VOA常速英语:穆勒报告未排除特朗普妨碍司法公正的嫌疑

At the White House, President Donald Trump was upbeat after the release of the Muller report. I’m having a good day, too. It was called no collusion, no obstruction. There never was by the way and there never will be.
But the report paints a different picture on the question of obstruction of justice, detailing numerous instances when the president sought to influence the investigation. At one point, Trump ordered then White House lawyer Don McGahn to have special counsel Robert Muller fired, said Chad Day of The Associated Press. Now McGahn rebuffed this effort, but it shows how the president at the report quotes him saw the probe is possible into his presidency and you know something that would threaten his powers.
The report describes numerous contacts between Trump campaign associates and Russians in 2016, but concluded there was a lack of evidence of a criminal conspiracy between the campaign and Russia, but Muller did not make a judgment on whether the president sought to obstruct justice.

The report did not conclude that Trump committed a crime, but neither did it exonerate him. In the end, it was Attorney General William Barr who decided that the evidence of obstruction did not warrant further legal action. Apart from whether the acts were obstructive, this evidence of non corrupt motives weighs heavily against any allegation that the President had a corrupt intent to obstruct the investigation.
Democrats were troubled by the detailed accounts of possible presidential obstruction, and quickly vowed to investigate further, including House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler. The special counsel made clear that he did not exonerate the president, and the responsibility now falls to Congress to hold the president accountable for his actions. Congress must get the full unredacted report with the underlying evidence uncovered by special counsel Muller.
The lingering questions over presidential obstruction could continue to cast a cloud over the Trump White House, says legal analyst David Abraham, I’m not sure that the findings constitute a victory for the president, but those claims run contrary both to the facts in regard to the effectiveness of Russian interventions, and as to the depth and extent of the obstruction efforts by the White House from the President on down.
The ongoing controversy over the Muller report makes it likely that the legal and political debate over Trump’s actions will drag on indefinitely, says political expert Bill Sweeney. If this goes on for weeks and months, it will be another divisive issue within a country that is already very strongly divided.
Attorney General Barr has been asked to testify before Congress next month, and Democrats also want to hear Special Counsel Muller himself in the near future.
Jim Malone VOA news Washington.