Special counsel Robert Mueller has provided a federal judge with an unredacted version of the Justice Department memo laying out the scope of his investigation and the potential crimes he’s authorized to pursue. However, the memo — long sought after by President Donald Trump’s allies on Capitol Hill, who regularly accuse Mueller of overstepping his bounds — remains classified and not public, leaving its details hidden. The document was filed as an “unredacted memorandum” under seal with the U.S. District Court’s Eastern District of Virginia, where Mueller is expected to try former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort on bank fraud charges.
Mueller’s decision to share the classified document comes two weeks after the judge, T.S. Ellis, demanded to see the full scope memo, authored by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Earlier this month, Ellis called for the document during a hearing on Manafort’s attempt to toss out some of the charges against him.
In comments that drew applause from President Donald Trump and his allies, Ellis scolded Mueller’s team and raised questions about whether its pursuit of charges against Manafort was really part of an attempt to elicit testimony against Trump himself in Mueller’s ongoing probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether Trump’s team coordinated with Moscow.
Full Article: Mueller hands judge full memo detailing Russia probe scope – POLITICO.