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Trump Plays Golf in Florida Nation Awaits AG's Move on Special Counsel's Findings; Democrats Renew Demands for Full Mueller Report; Attorney General William Barr Reviews Mueller Report; Who is Special Counsel Robert Mueller; Robert Kraft Breaks His Silence Over Sex Trafficking Case. Aired 9-10p ET

Aired March 23, 2019 - 21:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


[21:00:21] ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: Hello on this Saturday night. You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York, and this may be the most tension-filled Saturday evening in Washington in more than 40 years.

The attorney general has the Mueller report. Congress, the White House, and the rest of us do not.

Here's what we know at just after 9:00 p.m. Eastern. This is video of the AG William Barr leaving the Justice Department this evening. He was at work for more than nine hours today. Alongside Rod Rosenstein, the deputy AG, poring over the Mueller findings. But that may not have been enough for House Democrats. They want the full report and they want it now.

Those lawmakers held an emergency conference call this afternoon led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi. And the House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler tweeted late today that letters have been sent to the White House counsel and more than half a dozen agencies demanding any underlying evidence and investigative materials, compiled by the special counsel, be preserved.

CNN senior White House correspondent Pamela Brown is watching it all for us.

Pam, good evening.

PAMELA BROWN, SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ana, President Trump is uncharacteristically quiet about the Mueller probe in the wake of the report being delivered. This is someone who tweeted it was a witch hunt more than 170 times during the course of the investigation. But sources close to the president I've spoken with say he is very happy that the investigation is over. But he wants to wait and see what happens next.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): As the president spent the day on a Florida golf course, the attorney general spent the day reading a report that could define Donald Trump's presidency. Attorney General William Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein were both in the office today, reviewing Mueller's findings. Barr telling lawmakers he could release the principal conclusions of the report to them as soon as this weekend.

Tonight as the wait for information continues, Justice Department officials say one thing is clear. There will be no more indictments related to the Russia probe. The White House seizing on that as a victory. President Trump attending the Republican fundraiser Friday, seated next to Lindsey Graham who went on the attack against the other candidate in the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton, saying, quote, "We're going to make sure both campaigns are looked at." Prompting chants of "lock her up" from other attendees.

The president came to Florida flanked with his legal team, bringing along his White House lawyer Emmet Flood who's responsible for the response to the Russia investigation. And just hours before the announcement that Mueller was finished --

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There was no collusion, there was no obstruction. Everybody knows it. It's all a big hoax. I call it the witch hunt. It's all a big hoax.

BROWN: President Trump continued his attacks on the investigation, telling FOX Business Americans will not accept a negative review.

TRUMP: It's always interesting to me because a deputy that didn't get any votes appoints a man that didn't get any votes. He is going to write a report on me. People will not stand for it.

BROWN: Even though the president did call for the release of the report this week --

TRUMP: Let it come out. Let people see it. That's up to the attorney general.

BROWN: Barr has previously refused to commit to providing Congress with a full report and said that DOJ rules prevent him from sharing damaging information about individuals not charged with crimes.

WILLIAM BARR, ATTORNEY GENERAL: All I can say right now is my goal and intent is to get as much information out as I can consistent with the regulation.

BROWN: But Democrats are demanding the report be made public in its entirety and have threatened a subpoena to get it.

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D), MINORITY LEADER: The American people have a right to the truth. The watch word is transparency. In conclusion, the president himself has called without qualification for the report to be made public. There is no reason on God's green earth why Attorney General Barr should do any less.

BROWN: White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders saying late Friday that the attorney general is in control of what happens next, tweeting, "The next steps are up to Attorney General Barr and we look forward to the process taking its course. The White House has not received or been briefed on the special counsel's report."

(END VIDEOTAPE) BROWN: Now last check, the White House said that it had not been updated on anything about the report and the contents of it, and it doesn't know what Bill Barr, the attorney general, will be providing to Congress. The question is, will Bill Barr share it with the White House before sharing it publicly. That is something the Democrats have said they do not want to happen. They do not want the attorney general to give the White House a sneak preview. So we will have to wait and see how this plays out over the next day or so.

Back to you.

CABRERA: All right, Pamela Brown. Thank you.

As politicians, commentators and strategists publicly discuss what could be in the report and what the next steps are, there's one person who hasn't said a peep.

[21:05:08] And it's probably the last person you think would stay quiet. Amid the news that the investigation he publicly slammed numerous times has ended without any new indictments, President Trump has not tweeted in more than 28 hours. Instead the president spent the day golfing at one of his clubs. Sources tell CNN Trump is, quote, "happy" the investigation is over but is remaining cautious, taking a wait-and-see approach.

CNN's Boris Sanchez is in West Palm Beach where the president is spending the weekend.

Boris, take us inside the mood of Trump and his inner circle.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hey there, Ana. Yes, several sources close to the president indicate that he is encouraged and in a spirited mood about what he is seeing coming out of Department of Justice.

He is here at Mar-a-Lago with a crew that is larger than usual. He's accompanied by two press secretaries, as well as his two of his top attorneys, and Emmet Flood and Pat Cipollone who are updating him throughout the night yesterday as the news was coming from the DOJ about Attorney General Barr and his reading of the Mueller report.

Yesterday the president took part in a fundraising dinner, the Lincoln Day dinner at Mar-a-Lago where he gave a short three-minute speech. He essentially spent it joking about the first lady's approval rating and his good friend apparently, the senator from South Carolina, Lindsey Graham, who also gave a speech.

The president didn't talk at all about the Mueller report. In Graham's speech, he actually talked about the FBI opening up a probe into that dossier. The president continues to reference regarding the Russia investigation. The crowd reacted by chanting, "lock her up, lock her up," in reference to Hillary Clinton. President Trump according to sources didn't really jump into that. He didn't partake. He sort of sat back and absorbed what was going.

As you noted before, sources have indicated the president is taking a wait-and-see approach being cautiously optimistic. And of course as I noted before, he's here with top aides so the White House is ready to respond to whatever is in this report as it becomes public -- Ana.

CABRERA: And the president had a special guest golfing with him today?

SANCHEZ: That's right. (INAUDIBLE) -- I'm not going to try to keep going. Kid Rock was with the president on the golf course today, sporting some very patriotic trousers. Kid Rock, apparently a big fan of the president, he flirted with running for the Senate a couple of years ago before deciding to pull the plug on that. It's unclear what political or legal advice he may have offered the president. But this is a clear sign that the White House and the president are comfortable with where they are in things right now.

As I noted earlier in the day, one source close to the president told CNN that they believe the fat lady has sung and that the president can eventually in the next coming days close this chapter of this presidency, moving forward, and looking forward to 2020 -- Ana.

CABRERA: Kid Rock better have a good golf game wearing pants like that because he was getting a lot of attention out on the golf course.

(LAUGHTER)

CABRERA: Boris Sanchez, thank you.

President Trump isn't the only one anxiously waiting for the Mueller report. As we mentioned lawmakers on Capitol Hill are kind of chomping at the bit to get information on what's in it. Congressional Democrats are demanding Attorney General Barr release the full report to them, even holding an emergency conference call this afternoon to strategize.

CNN's Manu Raju has the latest now from Capitol Hill -- Manu.

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good evening, Ana. Now Democrats are very anxious about what they may learn and may not learn from the Mueller report. They had this emergency conference call earlier today raising significant concerns about potentially just only getting a summary of the findings, a summary of Mueller's conclusions, saying very clearly that is not enough.

Nancy Pelosi in this closed door -- private conference call today made clear to her members that she would not -- she wouldn't accept even a classified briefing with the Justice Department officials or Bob Mueller. She said it needs to be unclassified. Any briefings she said the underlying evidence needs to be made public and she said that these officials need to come forward so they can be questioned in an unclassified setting. Even public settings potentially.

Now the Democrats circulated talking points earlier today to their members about how far they're willing to go. They said this. They said, "If necessary, Democrats will be prepared to use its subpoena authority to obtain the full report and underlying evidence as well as to obtain briefing and testimony from the special counsel, the attorney general, deputy attorney general, and other necessary officials."

Now the Democrats also on Friday sent letters to the heads of various agencies, demanding that documents be preserved, documents related to the Mueller investigation. They reached out to the Justice Department, Treasury, State, IRS, virtually everybody who had some connection to the Mueller investigation saying that all those documents must be preserved. If not that could constitute a crime.

[21:10:03] So Democrats are trying to make it very clear. They're ready to fight for all the information and they're not done investigating. They want see what Mueller investigated and want to see what they can look into in the days and weeks and months ahead. But first this process fight is taking shape. We may see the summary of the conclusions tomorrow. But that may not be enough for House Democrats -- Ana.

CABRERA: All right. Manu Raju, thank you.

House Democrats are not only threatening to use subpoena power to get the full Mueller report. As Manu referenced, they're also ready to call Mueller himself in to testify..

And joining us now, Robert Mueller's former special assistant at the Department of Justice, Michael Zeldin, CNN political analyst and chief political correspondent for "Esquire," Ryan Lizza, and CNN national security analyst and Washington investigative correspondent for the "New York Times," Mark Mazzetti.

Michael, you know Robert Mueller. What will he do if he feels either his report is being misrepresented or that not enough of his findings have been made public? Will he speak out?

MICHAEL ZELDIN, ROBERT MUELLER'S FORMER SPECIAL ASSISTANT AT DOJ: I don't think so. If he's subpoenaed as a private citizen, he may not have a choice. But he's an institutionalist. He is going to do what the institution of the Justice Department rules require. And I don't think he' going to contradict what Barr wants to do. The question is, what does Barr want to do?

Barr is sort of ring fenced a bit by these regulations. However, Ana, it's important to remember that these are executive branch regulations, which the president of the United States could rescind. So Barr is bound by these regulations but if the president of the United States said I want this fully released, I am rescinding the regulations that govern this, that could happen. So it's really within the president's power to allow this to come forward if Barr feels he cannot because of the regulations.

CABRERA: Wow, so this could be in the president's hand. And we heard him say in the last couple of days that sure, release the report. We all deserve the transparency.

Ryan, the president has been uncharacteristically quiet, however, since the report dropped. Two sources who are close to him say he's happy the investigation is over and it's just a wait-and-see approach leading into tomorrow when we could get some of these findings. But given no more indictments, we know that now, is this already a huge victory for him politically?

RYAN LIZZA, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. He's exercised an incredible degree of self-control that is really uncharacteristic for the president. And a lot of the president's supporters and defenders have been cheering the one piece of information that we have, which as you pointed out, Ana, is the fact that no further indictments will be coming. To a lot of Trump supporters, that is a hugely important piece of information and a victory, and the fact that Trump has not come out and celebrated that fact is unusual, to say the least. And, you know, maybe he knows a little bit more about what is in the report.

Obviously, he and his lawyers spent a lot of time back and forth with the special counsel's office. So they have a lot more insight into this than we do. And so maybe he is being cautious for that reason. But there's no doubt about it that the greatest of all the investigations out there of the president, and there are, you know, at least a dozen more that aren't going to go away after this, by far the most serious for the country was this question of whether he actively colluded with the Russians, interfering in the 2016 election as opposed to just passively benefiting from that interference. And if that's what Mueller comes -- that's the conclusion of Mueller, that's an important milestone for Trump.

CABRERA: And over the course of this investigation, Mark, seven people pleaded guilty. Some of them very close to the president. We kept hearing people are being given plea deals for a bigger fish. Is there any indication that oh, why so many people got deals if there was no bigger fish?

MARK MAZZETTI, WASHINGTON INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORK TIMES: No, that's a great question. I mean, the president's allies dismissed these other indictments as what they called process crimes. Someone was lying to the FBI. Then they cut a deal. That was not significant. Now of course, lying to the FBI is a felony and it is significant. But there is that question, right, if these people were flipping, what were they flipping for? And what was the ultimate prize that they -- that Mueller and his team might be trying to get.

Now we now know, as you said, that there's not going to be any other indictments. So it is then in the question of what is in the report, not just the principal findings that we expect will be released tomorrow, but in also the substance of what Mueller came up with, what did they find in terms of this question of contacts, conspiracy, et cetera, with -- between the Trump campaign and the Russians?

You know, it's very clear that the Democrats at the very least are planning to play this out for some time, saying that they demand a report, they demand a full investigative findings of Mueller, and so they are playing a long game here beyond just whatever Barr releases tomorrow.

[21:15:19] CABRERA: Michael, how do you see the bigger fish plea deal question? Why do you think we didn't end up with a bigger fish?

ZELDIN: Perhaps they thought there was a bigger fish and they needed these witnesses to let them know whether there was or wasn't. So sometimes you make deals with people who are committing process crimes, as described these so-called lies, in order to obtain their testimony you couldn't otherwise get. And then in the end you determine that there isn't a crime there. We don't know what this report said. This report could say hypothetically that the president of the United States committed crimes but because he's the president of the United States, we can't indict him. That answers the why no indictments --

CABRERA: And that would be a bombshell if that's what they say.

ZELDIN: That would be a bombshell. I don't expect that at all. But Mueller, as any investigator would, has to keep walking up the evidence ladder. And maybe it was at the time that he thought there was something there-there, and he needed these people to get there. When he arrived, there was nothing there and that's what his report will tell us.

CABRERA: One of the biggest mysteries is, why didn't Mueller demand or really push for an in-person interview with the president?

ZELDIN: Yes, I -- reading through everything and knowing Mueller, my expectation is that he did ask for an interview. And that in consultation with Rosenstein and the solicitor general's office, and his solicitor general designee driven, that they came to the conclusion that they could not sustain the subpoena if they went to court. And they agreed that way and Mueller didn't push the issue. Because Mueller, if he wanted to, could have said I demand a subpoena. They could have said no. You can't get it because you haven't met the threshold. And then that would be reported to Congress.

I think Mueller sort of, again, as an institutional guy, had serious conversations. Looked at the law. Looked at the discovery that they got from the White House, and said, you know what, we may not prevail on that, I'm not going to ask.

CABRERA: I want to talk to you more, Ryan, about how Congress is prepared to respond here. Top Democrats on multiple House committees say they are going to continue investigating the president regardless of Mueller's findings. But if this report vindicates the president is it politically risky for Democrats to keep pursuing him?

LIZZA: You know, I'm not sure it's politically risky. I mean, look what happened with the Hillary Clinton e-mail investigation. That was investigated exhaustively by the Justice Department, the FBI, and Republicans continue to investigate it in Congress. And in fact, the president -- Candidate Trump ran essentially on the issue that the -- you know, the investigation was a fraud and that she should be, you know, locked up, as they used to chant in his rallies.

One thing on this question of indictment and what Congress' responsibility is, sometimes it's talked about as oh, you can't indict a president as if it's just a shield that the president has, like, you know, they're above the law. And of course that's not the case. The argument about why you cannot indict a president, which a lot of legal scholars disagree with it -- disagree with the Justice Department guidelines that you can't indict him or her, but the argument is that the remedy for a crime while a president is in office is impeachment, right?

So if indeed, as Michael pointed out, if Mueller says he committed these crimes but I'm abiding by the Justice Department guidelines and not indicting him, that is tantamount of course to a recommendation to the House of Representatives for pursuing impeachment proceedings. Now we have no idea if that's one of the conclusions he reached but that is certainly a possibility that's on the table.

CABRERA: So let's just think for a minute, after 675 days, we waited for the Mueller report to be submitted.

Mark, we are going to be waiting at least until tomorrow to learn the principal conclusions. Based on everything we know, is there anything in that report that could shock you at this point?

MAZZETTI: There's so much actually. I mean, you know, the expectation is that we're going to get kind of a bare bones, you know, top line assessment of the conclusions. But for people who have been following this closely, there are myriad threads that -- and questions that they would love answers to. And the expectation is that those answers won't come tomorrow. They will come if ever some point when the full investigation, the full report is released. You know, this was this incredibly complex investigation involving, you know, FBI and the Justice Department fanning out over, not only across the country but to multiple other countries.

[21:20:02] And we now know that Mueller's team really turned over every rock. So there is no expectation that tomorrow, if indeed the top line conclusions come out tomorrow, that there's going to be answers to all the questions everyone's had or -- you know, all the threads that people thought were particularly significant will be tied up neatly in a bow. I think that's going to be going on for some time. The questions are still going to be out there.

CABRERA: Ryan, anything that will shock you?

LIZZA: I think -- I mean, one -- we of course with good reason have been so focused on the president and his role and whether, you know, this word we've talked about for two years, collusion occurred. And, you know, obviously for good reason. We don't want a president who actively engaged in a conspiracy against the United States with an enemy, right?

And I think if Bob Mueller has exhaustively investigated that and sort of lifted that cloud off of the president, that is good news for the country. And so even though we're so focused on Trump, I'm hoping that this narrative lays out with as much detail as possible what the Russians did in 2016. Now a lot of that has been included in some of the indictments that have previously been issued. But we never set up a congressional committee that truly in a bipartisan way got to the bottom of this. And I think it would be a great service to the country if that answer is just crystal clear in this report.

CABRERA: All right, Michael. I'll give you the final thought on this. What will you be watching for when we do get those principal conclusions?

ZELDIN: So as a lawyer, what I'm most interested in seeing is Mueller's analysis of obstruction of justice. This has been debated on our air for a year, whether or not the president can obstruct justice by doing something he has a constitutional right to do, like fire Comey, like ask the Flynn investigation to be dropped.

I want to see what Mueller decided about that. And that will tell me a lot about how much trouble the president could have been in had he not had a prosecutor as honest and forthright as Robert Mueller.

CABRERA: All right. Michael, Ryan, Mark, thank you, gentlemen. Good to have all of you with us tonight. I hope you'll come back when we get these results.

OK. Donald Trump's potential 2020 opponents are also chiming in on the Mueller report. We'll have their reactions just ahead.

Plus, man of mystery. As we await details of the Mueller report, we'll take a closer look at this man. The man behind it, Robert Mueller, and the key roles he's played.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[21:26:14] CABRERA: It's really the only question in Washington this Saturday night. What's in the Mueller report? But lawmakers on Capitol Hill aren't the only ones demanding to know. Our campaign teams are all over the country gathering reaction from the Democrats running for president. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CORY BOOKER (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, I'm going to be looking to see if the president was involved in illegal activity. If he was involved in obstructing justice. If he was involved in -- or people close to him were involved in really colluding with the Russians. And so I think there's going to be a lot of things in this that are going to be very helpful. Not just to congressional investigations but remember, there's other investigation going on like in the Southern District of New York around criminal activity.

SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: That report needs to be made public.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

HARRIS: The American people have a right and a need to know. The underlying evidence that supports that report should be made public.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

HARRIS: The Attorney General Barr should be called to testify under oath before the United States Congress.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely. Absolutely.

HARRIS: And the White House should not be allowed to interfere in any way in interpreting or presenting the information to the American people.

SEN. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Ninety percent of Americans want to see it public, 420 representatives from the House of Representatives voted to make it public. And this is about holding people accountable, yes, as you know. Dozens of people have already been indicted. But it is also about knowing what happened. What the scheme was so we're in a better place to prepare for the 2020 elections.

BETO O'ROURKE (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If you're wondering about collusion, then when you saw the president of the United States standing next to the leader of Russia on that stage in Helsinki, Finland, defending him and taking his word against our own intelligence committee and our country, in George Will's words, not mine, that is collusion in action. Ultimately I believe this will be decided at the ballot box in 2020.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't know what's in the report. Nobody does. I do know however that Mueller wound up indicting 34 people including six Trump campaign officials. And I also know that it is absolutely imperative that the Trump administration make that report public as soon as possible.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Everyone needs to get a chance to read the Mueller report. It needs to be made public, all of it. Everybody just wants a chance to look at it. This is someone who's conducted an investigation on behalf of the people of the United States. It's already produced 34 indictments or guilty pleas. It is a serious investigation.

MAYOR PETE BUTTIGIEG (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, it's a little hard to gauge since we haven't actually seen it. What I'll say is this investigation has led to a number of guilty pleas and charges and obviously it's a very important body of work. I think where we might be making a mistake in our party is if we think that this is going to change everything in terms of how the president is viewed.

A lot of people have made up their mind about this president and a lot of people who voted for him already understand that he is not a character of great integrity. They voted the way they did to send a message.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Now it's not just President Trump's Democratic challengers offering their takes, his potential Republican primary opponent, Bill Weld, tweeted this afternoon that the American people deserve to know the results of this investigation, adding, "Robert Mueller has conducted an exhaustive investigation with the utmost integrity." Weld also says of Attorney General Barr, "I trust that he will give Congress and the American people the maximum access to the report allowable." [21:30:03] Attorney General William Barr spent most of Saturday

reviewing the Mueller report and he could share some of that information from it with lawmakers and the public tomorrow. We will have an update, next, live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: It's our breaking news on CNN right now. Special Counsel Robert Mueller has handed in his report. His nearly two-year investigation of President Trump's election is over and now we wait for this man, U.S. Attorney General William Barr, to finish going over it, top to bottom, and decide how much of it to release to the American public.

CNN senior justice correspondent Evan Perez has more -- Evan.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Ana, Attorney General Bill Barr spent more than nine hours at the Justice Department reviewing the findings from Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation. Barr spent the day working with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and a small group of aides. So far they're among the few people who have seen the conclusions from the 22-month Trump-Russia investigation.

Officials say that Barr is still pushing to send to members of Congress sometime this weekend what he calls the principal conclusions from the Mueller report. What exactly Barr's report to Congress will look like, we still don't know. Officials tell us to expect a summary that distills the main takeaways from what Mueller produced. Justice Department officials say they expect that whatever Barr sends to Congress, he will also share with the public.

[21:35:05] In the weeks since Barr took office, officials have told us that one of the things he was wrestling with was exactly how much detail he can release from Mueller's report. The more detail that Mueller included in his report about evidence that didn't lead to charges, the more complicated the job would be for Barr as he tried to repair his summary.

Barr's report to Congress is being eagerly awaited by lawmakers and by the president who has been uncharacteristically quiet since Mueller completed his investigation on Friday -- Ana.

CABRERA: Evan Perez, thank you.

And now CNN's chief political analyst Gloria Borger has a closer look at Mueller and the key roles he's played at the Justice Department over the decades.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Ana, the special counsel has finally produced the report America has been waiting for. But this is far from his first time in the public spotlight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BORGER (voice-over): After two years leading the Russia investigation, Special Counsel Robert Mueller remains a mystery man. Perhaps the most private public figure in Washington. But he's still become a political pinata.

TRUMP: There should have never been any Mueller investigation because there was never anything that wrong. There was no collusion. There never has been.

BORGER: It's hard to remember that at the start --

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: I think he's the right guy at the right time.

BORGER: Mueller was a bipartisan favorite.

ROBERT RAY, INDEPENDENT COUNSEL DURING BILL CLINTON INVESTIGATION: He would have been on anybody's list of, let's say, the top five people in the country to have, you know, taken on this kind of a responsibility.

BORGER: The resume is long. At 74 he's been involved for decades in some of the Justice Department's most celebrated cases. Mobster John Gotti. Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega.

ROBERT MUELLER, SPECIAL COUNSEL: Wreckage of Pan Am 103 fell.

BORGER: And the Pan Am 103 bombing in Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988. A case that still remains personal.

MUELLER: I'll never forget the visit I made to Lockerbie where I saw the small wooden warehouse in which were stored the various effects of your loved ones. A white sneaker. A Syracuse sweatshirt. Christmas presents and photographs.

GARRETT GRAFF, AUTHOR, "THE THREAT MATRIX": He's been effectively the same Bob Mueller in every place he has ever worked. Whether that was the U.S. attorney's office in San Francisco in the 1970s, whether that was the George H.W. Bush administration in the 1980s, whether that was the D.C. homicide prosecutor's office in the 1990s or the FBI in the 2000s. He is hard driving, he's tenacious, he is incredibly thorough and has a very strong sense of right or wrong.

BORGER: A registered Republican but it's hard to tell.

PHIL MUDD, FORMER FBI SENIOR INTELLIGENCE ADVISER: Four and a half years or whatever, 2,000 meetings, I didn't hear him say anything political.

BORGER (on camera): How would you describe his politics?

LISA MONACO, FORMER MUELLER CHIEF OF STAFF: Not.

BORGER: As in there are none?

MONACO: He's not -- he's apolitical.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ladies and gentlemen, the president of the United States.

BORGER (voice-over): Which is partly why President Bush picked him to run the FBI in 2001.

GEORGE W. BUSH, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The FBI must remain independent of politics and uncompromising in its mission.

BORGER: Mueller arrived at the FBI just seven days before 9/11. He served most of his term under Bush. And when President Obama asked him to stay for two more years, it required an act of Congress. The Senate approved 100-0. His M.O.? A by-the-books guy even after hours.

MUDD: People told me after that Christmas party, I mean, why are we going to the director's house, the guy who never really interacts with us, at the end of the party, that he would flick the lights. So it's going 7:00 to 9:00. At 9:03, it's like, well, on the invitation, it's 7:00 to 9:00, it's 9:03, lights out. It's kind of a signal.

MONACO: He's in the office between 6:00 and 6:30 every morning and he would always plop his briefcase down on the chair opposite my desk. Not sit down and kibitz or shoot the breeze. Immediately, what's happening? What's going on?

MUDD: I never saw any insecurity or nervousness ever. Ever.

BORGER (on camera): Ever? Never?

MUDD: Never. Not a lot of back and forth. Very quickly you're going through the details of the case.

BORGER: Would you assume that he is managing the special counsel investigation the same way?

MUDD: Heck yes. I wouldn't assume it. That is his -- it's not like a professional choice. That's his DNA. What's going on today, what have you got? What have you got? What have you got? I don't want to hear a lot of noise. I want to hear what the facts are. Let's talk about it. What's your judgment? What do you think? OK. Next, here's our decision. Let's move on. Let's go.

BORGER (voice-over): Showing up at the special counsel's nondescript office at the same early time every day. Always avoiding the spotlight. So much so that spotting Mueller anywhere became a bit of a Washington parlor game.

Mueller grew up in the wealthy Philadelphia suburbs and attended an elite boarding school. A classmate of John Kerry, then to Princeton. But the combat death of college friend David Hackett in Vietnam inspired Mueller to join the Marines.

[21:40:07] GRAFF: He was wounded in combat, shot through the leg, received a Bronze Star with valor, Purple Heart, and, you know, was right back in the fight a couple of weeks later.

MUELLER: In some sense, you feel like you have been given a second lease on life and you want to make the most of it to contribute in some way.

BORGER: After graduating the University of Virginia Law School, Mueller soon found his way to the Department of Justice and remained there for most of the next four decades.

MUELLER: My colleagues here at the Department of Justice past and present --

BORGER: With two short breaks to give private practice a try.

GRAFF: Bob Mueller has been notoriously unhappy every time he has tried to be in private practice. He just can't defend guilty people. They'll meet with a client, they'll explain his problem and he'll say, well, it sounds like you should go to jail then. You know, that --

(LAUGHTER)

BORGER (on camera): So will tell his client --

GRAFF: It sounds like you're guilty. Bob Mueller is someone who sees the world in very black and white terms.

BORGER (voice-over): By 2004 Mueller was running the FBI when his phone rang. It was James Comey, then deputy attorney general. It was the first time Mueller and Comey would find themselves in a very controversial legal drama.

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: I was very upset. I was angry.

BORGER: Comey was worried the Bush administration was determined to keep a warrantless eavesdropping program that Mueller, Comey and their boss, Attorney General John Ashcroft, thought was illegal. But Ashcroft was in the hospital recovering from surgery, leaving Comey in charge.

COMEY: I was concerned that given how ill I knew the attorney general was that there might be an effort to ask him to overrule me when he was in no condition to do that. Called Director Mueller. He said, "I'll meet you at the hospital right now."

BORGER: They had to race administration officials on Ashcroft's bedside.

COMEY: Director Mueller instructed the FBI agents present not to allow me to be removed from the room under any circumstances.

BORGER: In the end, Ashcroft backed Comey and Mueller.

GRAFF: He enlisted Bob Mueller because he knew that Bob Mueller had this incredible nonpartisan reputation in Washington.

BORGER: Now Trump views Mueller's relationship with suspicion.

TRUMP: His best friend is Comey who's a bad cop.

BORGER: Mueller loyalists deny it. But it's all part of the landscape as his special counsel's work ends, and the country waits to see how the long silent Bob Mueller will finally be heard.

GRAFF: Bob Mueller believes in American institutions. So I think he wants to set the institutions up to make the best decisions that they can.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BORGER: Ana, now those institutions -- Congress, the Justice Department, and the White House -- may be on a collision course over just how much of Mueller's entire investigation should be made public.

CABRERA: Gloria Borger, thank you for that reporting.

A massive effort underway to rescue more than 1,000 people stuck on a cruise ship. The shipment's engine has failed. You can see it's taking on water. We'll have the latest next in the CNN NEWSROOM.

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[21:47:03] CABRERA: A celebration today in what was very recently an ISIS stronghold. Coalition forces held a formal ceremony marking the complete defeat of ISIS in eastern Syria.

In a White House statement the president said, "I am pleased to announce that together with our partners in the global coalition to defeat ISIS, including the Iraqi Security Forces, and the Syrian Democratic Forces, the United States has liberated all ISIS-controlled territory in Syria and Iraq. One hundred percent of the caliphate."

French President Emanuel Macron says the major danger has been eliminated but he warns the threat continues.

A large scale rescue mission will likely go on through the night where a massive cruise liner lost power. This is in the frigid waters off the coast of Norway. The ship called the Viking Sky pitching and rolling in the waves. 1300 passengers and crew members are now being rescued by helicopter. At last check, 150 people have been evacuated.

The rescue effort taking place in very cold rainy conditions and rough seas. And here you can see water on board the ship, flooding the decks in some places. Officials say a handful of people suffered minor injuries. Norwegian Emergency Services says the crew sent a mayday distress signal reporting engine problems. Crew members are trying to restore power and get the ship back into court.

A family in Florida is going through deep shock and sadness right now after their teenage daughter's suicide. Sydney Aiello was a survivor of last year's shooting massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Her mother says Sidney never got over that ordeal. She was suffered tremendous guilt after 14 fellow students and three teachers were killed at the school, and that she was recently diagnosed with post-traumatic stress from that horrible day.

Sydney Aiello took her own life last weekend. Her funeral was Friday. She was just 19 years old. The Department of Homeland Security says the private data of more than

2 million people have been shared by FEMA illegally. Survivors of Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria along with the 2017 California wildfires are among those impacted. The DHS inspector general says information was shared with a federal contractor helping survivors find temporary housing. FEMA does not believe the data has been compromised.

Robert Kraft says he's sorry. The latest on the prostitution case involving the New England Patriots when CNN NEWSROOM returns.

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[21:53:21] CABRERA: New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft is publicly apologizing. And it's the first time we've heard directly from Kraft since he was charged with soliciting prostitution at a Florida spa last month.

CNN's Polo Sandoval has more.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Robert Kraft's statement today is significant as it is the first time we've heard from the New England Patriots owner since prosecutors in Florida announced the sex trafficking investigation, one that led to charges against close to 100 men, among them Kraft.

Investigators alleged that they sought out paid sex services at various day spas. Kraft and his legal team pleading not guilty initially after that announcement was made. However, today this statement, and in this Kraft saying that he is truly sorry. A portion of that reading, "Throughout my life I have always tried to do the right thing. The last thing I would ever want to do is disrespect another human being. I have extraordinary respect for women. My morals and my soul were shaped by the most wonderful woman, the love of my life, who I was blessed to have as my partner for 50 years."

That's a reference to Mr. Kraft's late wife. Kraft also writing that he hopes to use his platform to make a difference. That's certainly something to certainly look at here as this week according to a source familiar with the case, that source telling CNN that Kraft will not accept a plea deal that was offered up by prosecutors. That deal basically they would choose to drop that misdemeanor charge in exchange for fines, community service, and an admission from Kraft that he would be found guilty should this case go to trial. Prosecutors saying that that is fairly standard for first-time offenders.

[21:55:03] This week attorneys for Kraft also filed a motion seeking a protective order that would have essentially blocked the release of not just video evidence but also really other incriminating evidence according to investigators that could potentially be made public. But again, now the statement released over the weekend from Robert Kraft saying that he is sorry for what happened.

Ana, back to you.

CABRERA: Polo Sandoval, thank you.

That wraps up this hour of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York. Thanks for being with me. Next on CNN, part one of our special series on President Richard Nixon, "TRICKY DICK." Good night.

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