Adam Schiff in The Mueller Report

On Government Reform: Congress must act to protect elections from Russians

The Russians massively intervened in 2016 and they are prepared to do so again in voting that is set to begin a mere eight months from now.

We must make all efforts to harden our elections infrastructure, to ensure there is a paper trail for all voting, to deter the Russians from meddling, to discover it when they do, to disrupt it and to make them pay. Protecting the sanctity of our elections begins with the recognition that accepting foreign help is disloyal to our country, unethical and wrong.

We cannot control what the Russians do, not completely, but we can decide what we do and that this centuries-old experiment we call American democracy is worth cherishing.

On Principles & Values: Anyone excerpt the president would have been indicted

And your work speaks of a president who committed countless acts of obstruction of justice that in my opinion and that of many other prosecutors, had it been anyone else in the country, they would have been indicted.

You would not tell us whether you would have indicted the president but for the OLC only that you could not. So the Justice Department will have to make that decision when the president leaves office, both as to the crime of obstruction of justice and as to the campaign finance fraud that individual one directed and coordinated and for which Michael Cohen went to jail.

On Principles & Values: Congress must decide on impeachment, not Mueller

You would not tell us whether the counterintelligence investigation revealed whether people still serving within the administration pose a risk of compromise and should never have been given a security clearance, so we must find out.

We did not bother to ask whether financial inducements from any Gulf nations were influencing U.S. policy since it is outside the four corners of your report, and so we must find out.

You would not tell us whether the president should be impeached, nor did we ask you since it is our responsibility to determine the proper remedy for the conduct outlined in your report. Whether we decide to impeach the president in the house or we do not, we must take any action necessary to protect the country while he is in office.

On Principles & Values: Trump accepting assistance from Russians is criminal

Schiff, in his closing questions to Mueller, asked if "knowingly accepting assistance from a foreign government," to which Mueller responded "a crime."

Schiff continued, adding that if knowingly accepting assistance from a "foreign government during a presidential campaign is an unethical thing to do."

"And a crime in certain circumstances," Mueller responded.

Schiff questioned whether public officials acting unethically "exposes them to compromise particularly in dealing with foreigners."

"True," Mueller responded again.

Schiff, in that brief interaction, helped cut to the center of why the Russia investigation was so critical--and why America needs to pay attention to the results.

On Principles & Values: Investigation necessary to expose Russian interference

The Mueller report makes it absolutely crystal clear that this investigation was absolutely necessary because it revealed a widespread, systemic effort by the Russians to help the Trump campaign. And that is the overriding conclusion of this report. We need to put our emphasis on making sure that kind of intervention never happens again.