House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) repeated Sunday that it was a “mistake” for special counsel Robert Mueller to rely on President Donald Trump’s written testimony rather than interviewing him in person.
“It was a mistake to rely on written responses by the President,” Schiff told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos. “[Those answers reflect] generally more what the lawyer has to say than what the individual has to say.”
Schiff said he could “understand” why Trump’s lawyers resisted a sit-down interview — “the President is someone who seems pathologically incapable of telling the truth for long periods of time,” he said — but that the fact remained, “if you really do want the truth, you need to put people under oath, and that should have been done.”
Mueller, Schiff said, “may have made the decision that, as he could not indict a sitting president on the obstruction [of justice] issue, as it would draw out his investigation, that that didn’t make sense.”
Schiff: "It was a mistake to rely on written responses by the President" rather than interviewing him in person. pic.twitter.com/sVFoD5gwfm
— Matt Shuham (@mattshuham) March 24, 2019