I’m in the camp that says a sitting President can’t be indicted for a Federal offense and shouldn’t be indicted for any other offense. That puts the burden precisely where it belongs — on Congress. If a President commits a crime so significant that it is more important that he be prosecuted than that he tend to the nation’s business, Congress can and must impeach him and commit him to the tender mercies of the criminal justice system. But if Congress implicitly says that he is above the law (by not impeaching him), then he is above the law, because Congress makes the law. If that’s impractical because Representatives and Senators of the President’s party won’t impeach or convict them, then the party is the agency operating above the law, and the voters must replace its stooges.

From my perspective, then, Mueller’s job is to tell Congress how the Russians did what they did. If the answer to that question includes behavior by the President that can be called a high crime or misdemeanor, whatever else it can be called, then the President should be impeached. So, I have no problem with Mueller being completely non-committal as to the binary question of whether a particular label attaches to particular acts, provided that he gives a full narrative of the Russian interference, including any acts of commission or omission by the Trump campaign or the Trump administration in connection with that might give Congress reason to impeach.

If I were a betting man, I would bet that Mueller’s report contains narrative summaries that do not require redaction, because they were written for that specific purpose. These summaries would be followed by supporting materials, much of which might indeed need to be redacted. That will leave Mueller citing “unnamed sources,” which will give Trump fits, but Mueller is not fake news, and he will be believed. If that’s the case, the posture of the report regarding criminal charges, and Mr. Barr’s summary thereof, will prove at the end of the day to have been of no real importance.