. robert: to gerry's question, does the white house want impeachment proceedings for 2020? yamiche: they are having meetings about impeachment. white house aides have been telling us that it might help him win back the house. i've been talking to sources inside the trump campaign a they say this would help turn out our voters. we want them to come. and what better message than to say they're still mad of016 and they're trying to take him

out of office for 2020. that's what nancy pelosi is looking at and why she's proceedings so cautiously. rort: are there any cracks. we saw repsentative amash. >> he duds not represent acr k. he's a principled libertarian member of cgress who speaks only for himself. it's not as though -- it's not like kevin mcyarty announced he's in favor of impeachment. that doesn't mean n you cou possibly have some erosion of republicans if you had some big disclosure. they have stuck with president trump for the past two years. the white house cannot confident that a mitt romney, for instance, woun't find something that made him support taking action. >> can you imagine 20 republican senators voting to convict? >> no. >> nancy pelosi says another

thing. she talk about how impeachment would be very divisive.ce she's s in that. and she's certainly right. that would be extraordinary divisive. that's in our mind as she does the calculus in this question. >> you look at the country, politics has become so tribal. take any event, roberatmueller's ent or what president trump is tweeting or what nancy pe lesley:losi is saying -- pelosi. and if you talk to republicans it's a different story than democrats. >> we know this gins up president's base but not impeaching a president who many of the most reliabl democratic voters ought to be impeached is could hold down a democratic turnout. it could be a problem fde crats in 2020 as well. robert: final question on this issue. ether the president gets impeached could he still face

charges as he leaves office? >> it's something that mueller says very specifically in the report. it's a scenario that could happen. i tnk that's still a difficult and -- and high hurdle nd politically legally. but yeah, that's definitely on the table in terms of a legal possibility down the road. >> let's turn to trade president trump has threatened to impose new tariffs on mexico with the goal of having mexico be more aggressive on immigration. some republicans slam the move as a misuse of presidential tariff authority. "the wall street journal" reported that bob light also objected to the plan that it could jeopardize t trade agreement. what does this mean for u.s. consumers? >> mexico is the second largest providor o imports. there are all kinds of stuff

that comes in.'s armful to the auto industry. price of cars goes up. ice of mexican produce at the restaurant or the grocery store goes up. the appliance that you might buy might have been made in mexico. there's a lot of impact for consumers. there's potential follow-up on impact if this actually happens and mexico pesponds byling tariffs then that's going to affect farmers. one footnote, this is not happening immediately.nt the presias said, i will put these on effective june 10th if mexico -- robert: 5% startingune 10th. then 5% in addition -- gerald: 5% every month. there's something to aidow prt trump to back-off. we've seen this in the chinae trispute. there's a threat, a panic, the president puts a deadline and he

says i succeeded and he backs off. >> why did he act now? >> i don't know if i can answer that. but this has been a white house that's been trying to make a case that there's a crisisn the border and has been using changes in asylum. i will say this, i was in the call with white house officials and one of the key questions asked, well, what can mexico do to make sure these tariffs don't happen? there were no clear goalfr post the white house. so you have a very clear punitive action. it's going to be this date and this date. buton they say if border apprehensions go down by 5% then we'll pull that back. so what you have is a vague successful goal, a vague goal for success, and mexico could pretty much do anything and trump can say, i'll move or we'll tak this away. or he could say, they didn't do

enough, we will go to 25%. susan: the president has done threats and not done them. he's often done the at a moment where we're talking about it. what are we talk about this week? t and ller's announcem trying to shield the president from trying to seld this ship in japan that is named the u.s.s.ccain. those are stories in which he was not getting a lot of defenders. we're talking about trade on an issue he would like us to talk about. robert: we've seen him controversial powers, very conversationable even among republicans and going into the national security area. >> one of the great things about politics or maybe one of the worst things about politic is that your vie of executive power depends on who happens to be the executive at the time. there's this battle with how

muchuthority the preside has on a whole number of fronts. ba helps trump in a number of ways. one of the ways that you've seen him, y know, become very close to trump very quickly in a way a lot of other cabinet officials have struggled to do is that trump likes histtorney general already. and a lot of what barr is doing is to the benefit of the president. and for democrats they see that as, you know, very dangerous and alarming and trump finally feels he has a real defender, a reale lan the justice department. robert: does this upend the new version of nafta that sits on nancys pelos hands as she sits on capitol hill? >> that's one of the reasons why his top aid -- advisors says don't do tt. because this sort of things stirs up nl sentiment which is very close to the

surface in mexico. there's a chance that the legislature says nope, we're not going to do any deals with the u.s. and here it gives the democrats an excuse to vote against a trade agreement they're not sure they like anyway. it creates a political problem that i very close t the president's heart. >> i appreciate you being here on a friday nht. our conversation will continue on the "washington week" extra. watch it. you can stream it on our website, or facebook. i'm robert costa. have w a greatkend. ♪ [captioning performed by the national captioning institese, which isnsible for its caption content and accuracy.visit ncicap.org]

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