The former US special counsel Robert Mueller methodically demolished Donald Trump’s central claims about his Russia investigation – insisting the results did not exonerate Trump – but he did not provide the fireworks that supporters of impeachment had been craving as he testified to Congress on Wednesday.
Testifying for almost seven hours at back-to-back hearings on Capitol Hill, Mueller rejected the US president’s claims that his investigation was “a witch-hunt”, that Russian election interference was “a hoax” and that Mueller’s report provided Trump with “total exoneration”.
Mueller expressed fears that hostile government interference in US elections, and political candidates failing to report it, may become “the new normal”.
Yet for those who had billed the hearings as a made-for-TV-moment that would convey the Mueller report to millions of people unaware of its contents, there was also a sense of anti-climax. It was political theatre without much drama as Mueller stuck rigidly to his published conclusions and provided few new revelations.
Worse, he was a star witness lacking star power, often struggling to keep up as questions pinballed from one member of Congress to another and providing only halting answers. At times he seemed uncertain of the contents of his own report.
Nevertheless, Adam Schiff, the Democratic chairman of the House intelligence committee, teased some specific answers out of Mueller likely to grab the attention of TV viewers. “It is not a witch-hunt,” the special counsel said, refuting one of the president most repeated assertions.
Democratic congresswoman Jackie Speier asked: “Would you agree that it was not a hoax that the Russians were engaged in trying to impact our election?”
Mueller, who became most animated when warning of the threat of Russia, replied: “Absolutely. That was not a hoax.”
Earlier in the day, at the start of the judiciary committee hearing, its chairman, Jerry Nadler, asked if Mueller’s report exonerated Trump, as the president has frequently claimed. Mueller answered: “No.”
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