Sources tell Politico President Trump's lawyers have set an informal Thanksgiving deadline for him to finalize his answers to Special Counsel Robert Mueller's questions.
The president’s written answers — which carry the same legal burden for truthfulness as an in-person interview — are likely to be submitted as Trump settles into his Mar-a-Lago club in South Florida for the Thanksgiving holiday. Trump is scheduled to depart Washington, D.C., on Tuesday afternoon.
Trump over the past week has spent several hours with his legal team, including Rudy Giuliani, Jay Sekulow and Jane Raskin, finalizing his answers to questions from the special counsel focusing on his time before he was sworn in as president.
Still unclear is whether Mueller and Trump will reach agreement on any format for responding to the special counsel’s wider obstruction-of-justice investigation involving the president’s time in office, including his May 2017 firing of FBI Director James Comey.
President Trump told Chris Wallace on Sunday he is not likely to agree to an in-person interview with the special counsel.
“We gave very, very complete answers to a lot of questions that I shouldn’t have even been asked, and I think that should solve the problem. I hope it solves the problem. If it doesn’t, you know, I’ll be told and we’ll make a decision at that time. But probably this is the end,” the president said.
“I think we’ve wasted enough time on this witch hunt and the answer is probably, we’re finished,” Trump added.
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The president told reporters in the spring of 2017 that he was “100 percent” willing to testify under oath about alleged Russian ties to his campaign. His lawyers at the time were even gearing up to offer Trump for an interview by Thanksgiving 2017 had Mueller not yet requested a sit-down.
Trump has since backtracked on his in-person interview pledge, and his lawyers have instead tried repeatedly to get Mueller to accept written answers. The special counsel rejected that approach at least once, Giuliani told POLITICO in May. More recently, Mueller did send over questions related to the Russian hacking, though Giuliani insisted the president was under no obligation to answer all of them.
Trump to give Mueller written answers by Thanksgiving (Politico)