Trump Claims Executive Privilege Over Entire Mueller Report

President Trump on Wednesday declared that he is claiming executive privilege over the entire Mueller Report, including all of the underlying evidence, delivering a fierce rebuke to Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee. The decision to shield all of the material requested was announced in a letter from a Justice Department official to House Judiciary Chairman Jerold Nadler, in which the DOJ blames the committee’s move to vote on holding Attorney General William Barr in contempt of Congress for the president’s decision. Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders followed the assistant attorney general’s letter with a scathing statement of her own: “The American people see through Chairman Nadler’s desperate plea to distract from the president’s historically successful agenda,” labeling his demand for the unredacted Mueller Report and underlying evidence “unlawful” and “reckless.” “Faced with Chairman Nadler’s blatant abuse of power, and at the attorney general’s request, the president has no other option than to make a protective assertion of executive privilege,” she added.