Obstruction Laws News Today

Information to others, violations of the espionage act, obstruction laws, and lying. its really bad for donald trump. >> there was a lot of evidence, right? especially trumps attorney evan corcoran, voice memos and audio of trump himself and conversations. tell us about that and how critical that evidence was. >> its unusual that the key evidence comes from your own lawyer. you bring up a good point. usually attorney/client privilege is sacrosanct. as such trump is free in his mind to make these...

Can speed things up. >> the january 6th commission wants to speak with the facebook whistle-blower, frances haugen. tell us what you expect they can get from her. >> well, i think theyre broadly looking at the extent to which private actors, we saw in the report, also members of the pennsylvania republican state delegation, how much there was concerted effort around the january 6th insurrection, but i want to put a pin in another option for congress in this moment. so, the report mentions that t...

Reach of obstruction laws and that is what the report said so basically -- -- >> it is important -- >> i dont think he heard the case. he basically said what was in the report and that is what people like me were expecting. >> it is important to bring to the attention of people who werent watching what radcliffe brought to the attention of people in the hearing which is it was not muellers job to exonerate the president. where we came up with that principle simply isnt a bedrock principle of the...

That. because they did a report and there was no obstruction. >> all right. so keeping them honest, the mueller report did not conclude there was no obstruction of justice. the presidents attorney general did. the report spoke at length how a matter of policy a sitting president could not be indicted in addition it laid out many instances of potential obstruction including this quote from page 7 of volume 2. many of the presidents acts directed at witnesses including discouragement of cooperatio...

Pardons took place in public view. that circumstance is unusual but no principle of law excludes public acts from the reach of the obstruction laws. by the way, one of the republican talking points that cnn dana bash obtained today that well go into later says and i quote, the president never interfered with anyone or any part of the investigation and was committed to transparency throughout the entire process. i mean, that is a talking point. its clearly not true according to the mueller report...

Of the united states to subvert the constitution and obstructed it on top of it. you dont have that here. >> well, if you take the concurrent barr interpretation of the obstruction laws, even nixon didnt obstruct justice. the so-called smoking gun under his puram tarameters would not obstruction of justice. so he set a different bar and a different standard and im not sure -- well, first of all the criminal law has no application in this area. while republicans have always said it must be a crim...

Volume 2 page 8 of the report is a clear reminder of constitutional checks and balances limiting the presidents power. >> the conclusion that congress may apply the obstruction laws to the presidents corrupt exercise of the powers of the office accords with our constitutional system of checks and balances and the principle that no person is above the law. congress is going to have to investigate whether the president really abused power or not. but they have to dig into the intent. what was driv...

Obstructive acts. and for at least four of them he finds substantial elements of all the legal elements of obstruction of justice. so congress should isolate those four instances and say with respect to, for example, the presidents efforts to fire you, robert mueller, the special counsel, did you find substantial evidence of all the legal elements of obstruction of justice? i think base on his own report robert mueller has to answer that question yes. and if you string together those four yeses ...

Justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrong doing. >> of course, that process is congress. and it is impeachment. mueller was clear. and by the way, you just look at volume 2, page 8 of the mueller report you didnt have to get to page 44le. volume 2 page eight. the conclusion that congress may apply the obstruction laws to the presidents corrupt exercise of the powers of office aaccordings with our constitutional system of checks and balances. and the principle that no person ...

Basically says in the report and must determine the presidents criminal culpability for committing obstruction of justice here. that was my favorite part from the whole written report, right? that congress, he says, that congress may apply obstruction laws to the presidents corrupt exercise to the powers of office accords with our constitutional system of checks and balances and the principle that no person is above the law. congress has the authority to prohibit a presidecorrupt use o authority...