Democrats get Mueller ammunition but they are split on how to use it

Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report into Russia’s role in the 2016 US election provided extensive details on President Donald Trump’s efforts to thwart a federal investigation, giving Democrats plenty of political ammunition against the Republican but no consensus on how to use it.
 
The 448-page report painted a clear picture of how Trump had tried to hinder Mueller’s probe but stopped short of concluding the Republican president had committed the crime of obstruction of justice, although it did not exonerate him.
 
Mueller noted Congress has the power to address whether Trump violated the law, and Democrats quickly vowed to steam ahead with congressional investigations of the president.

 

But party leaders played down talk of impeachment just 18 months before the 2020 presidential election, even as some prominent members of the party’s progressive wing, most notably US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, promised to push the idea. “Many know I take no pleasure in discussions of impeachment. I didn’t campaign on it, & rarely discuss it unprompted,” she said on Twitter. “But the report squarely puts this on our doorstep.”
 
Representative Doug Collins, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said Democrats had misconstrued a section of the report about obstruction of justice to suit their anti-Trump agenda.

 
"There seems to be some confusion...This isn’t a matter of legal interpretation; it’s reading comprehension," Collins wrote on Twitter.
 
“The report doesn’t say Congress should investigate obstruction now. It says Congress can make laws about obstruction under Article I powers,” Collins said.