WASHINGTON -- Special counsel Robert Mueller's office on Friday issued a rare public statement disputing the accuracy of a BuzzFeed News report that said his investigators had gathered evidence showing President Donald Trump directed his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, to lie to Congress about a prospective business deal in Moscow.
BuzzFeed, citing two unidentified law enforcement officials, reported that Mueller's investigators learned about Trump's directive "through interviews with multiple witnesses from the Trump Organization and internal company emails, text messages, and a cache of other documents."
The report said Cohen then acknowledged Trump's instructions when he was interviewed by the Mueller team.
The statement by Mueller's office on Friday night doesn't cite any specific errors, but the special counsel's spokesman, Peter Carr, said, "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."
BuzzFeed spokesman Matt Mittenthal said the publication stands by its reporting and urged readers to "stay tuned" as they worked to determine what Mueller was denying. Ben Smith, editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed News, also said the publication stands by its reporting and the sources who informed it.
"We urge the special counsel to make clear what he's disputing," Smith said.
Immediately after the Mueller team's statement was issued, Trump retweeted a post that said: "Sadly so many will never get the memo that it was fake!" He later tweeted: "A very sad day for journalism, but a great day for our Country!"
Trump's lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, tweeted: "I commend Bob Mueller's office for correcting the BuzzFeed false story that Pres. Trump encouraged Cohen to lie. I ask the press to take heed that their hysterical desire to destroy this President has gone too far. They pursued this without critical analysis all day. #FAKENEWS."
The statement by Carr was unusual because it appeared to be the first time he had publicly challenged the facts of a media account that had generated significant attention for its revelations about the president.
Democrats had earlier vowed to investigate whether the report was true, calling that possibility a "concern of the greatest magnitude." House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., both said they would investigate the matter.
Any evidence that Trump directed a witness to lie to investigators would place him in great political and legal jeopardy.
The Associated Press and The New York Times have not independently confirmed the report. One person familiar with Cohen's testimony to the special counsel's prosecutors told the Times that Cohen never implied that the president had pressured him to lie to Congress.
Cohen pleaded guilty in November to lying to Congress to cover up that he was negotiating the Trump Tower project on Trump's behalf during the heat of his presidential campaign. The charge was lodged by Mueller and was the result of Cohen's cooperation with that investigation.
He admitted that he lied when he told lawmakers he had never agreed to travel to Russia in connection with the Moscow project and when he said that he'd decided by the end of January 2016 that the "proposal was not feasible for a variety of business reasons and should not be pursued further." In reality, those efforts continued through June of that year.
He was sentenced to three years in prison for crimes that included arranging the payment of hush money to conceal his boss's alleged sexual affairs, telling a judge that he agreed time and again to cover up Trump's "dirty deeds" out of "blind loyalty."
Cohen is due on Capitol Hill in early February to give public testimony before the House Oversight and Government Reform panel, and also is expected to speak around that time with the House and Senate intelligence committees privately, according to top Democrats. Lawmakers anticipate that Cohen may refuse to speak about Russia-related issues during his public hearing, as Mueller is continuing to investigate those matters, but hope to glean more information during private testimony.
Most top Democrats on Friday were careful to note that they did not know if the BuzzFeed allegations were true while vowing to investigate them.
"These allegations may prove unfounded, but, if true, they would constitute both the subornation of perjury as well as obstruction of justice," Schiff said in a statement Friday, adding that the panel "is already working to secure additional witness testimony and documents related to the Trump Tower Moscow deal and other investigative matters."
Some rank-and-file Democrats on Friday suggested the allegations should spark serious consideration of impeachment proceedings, despite party leaders' best efforts to defer such decisions until after Mueller has completed a final report expected in coming months.
"If the BuzzFeed story is true, President Trump must resign or be impeached," tweeted Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro, a member of the House intelligence panel.
A Senate Democrat, Chris Murphy of Connecticut, tweeted that "we need to know this ASAP" if Mueller does have multiple sources confirming that Trump directed Cohen to lie.
"Mueller shouldn't end his inquiry, but it's about time for him to show Congress his cards before it's too late for us to act," Murphy tweeted.
Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, largely sought to deflect questions about the BuzzFeed report on Friday.
Asked if it would be an impeachable offense for Trump to direct Cohen to lie to Congress, Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, told reporters he was focused on ending the partial government shutdown.
"Honestly, I haven't even seen the reports. I'm not focused on that right now," he said, adding that Mueller's investigation "is the place to sift all this out ... unimpeded."
Information for this article was contributed by Mary Clare Jalonick, Eric Tucker, Jill Colvin, Zeke Miller, Jonathan Lemire and Jim Mustian of The Associated Press; by John Wagner, Karoun Demirjian, Tim Elfrink, Tom Hamburger, Erica Werner and Devlin Barrett of The Washington Post; and by Mark Mazzetti and Sharon LaFraniere of The New York Times.
A Section on 01/19/2019