President Donald Trump told Fox News’ Chris Wallace in an interview broadcast Sunday that he is unlikely to sit down for a face-to-face interview with Special Counsel Robert Mueller. | Alex Wong/Getty Images Legal Trump to give Mueller written answers by Thanksgiving Trump’s lawyers set an informal Thanksgiving deadline for the president to finalize his responses to inquiries about the Russian hacking of the 2016 election.

President Donald Trump will give special counsel Robert Mueller written responses to a slate of questions as early as Tuesday.

Trump’s lawyers set an informal Thanksgiving deadline for the president to finalize his responses on topics surrounding the Russian hacking of the 2016 election, and he’s almost ready to submit them, according to two sources familiar with the conversations.


The president’s written answers — which carry the same legal burden for truthfulness as an in-person interview — are likely to be submitted as Trump settles into his Mar-a-Lago club in South Florida for the Thanksgiving holiday. Trump is scheduled to depart Washington, D.C., on Tuesday afternoon.

Trump over the past week has spent several hours with his legal team, including Rudy Giuliani, Jay Sekulow and Jane Raskin, finalizing his answers to questions from the special counsel focusing on his time before he was sworn in as president.

Still unclear is whether Mueller and Trump will reach agreement on any format for responding to the special counsel’s wider obstruction-of-justice investigation involving the president’s time in office, including his May 2017 firing of FBI Director James Comey.

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In an interview earlier this month, Giuliani said Trump’s lawyers were engaged in “very sensitive negotiations” with Mueller that could lead to a voluntary interview or another round of written questions on topics associated with events after January 2017.

Mueller also has the option of issuing a subpoena and forcing a historic legal fight with the president, something the president’s lawyers argue they’d challenge in court.

“I wouldn’t argue that you can never subpoena a president. I would argue that you can't in this particular case because, to subpoena a president, you have a burden you don't have with anybody else,” Giuliani said. “You've got to show a real need for it. A real need for it in terms of developing your case and not a real need in order to try to trap him. Trapping is not a legal legitimate objective.”

Trump told Fox News’ Chris Wallace in an interview broadcast Sunday that he is unlikely to sit down for a face-to-face interview with Mueller.

“We gave very, very complete answers to a lot of questions that I shouldn’t have even been asked, and I think that should solve the problem. I hope it solves the problem. If it doesn’t, you know, I’ll be told and we’ll make a decision at that time. But probably this is the end,” the president said.

“I think we’ve wasted enough time on this witch hunt and the answer is probably, we’re finished,” Trump added.

Once submitted, Trump’s written answers will mark the end of at least one critical phase of the Mueller probe that dates back to the start of the investigation.

The president told reporters in the spring of 2017 that he was “100 percent” willing to testify under oath about alleged Russian ties to his campaign. His lawyers at the time were even gearing up to offer Trump for an interview by Thanksgiving 2017 had Mueller not yet requested a sit-down.

Trump has since backtracked on his in-person interview pledge, and his lawyers have instead tried repeatedly to get Mueller to accept written answers. The special counsel rejected that approach at least once, Giuliani told POLITICO in May. More recently, Mueller did send over questions related to the Russian hacking, though Giuliani insisted the president was under no obligation to answer all of them.

“As you might imagine, some questions are, from our view, more relevant than others,” Giuliani said.