House votes for public release of Mueller report Stone’s trial set for Nov. 5
WASHINGTON — The House voted overwhelmingly and in bipartisan fashion to urge the Justice Department to publicly release the entirety of special counsel Robert Mueller III’s report into Russian interference in the 2016 election, once completed.
The move is an attempt to “send a clear signal both to the American people and the Department of Justice” that lawmakers expect to see the full account of Mueller’s work, according to the Judiciary Committee’s chairman, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y.
The final vote count was 420 in favor, with no one voting no. Four lawmakers voted “present.”
But the resolution by itself cannot force Attorney General William Barr to publish more of the report than he intends to — and that is why even some of the Republicans supporting it complained that the measure was a waste of time.
“Attorney General Barr said he wants to be transparent with Congress and the public consistent with the rules and the law,” Rep. Douglas Collins of Georgia, the Judiciary Committee’s top Republican, said on the House floor Thursday, adding that the resolution was “simply a restatement of the regulation.”
The resolution is not expected to get a vote in the GOP-led Senate, where Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., tried to arrange one Thursday but was foiled by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. Graham objected to a vote on the resolution unless lawmakers also urged the attorney general A federal judge set a Nov. 5 trial date for Roger Stone on charges of lying to Congress and obstructing justice in a Thursday hearing. She also postponed any decision of whether a new book by the longtime GOP operative and Trump confidant violated a gag order in his case.
U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson in Washington said the trial would be expected to last at least two weeks on the accusations that Stone lied about his efforts to gather information about hacked Democratic Party emails during the 2016 presidential campaign. Stone, 66, has pleaded not guilty and remains free pending trial.
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to appoint a second special counsel “to investigate Department of Justice misconduct” during federal investigations of Donald Trump’s alleged Russia ties and Hillary Clinton’s emails. Schumer refused.
For House Democrats, passing the resolution was an important gesture, as during his confirmation hearing, Barr refused to pledge to release the full report to the public.
Democrats are worried that Barr’s defense of his own prerogative, combined with his stated respect for Justice Department rules advising against the indictment of a sitting president or the impugning of an unindicted individual in an investigative report, means potential information implicating Trump in wrongdoing could be buried.