Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin Richard (Dick) Joseph DurbinFeinstein 'surprised and taken aback' by suggestion she's not up for Supreme Court fight Grand jury charges no officers in Breonna Taylor death Democrats shoot down talk of expanding Supreme Court MORE (D-Ill.) says special counsel Robert Mueller Robert (Bob) MuellerCNN's Toobin warns McCabe is in 'perilous condition' with emboldened Trump CNN anchor rips Trump over Stone while evoking Clinton-Lynch tarmac meeting The Hill's 12:30 Report: New Hampshire fallout MORE’s findings about contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russian agents, as well as President Trump Donald John TrumpBiden on Trump's refusal to commit to peaceful transfer of power: 'What country are we in?' Romney: 'Unthinkable and unacceptable' to not commit to peaceful transition of power Two Louisville police officers shot amid Breonna Taylor grand jury protests MORE’s efforts to impede Mueller’s investigation, are “troubling.”

“The Special Counsel’s findings paint a very different picture than what the President and his Attorney General would have the American people believe,” Durbin said in a statement Thursday following the Mueller report’s release.

“Special Counsel Mueller has provided a detailed and sobering report about the troubling contacts between the Trump campaign and the Russians and about the President’s efforts to impede and end the Special Counsel’s investigation,” he said.

ADVERTISEMENT

Durbin, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, joined other Democrats in calling for Mueller to testify before the Senate and House Judiciary committees.

Mueller found that Russian officials reached out to Trump’s campaign on several occasions with pledges of assistance, although they sometimes didn’t follow through or campaign officials were unaware they were dealing with Russian agents.

Sen. Patrick Leahy Patrick Joseph LeahyDemocrats shoot down talk of expanding Supreme Court Battle over timing complicates Democratic shutdown strategy Hillicon Valley: Russia 'amplifying' concerns around mail-in voting to undermine election | Facebook and Twitter take steps to limit Trump remarks on voting | Facebook to block political ads ahead of election MORE (Vt.), another senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said “members of the Trump campaign were not simply useful pawns in Russia’s attack on our elections.”

“They were eager, unapologetic beneficiaries of Russia’s interference. They welcomed it. They encouraged the release of stolen materials and planned a press strategy around it. They not once reported it to law enforcement authorities. Then they misrepresented the facts and hid their actions from the American people,” Leahy said in a statement.

The highest-profile interaction came on June 9, 2016, when senior representatives of the Trump campaign, including Donald Trump Jr. Don John Trump'Tiger King' star Joe Exotic requests pardon from Trump: 'Be my hero please' Zaid Jilani discusses Trump's move to cancel racial sensitivity training at federal agencies Trump International Hotel in Vancouver closes permanently MORE, campaign chairman Paul Manafort Paul John ManafortOur Constitution is under attack by Attorney General William Barr Bannon trial date set in alleged border wall scam Conspicuous by their absence from the Republican Convention MORE and senior adviser Jared Kushner Jared Corey KushnerAbraham Accords: New hope for peace in Middle East Tenants in Kushner building file lawsuit alleging dangerous living conditions Trump hosts Israel, UAE, Bahrain for historic signing MORE met with a Russian attorney “expecting to receive derogatory information” about Trump’s campaign opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonDemocratic groups using Bloomberg money to launch M in Spanish language ads in Florida The Hill's Campaign Report: Presidential polls tighten weeks out from Election Day More than 50 Latino faith leaders endorse Biden MORE.

The attorney, Natalia Veselnitskaya, however, failed to provide any evidence backing up her claims that Clinton and other Democrats had received funds from illegal activity in Russia and instead talked about U.S. sanctions against Russian officials.

On July 27, 2016, then-candidate Trump publicly called on Russia to help find documents missing from Clinton’s personal computer server, saying, “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.”

Russian military hackers that same day targeted the email accounts of Clinton’s personal office. They also broke into a Democratic National Committee account hosted on the cloud.

Mueller reported that Russian agents working for the GRU, a military intelligence agency, contacted a former Trump campaign member while posing as the hacker Guccifer 2.0 to ask about a stolen Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee document, which the Trump official described in a response as “pretty standard.”

The special counsel also found that on June 17, 2017, Trump called then-White House counsel Don McGahn and instructed him to call acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein Rod RosensteinDOJ kept investigators from completing probe of Trump ties to Russia: report Five takeaways from final Senate Intel Russia report FBI officials hid copies of Russia probe documents fearing Trump interference: book MORE and inform him that Mueller must be removed from his post for conflicts of interest. McGahn refused by saying he would rather resign than trigger a “potential Saturday Night Massacre.”