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Agence France-Presse

He hovers over Washington’s seething political swamp like The Phantom. No one ever sees Robert Mueller, the special counsel leading the Russia collusion investigation; he never speaks.
But he is constantly present, showing his hand through a trickle of court filings, each one stoking speculation through the halls of government, in offices and over dinner tables: what does he have on Donald Trump?
Eighteen months into his investigation, Mueller has the US capital spellbound.
He threw tantalising new bait to Russia-gate adepts late Tuesday when he recommended to a court that Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who had lied to investigators about his own Russia contacts, be let off without any jail time.


While Flynn was guilty of a “serious” offence, Mueller said in a court filing, he had fully cooperated with investigators in multiple cases, and submitted to interviews 19 times.
What Flynn told them, though, Mueller wasn’t saying.
It all adds to a mystique about the veteran prosecutor, who is depicted in fan memes as a Star Wars Jedi or a character from Game of Thrones.
“Mueller is coming,” they warn ominously.

Mueller Is Coming. #BobMueller #RobertSMuellerIII #InBobWeTrust #MuellerTime #IBelieveInBobMueller #ProtectMuellerNow #WeStandWithMueller #SpecialCounsel #TrumpRussia #TrumpIsDone #Manafort #PleaDeal #HeFlipped #TrumpCrimeFamily #GOT #GameOfThrones #DigitalArt #RinaldoZoontjes pic.twitter.com/0AdjHmYbOr
— Rinaldo Zoontjes ® (@RinaldoZoontjes) September 14, 2018

Liberals see Mueller as a warrior against injustice, and are whipped up by every court document containing a titbit that potentially links the president to a crime.
Republicans are afraid to even imagine what damage their party faces from the outcome of the probe.
Trump, meanwhile, seems more on edge with each new court filing, blasting out tweets calling the probe an “illegal witch hunt”.

When will this illegal Joseph McCarthy style Witch Hunt, one that has shattered so many innocent lives, ever end-or will it just go on forever? After wasting more than $40,000,000 (is that possible?), it has proven only one thing-there was NO Collusion with Russia. So Ridiculous!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2018

It’s an extreme makeover for the 74-year-old former Marine, who was a public prosecutor battling the mafia and Russian spies before taking the lead of the Federal Bureau of Investigation just one week in advance of the devastating September 11 terror attacks.
Director of the FBI for 12 years, he was a very public figure, respected but hardly beloved. Now, he is the invisible star of Washington.

Yet he is barely known by the people that cheer and fear him.
Gaunt and stately, he has only been spotted in public a handful of times this year, reported and heavily forwarded on social media: alone, with no security, crossing a Washington street; dining in a low-key restaurant; getting help at the Georgetown Apple store with his wife of 52 years, Anne Standish.
“Even special counsel needs occasional IT support,” tweeted communications consultant Meghan Pianta, who snapped a photo of the couple with one of the Apple techies.

Even special counsel needs occasional IT support #geniusbar #mueller pic.twitter.com/mU95QydwJT
— Meghan Pianta (@megpianta) September 26, 2018

In July, he was also spied in Washington National Airport waiting for a flight, unwittingly just feet away from Donald Trump Jnr, the president’s son who is believed to be a target of the investigation.
Mueller lives in a gated community in Northern Virginia, and arrives at and leaves work at a nondescript office building in southwest Washington unseen through the parking garage.
He doesn’t visit the White House to talk with Trump’s lawyers; they go to him. Mostly, his two dozen seasoned investigators and prosecutors do the public work, making court appearances and filings, and likewise letting documents speak for them.
Few know what Mueller is like in person. Is he the brusque taskmaster who demanded results in the 9/11 investigation barely 24 hours after it took place? Or the quiet, patient but determined chess-player that the Russia collusion investigation’s steady march suggests?

News-wise, in notoriously leaky Washington, his shop is hermetically sealed, making it an object of both wonder and disbelief.
He has a spokesman, Peter Carr, who will explain things that are already public record. For any seeking a hint of what is coming up, the answer is always “We decline to comment”.
However, by never defending themselves in public, his operation stays vulnerable to attacks like Trump’s, who repeatedly has threatened to shut the investigation down.
Mueller, the president said on Twitter on Monday “is a much different man than people think”.
“His out of control band of Angry Democrats, don’t want the truth, they only want lies.”
Despite hours spent speculating every day by an army of TV analysts, no one knows exactly where the investigation stands.

Bob Mueller (who is a much different man than people think) and his out of control band of Angry Democrats, don’t want the truth, they only want lies. The truth is very bad for their mission!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2018

That could change on Friday when Mueller’s team is expected to divulge more of what they have uncovered in a court filing in the case of Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen, who like Flynn has been cooperating.
If he sticks to practice, Mueller still will not give away the whole picture, until he is ready.
His fans, though, are showing signs of impatience.
To wit, Saturday Night Live closed its show last week demanding results in an abridged chorus of the Mariah Carey holiday rocker: “Mueller, All I want For Christmas is You”.

@rhymeswithred
Dec 1
All I’m asking and hoping for. Thanks @nbcsnl #snl for giving me my holiday anthem #AllIWantForChristmas #Mueller pic.twitter.com/ntcjV5Asoy
— Laura (@DesertPrimrose) December 3, 2018



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Trump-Russia collusion investigations

The mystique of Robert Mueller: he never speaks, but is constantly present

FILE - In this June 21, 2017, file photo, special counsel Robert Mueller departs after a meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington. Mueller is back. After a quiet few months in the run-up to the midterm elections, the special counsel’s Russia investigation is heating up again with a string of tantalizing new details emerging this week.(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

(FILES) In this file photo taken on December 01, 2017 Gen. Michael Flynn, former national security adviser to US President Donald Trump, leaves Federal Court in Washington, DC. - Robert Mueller, the special prosecutor in charge of the Russia election meddling probe, recommended on December 4, 2018, that President Donald Trump's former national security advisor Michael Flynn face no jail time due to his cooperation with the investigation. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski / AFP)

What does Robert Mueller have on Donald Trump? Photo: AFP

Russia probe: Robert Mueller recommends no jail time for Michael Flynn. What has he revealed about Donald Trump?

FILE PHOTO: Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort arrives for arraignment on a third superseding indictment against him by Special Counsel Robert Mueller on charges of witness tampering, at U.S. District Court in Washington, U.S. June 15, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo

In this Nov. 29, 2018, photo, Michael Cohen walks out of federal court in New York. A pattern of deception by advisers to President Donald Trump, aimed at covering up Russia-related contacts during the 2016 campaign and transition, has unspooled bit by bit in criminal cases from special counsel Robert Mueller. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

U.S. President Donald Trump selects a reporter to ask a question while speaking to members of the media before boarding Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Thursday, Nov. 29, 2018. Former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to a new federal charge and agreed to cooperate with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, admitting that he lied to Senate investigators about his former boss's business plans in Russia. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

US Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office said on Tuesday that President Donald Trump’s ex-national security adviser Michael Flynn provided ‘substantial’ cooperation with its probe into possible collusion between Trump’s campaign team and Moscow. File photo: EPA

News

World

United States & Canada

Robert Mueller is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US election
Donald Trump has called his probe a witch hunt


What does the special prosecutor in charge of the Russia election meddling probe have on Donald Trump?


United States

US Politics

The mystique of Robert Mueller: he never speaks, but is constantly present

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;}Robert Mueller is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US election Donald Trump has called his probe a witch hunt

Robert Mueller is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US election

Donald Trump has called his probe a witch hunt