Trump's lawyers to Mueller in letter: President can end probe, use pardon power

Christal Hayes | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption New York Times: Trump’s lawyers argue to head off a historic subpoena A confidential memo issued by President Trump’s lawyers to Special Counsel Robert Mueller has been obtained by the New York Times. Susana Victoria Perez (@susana_vp) has more.

Lawyers for President Trump told special counsel Robert Mueller in a confidential letter that the president would not comply with requests for an interview, could end the special counsel's investigation and could use his executive powers to pardon if needed.

The January 2018 letter, along with a second letter sent in June 2017, was obtained by The New York Times and provide the clearest view yet of Trump's legal strategy in Mueller's wide-ranging investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election and possible obstruction of justice.

Ahead of The Times' report, Trump tweeted about the leaked letters, saying "there was No Collusion with Russia (except by the Democrats). When will this very expensive Witch Hunt Hoax ever end?"

He continued: "So bad for our Country. Is the Special Counsel/Justice Department leaking my lawyers letters to the Fake News Media? Should be looking at Dems corruption instead?"

There was No Collusion with Russia (except by the Democrats). When will this very expensive Witch Hunt Hoax ever end? So bad for our Country. Is the Special Counsel/Justice Department leaking my lawyers letters to the Fake News Media? Should be looking at Dems corruption instead? — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 2, 2018

The more recent letter, dated Jan. 29, was written by two of the president’s lawyers at the time, John Dowd and Jay Sekulow and responded to a request to interview the president. The letter lists 16 subject areas Mueller's team intended to question Trump about, including his firing of FBI Director James Comey.

Dowd later resigned from the case. In April, Trump hired former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and two other former federal prosecutors to join his legal team.

Multiple times throughout the letter, Trump's lawyers appear trying to discredit Comey as a witness. They also contend that Trump has the power to shut down any investigation by the FBI or Justice Department "at any time and for any reason."

"He could, if he wished, terminate the inquiry, or even exercise his power to pardon if he so desired," the letter says.

The inclusion of pardoning and ending the probe could serve as both a defense that if Trump was indeed obstructing the investigation, he would have ended it long ago. It could also leave open a pardon for his former national security adviser Michael Flynn or, himself if charged. The Times notes no president has ever pardoned himself.

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The letter goes on to say that if the president did order the termination of an investigation, even though he contends he did not, "this could not constitute obstruction of justice."

Dowd and Sekulow deny the request for a presidential interview and argue that Mueller has been granted access to a slew of documents and other witnesses, and already the same information that Trump would tell them in an interview.

"In light of these voluntary offerings, your office clearly lacks the requisite need to personally interview the President," the letter argues. "The information you seek is 'practically available from another source,' and your office, in fact, has already been given that other source."

In the June 23, 2017 letter from Marc Kasowitz, one of Trump’s longtime personal attorneys, he makes many of the same points, arguing there was no basis for an obstruction charge and the president, as Comey said, has the power to fire anyone when he so chooses. It again makes the case that Trump did not order the closure of the investigation but a president can close an investigation if he so chooses.

“President Clinton fired FBI Director [William] Sessions in July 1993 at a time when the FBI had multiple open investigations implicating the Clintons, including the Whitewater and the Travel Office investigations, yet there were no claims and certainly no investigations into whether President Clinton’s exercise of his Constitutional power constituted obstruction,” the letter states.

But Clinton's decision varied in many ways. Ahead of Clinton's inauguration, allegations were made against then FBI Director William Sessions, no relation to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, that he'd used an FBI plane for personal use and used tax dollars to install a security system at his home. He was under intense pressure to resign but did not and Clinton was later forced to dismiss him.

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Kasowitz also said an interview with NBC’s Lester Holt was taken out of context when Trump said, “I was going to fire Comey knowing there was no good time to do it. And in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself - I said, you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story.”

He said Trump’s thoughts were diverted and he later finished his point on Comey’s firing, saying he wanted the investigation to proceed but Comey needed to be fired because he was “the wrong man for that position.”

The letter also questions why there wasn’t a special counsel investigation into President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton amid the email server debacle.

Kasowitz details several of Obama’s comments that there wouldn’t be an indictment and Clinton wasn’t a target before the investigation was completed.

“Yet, no special counsel was appointed and no obstruction investigation was launched,” he argued.

Contributing: Richard Wolf