Ill be joined onset by democratic senator Michael Bennet whos poised to run for president. His first opponent he has to face is cancer. This will be his first tv interview since going public with his diagnosis and well have that later in the show. We begin tonight with the firestorm ignited by news reported by the new york times, then the Washington Post which a u. S. Official confirmed to nbc news. And its the following that some members of special counsel Robert Muellers team believe the attorney general downplayed the evidence against the president on obstruction. This is how the evidence against mr. Trump was characterized in all of these reports, which, by the way, are all based on anonymous sources. It was more damaging for the president than mr. Barr explained. To the post, it was alarming and significant and to us here at nbc news, it was compelling. But, folks, we preached caution when barr told us when the evidence meet. And were going to preach caution as well. We still have not seen a single sentences from this report. In many ways, this is the consequence of barrs decision to clear the president , its also a consequence of barrs decision to sit on summaries that apparently muellers team reported prepared for this very issue, for a public release. The House Judiciary Committee chairman is now calling on the attorney general to release those summaries. And as we wait for something, were left with a vacuum, and an arms race to fill it. President trump fils it with claims that hes been totally exonerated because bill barr did exonerate him on obstruction. And were all debating the fallout from a report we have not seen a single complete sentence from. Joining me know is one of the reporters who broke the story for the washington report, and a security analyst here and greg brower is here, hes a former u. S. Attorney. Rosalynn, im going to start with you. How nervous are you that were basing all of this on or people that dont want to go on the record. You know who they are. But were in this situation in the same way that barr put us in there in the first place where were all flying a little blind here . Yeah. I think thats i think the way that you put that in your introduction about the vacuum thats being filled with a lot of people who have not read the report is a good way to put it. I feel confident that were accurately describing the attitudes of some members of the mueller team, but i dont have a lot of confidence about exactly whats in that report and how damning or not damning it is because we havent seen it and thats just a weird place to be. I was going to say, the words you guys use were alarming k. You give us more. How did this source define alarming. I wish i could give you more. What we know, theres this frustration among some members of the team about whats been happened in this time period, the hardening of Public Opinion about whats in a report that they spent a long time on. Blood, sweat and tears. Ken, why wont anybody go on the record . And its even more dramatic than just they wont go on the record, were getting this secondhand. Were getting this from people who spoke to those people. But the reason its they wont go on the record is because they work for the Justice Department, theyre not allowed to talk to us. Its a sensitive matter. They were silent for two years in this investigation. Its amazing that were even getting this much out of them. Theyre frustrated. But youre right, we dont know how far this frustration goes within the mueller team. We dont know what Robert Muellers views are. Nbc news has a little more of a beat further than what the post and the times said is that were hearing frustration over the fact that the attorney general stepped in and cleared the president on obstruction. Were hearing that there may have been an intention to leave that open for congress or the public. Remember, the attorney general said the Mueller Report does not make a call on whether theres a prosecutable case for obstruction. Some people on the team felt like thats where it should stand. They didnt anticipate barr stepping in. We had this very conversation that it was probably muellers intent never to make the decision knowing this was a decision that congress would have to make. Not anybody at the Justice Department. I think you and i had that conversation that would be the most obvious assumption. We did. And i would use your word, chuck, caution. We need to be very cautious. Of course, we havent seen the report. And the sourcing is a matter of debate here. But assuming what the times and others are reporting is true, it puts the department in a very bad spot. It creates daylight between the ag and the special counsel which im sure neither one of them wanted to see in this matter. This is a report thats as high profile and as important as it gets. At the end of the day, we all hope to have to be no daylight between the ag and special counsel. I think one of the frustrations all of us have as reporters is when the special counsels office broke tradition and pushed back on the buzzfeed story that was wrong about the criminality issue regarding the president ordering Michael Cohen to lie to congress, it made us all think, oh, does that mean all of the other stories are true, if mueller doesnt it created that and i have to admit, im sitting here going, okay, if muellers team didnt like what was happening, why wait until now . Well, right. And i think that dynamic youre describing is exactly the reason why they were so quiet for so long and exactly why the fact that they spoke out about that buzzfeed story was so significant because i think they understood too that they might be setting a new precedent. Its interesting to note there has been a Statement Today on the record from the spokeswoman for the attorney general disputing not disputing the reporting so much, but disputing the notion that the attorney general mischaracterized, is moving too slowly, failed to release something that could be easily released, theres been no Statement Today from the special counsels office. If they wished to either confirm or alternatively say this reporting is wrong, they have a very easy way to do that. And they have not chosen to do so. Im glad you brought this up. Because i found i found the decision by justice to put out a statement the most Significant Development of the day because it allowed all three news organizations to feel better about the reporting, right . They could have not said anything. But they did. And i want to read from it. Because i think it gives away something here. Heres the Statement Given the extraordinary Public Interest in this matter, the attorney general decided to release the findings, and his conclusions immediately without attempting to summarize the report with the understanding that the report itself would be released after the redaction process. What i thought was interesting here, ken, is admitting in a clearer form here than they did in the memo that hes not summarizing the report and, im sorry, and admitting that this is his conclusion. And this is the second time that hes alluded to that. He also put out a letter. But he worded the letter a lot differently this is more clear. The reason these guys are expressing this frustration is because barr substituted his judgment for the people who spent two years investigating obstruction. Theyre not talking about collusion. Theres a lot more in the report about collusion russian government. We dont know there wasnt conspiracy with russians who didnt happen to conspire with employees of the Trump Campaign versus the government. Theres a lot of wiggle room. Were reporting that the report is going to lay some of that out. Thats not frustrating the mueller team. Therg with the conclusion that bar expressed. Theyre frustrated on this obstruction issue. And its a mismystery why mueller didnt make a call. Theyre portraying as if barr merely released the reports bottom line findings. He made the call on obstruction. And that is confusing to all of us. I wish there was that second letter, it created conclusion, its creating what were seeing now with push back from the mueller team. I still havent thought about this for a weekplus now. I cant figure out why bob mueller would abdicate we dont know do you think he he thought he was intending for barr to make this call . I cant imagine why. As weve discussed before, for the special counsel whos sole mission is to take these decisions away from the political appointees of justice, to say on the biggest decision, im going to punt to not only the politically appointed, trump appointed ag, but the guy who wrote the memo a year ago that caused him to catch so much flak from democrats in congress. That doesnt make sense. Rosalynn, do you take anything, were you surprised to find out that the fbi director hadnt read the Mueller Report. I would have thought to the investigation that especially mueller took over that began inside the fbi that he would have seen it . I dont know. I do think that every indication has been that the circle is extraordinarily small. That very, very few people have read this thing. You know, barrs one letter did indicate that the report comes in two pieces, one piece having to do with russian interference and the other piece having to do with obstruction of justice. He did not indicate theres a Counter Intelligence section of the report. It may be that that piece of it is not addressed in this report. I dont know. Ive heard that theory that its actually could be ongoing. I think the counter intel part sorry, rosalynn. I thought as ive listened to people try to make sense of the Mueller Report, what might be in it, that the counter intel part of it, is overblown. I think we need to remember that the fbi is continuing, has continued and will continue to do Counter Intelligence investigations based upon leads that the mueller work may have generated. But the Mueller Report was not a Counter Intelligence investigation, it was a criminal investigation. Important distinction there. Thank you. Nothing like the abyss of these vacuums that mr. Barr and mr. Mueller have created for all of us. Coming up with these new reports on the mueller teams purported frustration, democrats are pushing harder for the full report. Plus the democratic president ial field keeps getting big. Another has to put his 2020 plans on pause, not old. My exclusive interview with senator Michael Bennet and his cancer diagnosis and how it impacts his plans. Thats ahead. Youve had quite the career. Yeah, ive had some pretty prestigious jobs over the years. News producer, executive transport manager, and a beverage distribution supervisor. Now im a director at a Security Software firm. Wow, youve been at it a long time. Thing is, i like working. What if my Retirement Plan is i dont want to retire . Then lets not create a Retirement Plan. Lets create a plan for whats next. I like that. Get a plan thats right for you. Td ameritrade. To Severe Plaque Psoriasis get clearer. And stay clearer. 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And sessions was fired because he wouldnt protect the president personally. Comey was fired because he wouldnt protect the president. And they found barr. Thats his job. That was House Judiciary Committee chairman jerry nadler questioning the attorney generals handling of the Mueller Report. So that relationship is getting off to a great start. Lets bring in tonights panel, a washington correspondent for the new york times, former democratic congressman from maryland, and a former adviser to both jeb bush and john boehner. Lets be honest, this is exactly i think what we all together was going to happen, we dont know the facts and we can debate whether we dont know if barr is right or wrong, we dont know if mueller is right or wrong. But barr did do this, hes created this vacuum, and its been filled. Even whatever fragments of the report come into the light of day, i think this narrative battle is going to continue. This is going to push all the way to election day, whatever the executive branch turns over will not be good enough for the democrats, theyll want to see the underlying files. And to the extent the exrekt branch says no, and the they will get the fight this feels like the email fights with clinton. Mueller report is going to be the, but her emails. Barr created a vacuum and the president used it to seize the high ground. Not morally or intellectually, but in terms of the narrative so they are fighting from a stronger position during these words to come. And the worst to come are not going to move much. I think whats happening here is that democrats have said and nadler said this really clearly, look, were going to give you a chance to comply. We want to see what the redactions are. But we need to have the report and the underlying materials and thats about a constitutional responsibility. I think as long as democrats are on that ground, then theyre on solid ground. We should remind people that the public, nothing has changed them. The Mueller Report did it clear president trump, 29 said yes in our poll, 40 said no and 31 were unsure. And its the 31 that this is all about. Its like Hillary Clintons emails. They have their opinion one way or the other and its not changing. Which is why we need a report and not a summary, not somebody elses opinion of it. Because only then will the public be able to see for themselves whats going on in the report. I have to say, giulianis push back, and while his credibility at times can be hot and cold, the fact is, let me just read what he says here, he was able to look credible in this statement. If there was a significant difference, mueller would have corrected it as he did with the false buzzfeed report. This is from disgruntled mueller staffers who are rabid democratic supporters. Its yet another example of unethical behavior by mueller staff. It demonstrates that mueller had people who leaked as much as comey. How many leaks proved to be false, most. The problem that democrats have been pushing against that statement, it is all anonymous people, all of us are admitting, it is people who are talking to people who have talked to reporters. Were playing two levels of telephone here. Thats all true. The one thing that i think is not true in the statement most of it i said was untrue. The buzzfeed push back example, the fact that mueller didnt speak up when he did in that case what does that mean . It means hes choosing not to. In that case, Rod Rosenstein was pushing the special counsels office to correct that report. They were basically ordering that statement to be put out in a situation in which the Barr Justice Department does not want mueller to push back against barrs account of things, theyre not ordering him, theyre ordering him to shut up. And so the different behavior, you cant conclude from that mueller is thinking Something Different than he was in the buzzfeed situation. If a staff of tens of people, some of whom may have been regulated democrats have told friends who told reporters that they were unhappy with the attorney generals conclusion, thats pretty much unprovable. You cant deny that. Lets look at what we have. We have fewer than a hundred words that are not complete sentences, in a summary of a report that is almost 400 pages long. The American People need to and deserve to see the report. And i dont think barr is going to be able to stand in the way of that and so we will see what the redactions are. What if barr had waited until releasing the report to release his obstruction statement. We would be living with about two weeks of uncertainty that mueller makes no conclusion, ill have redactions later and left it at that, would we be at a better place . When we see the report or enough of it to understand, hopefully there will be some indication there about why mueller made this strange decision not to make a decision. And it could be that based on what mueller says there, barr is stepping in saying the Justice Department has to make a decision. If youre not going to do it, im going to do it, will look like a normal thing. If it looks like that he wanted the Justice Department to not put his thumb on the scale and congress to absorb this information and then barr thwarted mueller, then this is going to become trenched about ruining the nonpartisan i know whats coming. Were going to redo this statute again. This one didnt work, sorry neil. Because its congresss you know, its congresss responsibility with respect to the president to make the judgment about whether hes culpable in any kind of criminal behavior. It is not the responsibility of bob barr or its bill barr. I know. I know. By the way, understand i did it too a coup