Republican Senator Says Releasing Mueller Report Could Get Someone Killed

Republican Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana said that the unredacted release of Robert Mueller’s report detailing the special counsel’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election could very well get someone killed, Newsweek reports.

“I don’t want to get anybody killed by violating national security concerns,” said Kennedy, who indicated that he felt Attorney General William Barr will release as much of the report as possible without compromising national security. So far, Barr has made public a four-page summary of the larger report, which a growing number of sources close to the investigation have recently been suggesting does not present a complete picture of Mueller’s findings. Barr has indicated that he intends to make the report itself available soon, but only after the White House has had an opportunity to redact it at their own discretion.

“I think Bill Barr is a straight shooter and, even if you don’t agree with that assessment, he’s certainly not a moron,” Kennedy also said. “I mean, he is going to release as much of the report as he possibly can.”

Immediately following the conclusion of Mueller’s investigation, the Trump Administration, most vocally the president himself, took something of a victory lap, touting not entirely accurately that Barr’s summary indicated complete exoneration of Donald Trump with respect to both collusion with Russia and potential obstruction of justice.

However more and more sources, including senior officials within the White House, say that the full report will likely contain information that is incriminating, or at least embarrassing, to Trump and his allies, as New York Magazine reported. In response, Trump and his advisors have dialed back their enthusiasm regarding the report and have shifted from supporting its release to characterizing requests to make it public as “a disgrace” and calling the debates around the issue “a waste of time.”

Former CIA analyst: Barr's Mueller report summary like witnessing a murder and being told it never happened | Opinion https://t.co/WtEciXcE1r pic.twitter.com/JccAVPSJWH

— Newsweek (@Newsweek) April 6, 2019

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has maintained political pressure on the president over this and a number of other points of potential weakness for Trump.

“Show us the Mueller report, show us the tax returns, and we are not walking away just because you say no the first time around,” she said earlier this week. Additionally, the House Judiciary Committee authorized a subpoena for the full report if Barr does not make it available in the near future.

Kennedy, in pushing back on his Democratic opponents, claimed that they were simply doing everything in their power to gin up controversy around the report, accusing them of acting for reasons motivated by politics alone.