Special Counsel Robert Mueller would like to interview President Trump sometime within the next few weeks regarding the events surrounding the firing of former FBI Director James Comey and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, people familiar with his plans told The Washington Post Tuesday.
Flynn left the White House last February after it was reported that he misled Vice President Mike Pence about his communications with former Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak; in December, he pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. Comey was fired in May, and later testified that Trump had asked him to drop the FBI's investigation of Flynn. Mueller also wants to learn more about Trump's reported pressuring of Attorney General Jeff Sessions to quit, and whether this is a pattern of behavior for Trump, the Post reports. The Justice Department confirmed Tuesday that Sessions was interviewed by the special counsel's team for several hours last week.
Trump's attorneys are negotiating the terms of an interview with the special counsel's team, and they would like Trump to provide some testimony face-to-face with investigators and the rest in a written statement. Trump's informal adviser Roger Stone told the Post that Trump should do whatever it takes to get out of an interview, because it's "a death wish. Why would you walk into a perjury trap? The president would be very poorly advised to give Mueller an interview."