Washington Post published a piece Thursday fact-checking statements from House lawmakers during former special counsel Robert Mueller's testimony, but they didn't include any Democrats in the piece.
Fact-checkers Salvador Rizzo and Glenn Kessler wrote the piece, titled "Fact-checking lawmakers’ claims during the Mueller hearings." Their article analyzed eight quotes from Republican lawmakers but did not highlight any quotes from Democratic lawmakers, even though several received pushback from Mueller during Wednesday's hearing.
"Over the course of nearly six hours, former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III testified before two House committees. Here’s a guide to some of the claims made by lawmakers that were factually shaky or misleading," they wrote.
Some of the quotes they focused on were from Reps. Mike Johnson (La.) and Louie Gohmert (Texas), who accused Mueller of hiring partisan Democrats to join the Russia investigation. Johnson said Mueller hired people who "donated more than $60,000 to the Hillary Clinton campaign and other Democratic candidates."
The writers pushed back against these Republicans' characterizations, noting how "federal regulations prohibit the Justice Department from considering the political affiliation or political contributions of career appointees, including those appointed to the Special Counsel’s Office."
"All told, five of the 16 known members contributed to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign. An additional six members had made political donations to Democrats over the years," they wrote.
Mueller, however, did not agree with characterizations of multiple House Democrats during the hearing, including Reps. Ted Lieu (Calif.), Terri Sewell (Ala.), and Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.). But the Post didn't fact-check these statements.
"At least three crimes of obstruction of justice by the president occurred," Lieu said. Mueller said he would not subscribe to that view.
Sewell said Trump officials "eagerly sought a foreign adversaries help to win elections." But Mueller said "I can't accept that characterization."
Jeffries said Trump's actions constituted the legal definition of obstruction of justice and must be "held accountable," but after the gavel fell, Mueller broke in to clarify that he did not support Jeffries's charge.