MFA:

The assumptions that culminated in Mr. Barr's conclusions began almost two years ago, when the White House, Trump supporters and the media characterized the focus of the special counsel's investigation as "collusion." The word "collusion" does not appear anywhere in Mr. Mueller's appointment letter: His mandate was to investigate any "links and/or coordination" between the Trump campaign and Russia. There is a good reason for this: "Collusion" is the legal equivalent of Jell-O. Outside of specific factual contexts -- such as price fixing in antitrust law -- the word "collusion" has no legal meaning or significance. In fact, in his report, Mr. Mueller explicitly stated that his conclusions were not about collusion, "which is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States code."

The Trump administration seized on this legal ambiguity early on, with the refrain that "collusion is not a crime." The standard set here is that anything falling below criminally chargeable behavior is acceptable. When it comes to the presidency, this is not true. The Constitution lays out the procedure for removing an unfit president from office for "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors."

Nevertheless, we took the bait: Collusion may not be a crime, lawyers and pundits responded, but conspiracy is. This "reflexive" response adopted criminality as the bar to be met.

MFA:

Other Democratic hopefuls have said the report puts the question of impeachment on the table.

Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, told NBC News Friday that there's "evidence that this president deserves to be impeached" but added that he is not in Congress and will leave it those who are to decide whether to pursue proceedings.

Democratic presidential contender Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota dodged the question of whether Trump should face impeachment on MSNBC's "All in With Chris Hayes" Thursday, while Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., did not rule it out.

"Our job if there is impeachment brought, and that is up to the House, our job is to be the jury. So, I have been really careful about talking about what we would do if impeachment came before us," Klobuchar said.

"I think that there is definitely a conversation to be had on that subject, but first I want to hear from Bob Mueller," Harris told Hayes in a separate interview Thursday, "and really understand what exactly is the evidence that supports the summary that we have been given today."

Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., who recently announced a White House bid, said on MSNBC Friday that impeachment is "a conversation we have to have as far as holding this president accountable," but when asked to clarify whether that means he supports impeachment, he said, "I'm for bringing Bob Mueller in and see what the evidence is."

" It would be nice to know that all, or at least most, of them were on board with the process and would themselves speak to the need to impeach a compromised and corrupt President."

MSNBC @MSNBC

JUST IN: Citing details from the Mueller report, 2020 presidential candidate Sen. Warren calls for the US House to initiate impeachment proceedings against President Trump

Sen. Warren on her decision to call for the House to begin impeachment proceedings:

"The severity of this misconduct demands that elected officials in both parties set aside political considerations and do their constitutional duty."

Elizabeth Warren @ewarren

The Mueller report lays out facts showing that a hostile foreign government attacked our 2016 election to help Donald Trump and Donald Trump welcomed that help. Once elected, Donald Trump obstructed the investigation into that attack.

"It's almost like all the reporting was accurate, and the only thing they got wrong was how high the legal standard is for the president and his family to be charged with a crime."

The "they "referred to is the press, not Mueller's team.

IOW:

Dean Ray @itsthatdeanguy

It's almost like all the reporting was accurate, and the only thing they got wrong was how high the legal standard is for the president and his family to be charged with a crime.

"Mueller doesn't quantify Russia's interference does he? He says no collusion with the campaign occurred."

He says collusion isn't a term he used (bold mine):

"In evaluating whether evidence about collective action of multiple individuals constituted a crime, we applied the framework of conspiracy law, not the concept of "collusion." In so doing, the Office recognized that the word "collud[e]" was used in communications with the Acting Attorney General confirming certain aspects of the investigation's scope and that the term has frequently been invoked in public reporting about the investigation.

But collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal law. For those reasons, the Office 's focus in analyzing questions of joint criminal liability was on conspiracy as defined in federal law. In connection with that analysis, we addressed the factual question whether members of the Trump Campaign "coordinat[ed]"- a term that appears in the appointment order-with Russian election interference activities. Like collusion, "coordination" does not have a settled definition in federal criminal law. We understood coordination to require an agreement-tacit or express- between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference. That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests. We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

Mueller determined that coordination "requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests." But "two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests" sure sounds like collusion to me.