The president will “be guided by the advice of his personal counsel,” said White House attorney Ty Cobb.
WASHINGTON – While President Trump has now pledged to testify under oath for the federal investigation into Russia’s election interference, officials clarified on Thursday that negotiations on the precise details for an interview with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team are still ongoing.
The president will “be guided by the advice of his personal counsel,” White House attorney Ty Cobb said.
Trump’s legal team and Mueller’s investigators are still working out whether he will testify under oath, according to officials familiar with the probe who were not authorized to comment publicly. Other outstanding issues include a time limit for the interview, the location of the testimony, whether some areas of questioning will be off-limits and whether the session will be videotaped.
For weeks, Trump’s team has been negotiating the terms and scope of a possible interview with the president related to the wide-ranging investigation into Russia’s possible collusion with Trump associates and whether the president obstructed justice in connection with the probe.
Yet the talks took an unusual turn Wednesday night when Trump gave impromptu remarks to reporters, stressing that he was eager to testify. “I would do it under oath,” he said, as he prepared to leave on his trip to an economic conference in Davos, Switzerland. “I’m looking forward to it, actually.”
While Trump said his testimony is “subject to my lawyers and all of that,” he made one thing clear: “I would love to do it.”
Yet the officials have held out hope of written testimony from the president instead of a live interview, noting that President Ronald Reagan followed that approach during an investigation into the Iran-Contra imbroglio of the 1980s.
It’s unclear whether Mueller’s office, which has not commented on its talks with Trump’s lawyers, would accept such an arrangement.
Those officials are also looking at the precedent set by former president Bill Clinton’s testimony during independent counsel Kenneth Starr’s 1998 investigation into his relationship with intern Monica Lewinsky. Clinton agreed to testify via videostream from the White House under oath. The video was transmitted back to the grand jury. The testimony was limited to four hours after negotiations among lawyers.
While expressing his own interest in testifying under oath on Wednesday, Trump pointed out that his previous Democratic rival Hillary Clinton did not testify under oath when FBI agents interviewed her in 2016 about her use of a private email server during her time as secretary of State.
Trump also addressed another aspect of the Mueller probe: Whether he obstructed justice by abruptly firing FBI Director James Comey when he was running the Russia investigation. Trump said his critics have been unable to prove any sort of collusion – so now they are hyping his efforts to “fight back” against what he considers an unfair investigation.
“There’s no collusion,” Trump said. “Now they’re saying, ‘Oh, well, did he fight back? Did he fight back?’ You fight back… (they say) ‘Oh, it’s obstruction.’ ”
Trump did not explain what he meant by “fight back.”
In the interview, Mueller is likely to ask about the circumstances surrounding Comey’s firing. While the White House said Trump fired Comey for his controversial handling of the Clinton email investigation, the president days later acknowledged in a television interview that the Russia investigation was on his mind when he made the decision.
Comey also testified publicly that Trump asked him to drop the investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn. Trump is likely to be questioned about his dismissal of Flynn for misleading Vice President Mike Pence about his contacts with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Last month, Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his pre-inaugural contacts with the ambassador and is cooperating with Mueller’s team.
Trump and his aides have said in past months that there is no obstruction of justice because presidents have the right to fire their FBI directors – and that Trump dismissed Comey for performance issues. Officials have also said that Trump was well aware the Russia investigation would continue with or without Comey.
As recently as Jan. 10, Trump questioned the need for any sort of testimony in Mueller’s probe. At a news conference earlier this month, Trump declined to commit to an interview, claiming his testimony isn’t necessary for the “Democrat hoax.”
In the day since Trump’s remarks, his legal team has been stressing its cooperation with Mueller, citing reams of documentation they have provided to his office.
In a statement put out Thursday, Trump’s legal team claimed “unprecedented” cooperation and transparency, both with Mueller’s office and congressional committees.
The White House has provided more than 20,000 pages to Mueller’s office on topics that include Russia, Flynn, and Comey, the statement said. Trump’s presidential campaign supplied more than 1.4 million pages of documents, it said.
If negotiations between the Mueller and Trump teams break down, the special counsel could seek to subpoena the president.
