What Trump Did and Didn’t Do - The Mueller Report and Beyond

There is no way to get around the fact that the Mueller Report makes very clear that there was no collusion or cooperation with Russia regarding its interference in the election for the purpose of insuring Trump’s election.  Therefore Trump and his campaign did not commit that crime, or at least the evidence was not sufficient to ensure successful prosecution of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, which is the criminal standard Mueller was using.

With regard to the obstruction charge, I don’t know the fine points of law on this subject, but Mueller was not willing to say what he did regarding the Russia charge … there was no obstruction.  And so he said that the findings do not exonerate Trump.  He just laid out the facts for and against.

But in our system of justice, if you don’t have enough facts to prove a crime, even though it sure looks like it, the person should not be charged, and if he is he will be found not guilty.  Thus from this technical perspective, Barr was correct in his prosecutorial decision.

So Trump and his campaign either did not commit these crimes, or at least could not be successfully prosecuted for them, which we must take as legally the same thing.  Innocent until proven guilty is our system’s maxim.

One more point should be made about Trump not being guilty of a crime.  Many people point out how the report is loaded with examples of Trump lying and forcing others to lie.   But lying is not a crime, unless it’s under oath, and Trump did not lie under oath because Mueller never got to take live testimony from him.  Nor was there sufficient evidence to prove that he forced others to lie under oath, which would be what’s termed “suborning perjury.”

But there is one potential crime that the Mueller report does not seem to have addressed:  accessory after the fact, or aiding and abetting, Russia’s interference in the election.  Certainly Trump and his campaign knew that Russia was interfering in the election.  That was a crime and the Special Counsel has indicted numerous Russian operatives in that regard.

Now, failure to report a crime is generally not a crime itself.  However, if you take action to help conceal the crime, then you become an accessory after the fact which is a crime.  And so the question is, did Trump and/or campaign officials help or conspire to conceal information of Russia’s election interference.  Did they do something beyond not reporting?  That remains for Congress to investigate.

But beyond the Special Counsel’s narrow prosecutorial question, whether there was sufficient evidence to successfully prosecute a crime, that leaves the question whether Trump committed a "high crime or misdemeanor" which is an impeachable offense, or whether he acted in a manner not befitting the office of President.  These are both questions for Congress to assess.

With regards to cooperating with the Russians or obstructing justice, the Report lays out a multitude of facts, which may well meet the lesser standard of proof for an impeachable offense, which is closer to the preponderance of the evidence, was it more likely it happened or not.  Also there is the question of whether he was an accessory after the fact, or aided and abetted.   As for being unfit for office, unfortunately, one cannot impeach a President for being unfit for the office.  Only the public can remove him for that cause by voting him out of office. May the investigations begin.