Unpacking Mueller’s Curious Denial of the BuzzFeed Story

Last night, BuzzFeed reported that according to “two federal law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of the matter,” Donald Trump directed his longtime attorney Michael Cohen “to lie to Congress about negotiations to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.” 

If true, the BuzzFeed report implicates Trump in clear criminal behavior that would likely lead to impeachment, conviction or both.

Today, the “if true” part of the story took center stage when Robert Mueller’s Office of Special Counsel issued an ambiguous, narrowly worded denial of aspects of the BuzzFeed story.

The problem is that it is unclear exactly which aspects of the story the Special Counsel denied, or why.

I’ll try to unpack both.

Here’s the text of the Special Counsel’s statement:

“Buzzfeed’s description of specific statements to the Special Counsel’s Office, and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding Michael Cohen’s Congressional testimony are not accurate.”

The Special Counsel’s denial focuses on two subjects: (1) “specific statements,” and (2) “characterization of documents and testimony.”

Since the denial doesn’t say which specific statements were inaccurate, we’re somewhat on our own.  But we’re not entirely helpless. 

Even if we can’t know the exact meaning of this denial, we can easily narrow down the possibilities because the BuzzFeed story contained only one description of “specific statements” made to the Special Counsel’s office:

“Now the two sources have told BuzzFeed News that Cohen also told the special counsel that after the election, the president personally instructed him to lie — by claiming that negotiations ended months earlier than they actually did — in order to obscure Trump’s involvement.”

While this could be interpreted as a full denial that the Special Counsel has evidence that Trump instructed Cohen to lie to Congress, I think that’s unlikely.  If that were the case, I doubt the denial would have been so carefully worded and limited.

More likely, I think, is that the Special Counsel’s Office was narrowly denying only a discrete aspect of BuzzFeed’s report.  For instance, maybe the sources got the timing wrong, and Trump actually told Cohen to lie before the election, not “after.”  Or maybe Cohen told the Special Counsel that Trump conveyed the instruction to lie through an intermediary, not “personally.”

Maybe a lot of things.  The point is we just don’t know.

The same ambiguity underlies the Special Counsel’s claim that BuzzFeed’s “characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office” was inaccurate. 

Again, we are somewhat on our own, but not completely in the dark because BuzzFeed made only limited statements about that point:

“The special counsel’s office learned about Trump’s directive for Cohen to lie to Congress through interviews with multiple witnesses from the Trump Organization and internal company emails, text messages, and a cache of other documents.”

Maybe the Special Counsel is trying to state broadly that Cohen’s testimony was not corroborated by other evidence, but I doubt it. 

It seems more likely that the denial goes to something narrower. 

For instance, maybe only one witness gave testimony corroborating Cohen’s statements, not “multiple witnesses.”  Or maybe there were multiple witnesses, but only one was “from the Trump Organization.”  Maybe there were only emails corroborating Cohen, but no “text messages.”  Maybe they thought the characterization of the other documents as a “cache” was overblown and misleading.

Why, you may ask, would the Special Counsel use an extremely rare public statement to issue such a narrow denial if the core of the story were true?  What would be the point?  Why not just say nothing?

Well, I can think of at least one good reason. 

BuzzFeed identified its sources as “two federal law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of the matter.”  BuzzFeed doesn’t claim or suggest that the two officials were from the Office of the Special Counsel, but the description of the sources certainly leaves open that possibility.

The Special Counsel is now in the final stages of his investigation.  Trump and his supporters know that something bad is coming, and they are doing everything they can to discredit the Special Counsel in advance of his issuance of more indictments and a final report. 

They also have a highly compliant Acting Attorney General with the authority to fire Mueller, but only for “cause,” and they are about to confirm an ultra-conservative Attorney General who has been vocally critical of the investigation.

Nothing would please Trump and his supporters more than finding something to discredit, and perhaps even fire the Special Counsel if they can show some pretense of “cause.”

How do you think a “Mueller’s a Leaker” narrative might play?  It wouldn’t have to be true, just plausible enough to gain some traction.

That puts Mueller in a nearly impossible bind.  He’s damned if he denies being the source, and he’s damned if he doesn’t. 

Law enforcement officials never want to directly deny being an unnamed source.  That’s a very dangerous, very slippery slope.  Once you start down that road, you’re trapped.  Deny once, and you have to keep denying every time.  Otherwise people will view your silence as an admission.

Denying that he is the source of a leak just isn’t in Mueller’s playbook.

Yet he knows that permitting the possibility of being branded as a leaker could threaten his investigation at its most vulnerable stage.

So what does he do?

Well, maybe he can find a way to deny it indirectly. 

For instance, he might have his spokesperson issue a statement that the story, or at least parts of it, is inaccurate.  Branding the story as inaccurate would go a long way toward shutting down any narrative that he is the leaker. 

Yes, this is speculation.  I’m not saying that it’s the explanation for the Special Counsel’s denial.

I’m saying that it is an explanation that would fit the circumstances.  And a plausible one at that, at least to me.

But what I’m really saying is that we should all cool our jets and not read too much into the Special Counsel’s carefully-crafted denial.  The simple truth is that we just don’t know what it means. 

We’ll find out in due course.