President Donald Trump will decide once and for all whether to sit down with special counsel Robert Mueller within a week to 10 days, his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said Thursday.
“I think our decisions will get made in the next week to 10 days,” Giuliani, who leads Trump’s legal team, told Politico. Trump may yet reject the interview, he added.
Trump reportedly was urging his attorneys to allow him to speak to Mueller, The New York Times reported on Wednesday, even though they’ve counseled him to refuse the request. Trump continues to deride Mueller’s probe as a “Rigged Witch Hunt” and reportedly believes an interview with the special counsel would help bring it to an end.
Trump’s lawyers have yet to offer a clear indication of which way they’re leaning. Last week, the president’s lawyers submitted a counteroffer to Mueller with specific conditions for an interview with Trump, The Wall Street Journal reported. Trump proposed answering questions on Russian collusion in the 2016 U.S. election, but not on obstruction of justice.
Giuliani said Thursday that his team was looking over the latest proposal from Mueller, which still included a few questions on obstruction. The two sides are still negotiating remaining points of contention, he added, including whether Trump could offer written answers and whether Mueller’s team would be able to ask follow-up questions.
Giuliani is ready for Mueller to “put up or shut up,” he told CNN on Wednesday. “We have every reason to believe they don’t have anything of the president doing anything wrong. I don’t think they have any evidence he did anything wrong.”