I’ve compiled some initial summarizing notes re: the Mueller report, with some of the most pertinent quotes from Mueller that are very damning, and detail Mueller’s belief that the President’s conduct was in his word’s a ‘corrupt abuse of the powers of the office’. (See Below)

But first, a quick anecdote from a foreigner visiting Sacramento from Spain who I interviewed as I was out doing an on the street video shoot for my local TV show ( at the State Capitol today…

She and her girlfriends were in a small group on the Capitol steps…They were clearly a fun group of young ladies and when I introduced myself, they told me they were all from Spain. After I welcomed them to Sacramento, I explained I was looking for comments about Trump after the Mueller report was just released.

Immediately all of them recoiled in disgust at the mention of his name, and it seemed as though all 4, but at least 2 or 3 of them responded in unison “We HATE Trump!” They were more than happy to share their thoughts on camera for my show, which I produce monthly for a network of 14 cable access markets across the nation.

But what happened after I stopped taping was remarkable. I had walked toward downtown to see about interviewing some more locals on the K Street mall area, and as luck would have it, I ran into them again as they had also walked that direction.

They hollered “Hi again!” in a very gregarious and supportive way toward me. The girls had joined up with a few of their male friends, and it was apparent they were all in the mood to talk to me a little more about how disturbed they were with Trump.

One of the girls suddenly had an unexpected change come over her demeanor…I don’t think she really was thinking about it intentionally…it just spontaneously happened with her…Seeing me as sort of the ‘representation’ of America in their presence, she just turned and made eye contact with me and told me, “You really should be ashamed that you elected such a person”

I knew that she knew that I wasn’t a Trump voter…but my point is she was letting out some painful emotion that many foreigners are feeling toward our country right now, while at the same time so many Americans are nothing but apathetic, and act too busy to give a damn about anything but the next episode of the Kardashians and “Swamp Creatures”.

This girl from Spain didn’t mean to lash out at me, she was just really needing to let an American know how severely painful it was even for a foreigner to be watching this shame for our country. That’s because so many foreigners hold America high up on a pedestal, because of the moral and democratic principles we supposedly stand for.

Maybe she still hadn’t fully comprehended that she was ‘preaching to the choir director’ as they say, and of course I told her I was in full agreement with her. I told her that the moral-minded majority of Americans, INCLUDING a growing number of Republicans, are EXTREMELY ashamed and embarrassed that this corrupt individual found enough votes to get elected.

She still had a horrified look on her face though, and immediately asked me if I thought he would be re-elected. I told her it was my opinion that there are many more moral-minded Americans who are aware of what has to be done to repair the damage the others have caused, and I told her no, I don’t think there’s a likelihood of his re-election. This seemed to ease her mind enough to allow her demeanor to shift back to her previous happy-go-lucky mindset with her friends.

In this the second half of this post, I’d like to share some very pertinent notes I’ve put together re: Mueller’s redacted report that has just been released, including some of his most powerfully damning quotes directed at the President’s ‘corrupt abuse of the powers of office’ as he puts it in one quote.

Suffice it to say, as many of us suspected, Mueller’s report exposes Attorney General Barr’s initial ‘summary’ as an intentionally dishonest work of fiction, making Barr look more like a mafia ‘consigliere’ for Trump than the people’s Atty General. In other words, Mueller’s report is the polar OPPOSITE of how Barr tried to falsely characterize it with his dishonest ‘summary’ intended to steal the first headline on the matter.

Hopefully my readers will find this helpful if you haven’t had an opportunity to stay informed with the news reporting on the topic…

My comments: The Mueller report is incredibly damning to Trump… There is a shocking and incredible degree of wrongdoing and illegal behavior detailed in his report.

And it is also very disturbing the degree to which Mueller’s report proves that Atty Gen Barr grossly mischaracterized the intent and nature of the damning evidence Mueller laid out, and that Mueller made clear he didn’t charge the President mainly because he was hamstrung and constricted by the Dept. of Justice policy that precludes the indictment of a sitting president. Mueller makes it very clear he intended Trump’s presidential corrupt abuse of power, and Trump’s many repeated efforts to obstruct the investigation, to be acted on by Congress…

On the FIRST PAGE of the Obstruction of Justice section of his report, Mueller writes: “We recognize that a federal criminal accusation against a sitting president would place burdens on the president’s capacity to govern and potentially preempt constitutional processes for addressing presidential conduct”

Mueller goes out of his way in a powerful paragraph in his report,  to specifically characterize Trump’s behavior as a ‘corrupt exercise of the powers of office’ and refers to impeachment as a remedy for the exhaustive obstruction evidence he had detailed…

Mueller writes: “The conclusion that Congress may apply obstruction laws to the President’s corrupt exercise of the powers of office accords with our constitutional system of checks and balances and the principle that no person is above the law.”

Mueller also writes in his report: “The President’s attempts to obstruct justice were mostly unsuccessful only because his aides did not carry out his orders” to include as Mueller details on page 85 of his report, Trump actually ordering White House lawyer Don McGann To FIRE the Special Counsel (Mueller), and since then McGann has testified that he refused such order from Trump partly because he considered it akin to the obstruction efforts by Nixon during Watergate Era known as “Saturday Night Massacre”. 

(My note: this clearly is evidence of intent…you don’t have to succeed to be guilty and have intent to obstruct)

Mueller quotes Trump after learning Special Counsel had been appointed to investigate him: “Oh my God this is terrible, this is the end of my presidency, I’m f—ked.” (My Note: He was correct, it is the beginning of the end for him, and will be ending in criminal charges, at least after he is removed from office)

My personal opinion: Mueller dropped ball in huge way in not pursuing an in person interview. He explained his reason was that it would take too long…But then Mueller actually writes in his report that a longer investigation would LIKELY PRODUCE EVIDENCE OF CRIMES, and personal, political concerns regarding Trump.

It’s important to note that a target of an investigation REFUSING to be interviewed by the Special Prosecutor IS obstruction in itself. Also important to note that Trump’s attorneys are on record stating they decided to refuse precisely because they knew Trump would be caught lying to Mueller…they actually SAID that!

Again, Mueller admits in his report that he decided not to subpoena Trump for fear of a substantial delay to the probe…Ironically the delay this cause to the probe was due to MORE obstruction, with Trump REFUSING to allow himself to be deposed and questioned in person by Mueller.

It is critical to note that the Mueller report goes into great detail documenting and describing many counts of coordination between the Trump campaign and Russian officials and surrogates, and even goes so far to say the above, that Trump ‘expected to benefit from Russian illegal actions’.   I believe Mueller severely dropped the ball and let the American people down in not acting on this himself.  But he does indicate in the report that he was limited by the Justice Dept. policy not to indict a sitting President.

Mueller states in his report there was evidence that Russia was illegally working to help Trump get elected, and that the Trump campaign EXPECTED TO BENEFIT from it, meaning they were AWARE of it, but then Mueller indicates in the report that simple contacts with the Russians did not necessarily amount to ‘Conspiracy’, and he felt the evidence from the many contacts he documents between the Trump Campaign and Russians was questionable as to whether ‘CONSPIRACY’ could be proven beyond a reasonable doubt …

This is one of the huge areas where many American’s are very shocked and disappointed in Mueller, to include a growing number of former prosecutors, one of whom I heard on NBC echoing my sentiments exactly on this…So I’d like to take a few paragraphs here to detail several things in plain sight that we all became aware of during Mueller’s investigation, that show evidence to the contrary…in other words, that show clear evidence of BLATANT COORDINATION between the Trump campaign and Russia:

First, for example, Trump’s campaign manager meeting with Konstantin Kolimnik, an individual known to have ties to Russian intel (WHO MUELLER HAS INDICTED in his investigation), this meeting being held at the cigar shop near Trump Tower, with Manafort actually giving them ‘CAMPAIGN POLLING DATA’ as well as specific info on key SWING STATES!…THE ONLY REASON YOU WOULD DO THAT WITH SOMEONE CONNECTED TO RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE IS BECAUSE YOU ARE CONSPIRING AND WORKING TOGETHER TO AFFECT THE ELECTION RESULTS!

Secondly, Trump lying for months leading up to election to deliberately cover up and hide from the American people his ongoing efforts to build a Trump Tower Moscow…And related to that, there are the telling quotes from Felix Sader, former mob member, and known close adviser to Trump, and his emails that surfaced saying that Putin and Russia would be working to make that happen, and get him elected President (Google it…Google “Trump Felix Sader emails”, you’ll find it in no time)…

And let’s not forget the infamous Trump tower meeting with Russians after they emailed Don Jr. and said from the jump that this was coming from Russian Govt, that they had dirt on Clinton, and Don Jr. says “I love it”. He then eagerly sets up the meeting for that purpose, during which quid pro quo discussions took place regarding the reversing of sanctions with specific regard to the Magnitsky Act (which is where the issue of adoptions comes from)

Mueller goes out of his way to state in the report that his report ‘DOES NOT EXONERATE THE PRESIDENT’, and he specifically writes: “No one in this country is so high that he is above the law”  So it is absolutely clear that Mueller intended to pass this burden on to the Congress, not Atty Gen Barr who lied and tried to say the President was exonerated.

We have never seen this level of corruption in the highest office of our nation… As I stated at the top, there is a shocking and incredible degree of wrongdoing and illegal behavior detailed in his report. And again, Mueller actually goes out of his way to characterize Trump’s behavior overall as a corrupt exercise of the powers of the office of the President, and specifically refers to impeachment as a remedy, and even going so far as to say that though he didn’t indict Trump, it is a possibility he could be indicted ‘after leaving office’.

As we know, Mueller also goes out of his way to say that his report IN NO WAY EXONERATES the President. He is clearly implicating Trump for criminal misconduct all over his report, and as I mentioned above, he states on the first page of the Obstruction of Justice portion that his decision NOT to charge the President for the many obstruction examples he details thereafter, was informed and guided entirely by the Justice Department’s policy not to indict a sitting President.

In closing take a look at this well stated quote from Rep. Adam Schiff, Chair of House Intel Committee:

“Regardless of whether the obstructive acts described by Mueller was criminal or whether the litany of illicit contacts with Russia rose to the level of conspiracy, they’re dishonest, unethical, and unpatriotic. Mueller’s report is not a vindication of Trump, but a condemnation.”

Connie Bryan

(Connie Bryan is a writer in Sacramento, CA…You can read all of her articles on her blog, and watch her fun, late night style cable talk show on demand at https://www.conniebryan.com/ )