In a briefing at the White House, Mr. Trump’s lawyers assailed Mr. Mueller’s team for what they said was an unrelenting focus on the president, saying that the probe has entrapped some family members and planted false reporting to embarrass them and, as the investigation reaches its final stages, they warned that this may make it harder for Mr. Trump to settle into the presidency.
“It will be much more difficult to deal with the outside world” once Mr. Mueller leaves office, said Martin Nesbitt, one of Mr. Trump’s attorneys. “In the time since the president took office, we have been involved in a vast foreign adversary investigation that has involved [the family members] Ivanka, Donald Jr., Eric and Tiffany as well as the president himself. And all of the activities involving those four people have been investigated.”
The president’s lawyers complained that Mueller’s team had given interviews to just one of the former Trump campaign operatives who worked on the 2016 campaign — Rick Gates, who pleaded guilty in February to a felony charge of conspiracy — and took four days to complete other interviews with possible witnesses.
At the same time, they expressed concerns about what they called overly personal questions, including ones about the president’s sex life.
They also expressed concern about the idea of prosecutors obtaining financial records, arguing that it could make it more difficult for Mr. Trump to find a new home for his finances.
The lawyers said that many of the details they would have learned about the president’s private financial dealings that might have yielded illegal material, were being exchanged by Mr. Mueller for sensitive, prosecutorial information.
“I can’t elaborate any further than what is a drip, drip, drip effect,” said Jay Sekulow, the other lawyer on the team.