Mueller raises possibility of Trump
subpoena: former Trump lawyer
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[May 02, 2018]
By Karen Freifeld
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Special Counsel Robert
Mueller, in a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump's lawyers in
March, raised the possibility of issuing a subpoena for Trump if he
declines to talk to investigators in the Russia probe, a former lawyer
for the president said on Tuesday.
John Dowd told Reuters that Mueller mentioned the possibility of a
subpoena in the early March meeting. Mueller's subpoena warning was
first reported by the Washington Post, which cited four people familiar
with the encounter.
"This isn't some game. You are screwing with the work of the president
of the United States," Dowd said he told the investigators, who are
probing possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. Dowd
left the president's legal team about two weeks after the meeting.
The Post said Mueller had raised the possibility of a subpoena after
Trump's lawyers said the president had no obligation to talk with
federal investigators involved in the probe.
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After the March meeting, Mueller's team agreed to provide the
president's lawyers with more specific information about the subjects
they wished to ask Trump, the Post reported.
With that information, Trump's lawyer Jay Sekulow compiled a list of 49
questions the president's legal team believed he would be asked,
according to the Post.
That list, first reported by the New York Times on Monday, includes
questions on Trump's ties to Russia and others to determine whether the
president may have unlawfully tried to obstruct the investigation.
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![](../images/050218pics/news_n23.jpg)
Special Counsel Robert Mueller departs after briefing the U.S. House
Intelligence Committee on his investigation of potential collusion
between Russia and the Trump campaign on Capitol Hill in Washington,
U.S., June 20, 2017. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein
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"We do not discuss conversations we have had or may have had with
the Office of Special Counsel," Sekulow told Reuters on Tuesday
evening.
Trump criticized the leak of the questions.
"So disgraceful that the questions concerning the Russian Witch Hunt
were 'leaked' to the media. No questions on Collusion," Trump wrote
on Twitter on Tuesday. "It would seem very hard to obstruct justice
for a crime that never happened!"
Russia has denied interfering in the 2016 U.S. presidential
election, as U.S. intelligence agencies allege, and Trump has denied
there was any collusion between his campaign and Moscow.
A spokesman for Mueller declined to comment.
(Reporting by Karen Freifeld; Writing by Eric Beech; Editing by Tim
Ahmann and Peter Cooney)
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