President Donald Trump has provided the special counsel's office with written answers to questions about his knowledge of Russian interference in the 2016 election, his lawyers said Tuesday, marking the first time Trump has directly cooperated with the investigation.

The step is a milestone in a months-long negotiation between Trump's attorneys and special counsel Robert Mueller's team over whether and when the president would sit for an interview, representing the first time the president is known to have described to investigators his knowledge of key moments under scrutiny by prosecutors.

If Mueller finds the answers satisfactory, the responses may also help stave off a potential subpoena fight over Trump's testimony.

The compromise outcome, nearly a year in the making, offers some benefit to both sides. Trump avoids, at least for now, a potentially risky and unpredictable sit-down with prosecutors, while Mueller secures a set of on-the-record statements whose accuracy the president and his lawyers will be expected to stand by for the duration of the investigation.

Associated Press writer Eric Tucker says someone very close to the president could become ensnared in Mueller's probe.

"We expect that there are going to be more indictments," Tucker said. "There's a lot of speculation and buzz in Washington as to who might be next up. We know that there's concern within the White House about President Trump's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr."

POOL

Washington - 20 November 2018

1. President Donald Trump greets White House visitors

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

2. SOUNDBITE: (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

++partially covered with b-roll++

"Today, we have learned that President Donald Trump and his lawyers have turned over to special counsel Robert Mueller written answers to questions about Russian election interference and questions that are related to the topic of whether the campaign colluded with the Kremlin to sway the 2016 U.S. presidential election."

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 21 August 2013

3. STILL of Robert Mueller speaking during an interview at FBI headquarters

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

++partially covered with b-roll++

4. SOUNDBITE: (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

"And so, we can imagine and infer that Mueller wants to understand to what extent did Trump know about the Russian hacking of Democratic emails, to what extent did Trump have any knowledge that his son was going to be attending a meeting at Trump Tower with a Kremlin-connected lawyer. Those are all questions that cut to the heart of the collusion question that Mueller is trying to answer."

POOL

Washington - 20 November 2018

5. Trump and his family walk outside at the White House

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

6. SOUNDBITE: (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

++partially covered with b-roll++

"We expect that there are going to be more indictments. There's a lot of speculation and buzz in Washington as to who might be next up. We know that there's concern within the White House about President Trump's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr. He, of course, attended and helped organize the Trump Tower meeting, which is very significant, because he took that meeting with the expectation of receiving dirt on Hillary Clinton, his father's opponent. We have no indication that he's in legal jeopardy, but we do know that the White House is concerned about that."

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Sun City, Arizona - 1 November 2018

7. STILL of Donald Trump Jr. speaking at a campaign rally for a U.S. Senate candidate

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

8. SOUNDBITE: (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

++fully covered with b-roll++

"The main question that now arises is whether special counsel Mueller would seek a subpoena of President Trump for his testimony in a criminal investigation ... and it is possible that Mueller will receive these answers from Trump and want additional information on the collusion question specifically and say he's not satisfied. If that were to happen, it is possible that he might seek a subpoena and try to get Justice Department approval for that."

POOL

Washington - 20 November 2018

9. Trump walks toward and boards the Marine One helicopter

President Donald Trump has provided the special counsel's office with written answers to questions about his knowledge of Russian interference in the 2016 election, his lawyers said Tuesday, marking the first time Trump has directly cooperated with the investigation.

The step is a milestone in a months-long negotiation between Trump's attorneys and special counsel Robert Mueller's team over whether and when the president would sit for an interview, representing the first time the president is known to have described to investigators his knowledge of key moments under scrutiny by prosecutors.

If Mueller finds the answers satisfactory, the responses may also help stave off a potential subpoena fight over Trump's testimony.

The compromise outcome, nearly a year in the making, offers some benefit to both sides. Trump avoids, at least for now, a potentially risky and unpredictable sit-down with prosecutors, while Mueller secures a set of on-the-record statements whose accuracy the president and his lawyers will be expected to stand by for the duration of the investigation.

Associated Press writer Eric Tucker says someone very close to the president could become ensnared in Mueller's probe.

"We expect that there are going to be more indictments," Tucker said. "There's a lot of speculation and buzz in Washington as to who might be next up. We know that there's concern within the White House about President Trump's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr."

POOL

Washington - 20 November 2018

1. President Donald Trump greets White House visitors

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

"Today, we have learned that President Donald Trump and his lawyers have turned over to special counsel Robert Mueller written answers to questions about Russian election interference and questions that are related to the topic of whether the campaign colluded with the Kremlin to sway the 2016 U.S. presidential election."

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 21 August 2013

3. STILL of Robert Mueller speaking during an interview at FBI headquarters

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

4. SOUNDBITE (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

"These are questions that relate to the time period before President Trump took office. And that's really important. They relate to the central question of collusion. And so, we can imagine and infer that Mueller wants to understand to what extent did Trump know about the Russian hacking of Democratic emails, to what extent did Trump have any knowledge that his son was going to be attending a meeting at Trump Tower with a Kremlin-connected lawyer. Those are all questions that cut to the heart of the collusion question that Mueller is trying to answer."

POOL

Washington - 20 November 2018

5. Trump and his family walk outside at the White House

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

6. SOUNDBITE (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

"We expect that there are going to be more indictments. There's a lot of speculation and buzz in Washington as to who might be next up. We know that there's concern within the White House about President Trump's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr. He, of course, attended and helped organize the Trump Tower meeting, which is very significant, because he took that meeting with the expectation of receiving dirt on Hillary Clinton, his father's opponent. We have no indication that he's in legal jeopardy, but we do know that the White House is concerned about that."

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Sun City, Arizona - 1 November 2018

7. STILL of Donald Trump Jr. speaking at a campaign rally for a U.S. Senate candidate

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Washington - 20 November 2018

8. SOUNDBITE (English) Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer:

"The main question that now arises is whether special counsel Mueller would seek a subpoena of President Trump for his testimony in a criminal investigation. The Supreme Court has never weighed in on that specific question, and it is possible that Mueller will receive these answers from Trump and want additional information on the collusion question specifically and say he's not satisfied. If that were to happen, it is possible that he might seek a subpoena and try to get Justice Department approval for that."

POOL

Washington - 20 November 2018

9. Trump walks toward the Marine One helicopter

The top Democrat on the Senate intelligence panel, Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, would not comment on whether the panel had issued a subpoena to Donald Trump Jr. but said the committee is going to "follow the truth wherever it leads."

Two people familiar with the subpoena who discussed it on condition of anonymity say the Senate intelligence committee has subpoenaed Trump Jr., calling him in to answer questions about his 2017 testimony to the panel as part of its probe into Russian election interference.

It's the first known subpoena of a member of President Donald Trump's immediate family, and a new sign that the Senate panel is continuing with its own Russia investigation even after the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report on the same subject.

It's unclear if Trump Jr. will comply with the subpoena from the committee, which is chaired by Republican Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina.

A person close to the president's eldest son, who requested anonymity to discuss the matter, said Wednesday that Trump has continued to cooperate by producing documents and answering written questions.

Warner, said the committee reserves the right to call witnesses back if they see inconsistencies in testimony. Warner made the comments at a breakfast Thursday hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

Warner said that the intelligence panel also wants to see the underlying evidence in Mueller's report, a request that House lawmakers have also made. Trump on Wednesday invoked the principle of executive privilege over that material, claiming the right to block lawmakers from receiving it.

Warner said his panel knew about "90 to 95 percent" of the Russian contacts mentioned in Mueller's report, and in other areas the committee had "much more extensive" information.

POOL

Washington - 9 May 2019

1. Sen. Mark Warner shakes hands with breakfast participants

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Reporter:

"I want to ask you about the, your committee's subpoena to Donald Trump, Junior. Given that it's highly unlikely that Mr. Trump will appear before your committee in person, what was the point of issuing the subpoena?"

3. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"I'm not going to, as those of you who trail after me on the hill on a regular basis, I'm not going to talk about our process of which witnesses we've called before us, what we will do on a going forward basis. You can ask that as many ways as you'd like and kind of give, stay with the same answer. I would point out that the witnesses we've called early in the investigation, we've always reserved the right to call them back and many of those witnesses, even significant ones, have have come back because I think they feel, my sense is an obligation to allow us to finish this this effort."

4. People eating breakfast

5. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"The remarkable thing is almost every path we've led to, has opened up more people, more contacts, more connections. I guess on a good news, bad news, 90 to 95% of what Mueller had determined in terms of the contacts and the effort of the Russians to interfere in our elections, we had that information and we will have other areas that will frankly be much more extensive than what Mueller had and much more, much more descriptive about the organized ongoing effort."

6. Wide of breakfast table

7. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"One we have to finish our investigation before we write the report and we have to get all of the answers from folks that we've called or want to call back or continuing information. We also I don't know how you would kind of finish that without and I think we, unlike other committees because of our intelligence oversight responsibilities, because this was a counterintelligence investigation, need to see the underlying evidence that we may not have collected that Mueller has. Because if what we're tasked with is is less, a finding on the very a c-word descriptions and more a finding on saying how do we make sure this doesn't happen again? And if we can't get all of the evidence that Mueller had in terms of counterintelligence then we can't make the kind of report and recommendations that we need to make in terms of how we prevent this from happening. (Reporter) Have you asked for that? (Warner) We are, we are, our requests for information are very, very extensive and we've tried to cover all our bases."

8. Reporter listening

The top Democrat on the Senate intelligence panel, Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, would not comment on whether the panel had issued a subpoena to Donald Trump Jr. but said the committee is going to "follow the truth wherever it leads."

Two people familiar with the subpoena who discussed it on condition of anonymity say the Senate intelligence committee has subpoenaed Trump Jr., calling him in to answer questions about his 2017 testimony to the panel as part of its probe into Russian election interference.

It's the first known subpoena of a member of President Donald Trump's immediate family, and a new sign that the Senate panel is continuing with its own Russia investigation even after the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report on the same subject.

It's unclear if Trump Jr. will comply with the subpoena from the committee, which is chaired by Republican Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina.

A person close to the president's eldest son, who requested anonymity to discuss the matter, said Wednesday that Trump has continued to cooperate by producing documents and answering written questions.

Warner, said the committee reserves the right to call witnesses back if they see inconsistencies in testimony. Warner made the comments at a breakfast Thursday hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

Warner said that the intelligence panel also wants to see the underlying evidence in Mueller's report, a request that House lawmakers have also made. Trump on Wednesday invoked the principle of executive privilege over that material, claiming the right to block lawmakers from receiving it.

Warner said his panel knew about "90 to 95 percent" of the Russian contacts mentioned in Mueller's report, and in other areas the committee had "much more extensive" information.

POOL

Washington - 9 May 2019

1. Sen. Mark Warner shakes hands with breakfast participants

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Reporter:

"I want to ask you about the, your committee's subpoena to Donald Trump, Junior. Given that it's highly unlikely that Mr. Trump will appear before your committee in person, what was the point of issuing the subpoena?"

3. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"I'm not going to, as those of you who trail after me on the hill on a regular basis, I'm not going to talk about our process of which witnesses we've called before us, what we will do on a going forward basis. You can ask that as many ways as you'd like and kind of give, stay with the same answer. I would point out that the witnesses we've called early in the investigation, we've always reserved the right to call them back and many of those witnesses, even significant ones, have have come back because I think they feel, my sense is an obligation to allow us to finish this this effort."

4. People eating breakfast

5. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"The remarkable thing is almost every path we've led to, has opened up more people, more contacts, more connections. I guess on a good news, bad news, 90 to 95% of what Mueller had determined in terms of the contacts and the effort of the Russians to interfere in our elections, we had that information and we will have other areas that will frankly be much more extensive than what Mueller had and much more, much more descriptive about the organized ongoing effort."

6. Wide of breakfast table

7. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"One we have to finish our investigation before we write the report and we have to get all of the answers from folks that we've called or want to call back or continuing information. We also I don't know how you would kind of finish that without and I think we, unlike other committees because of our intelligence oversight responsibilities, because this was a counterintelligence investigation, need to see the underlying evidence that we may not have collected that Mueller has. Because if what we're tasked with is is less, a finding on the very a c-word descriptions and more a finding on saying how do we make sure this doesn't happen again? And if we can't get all of the evidence that Mueller had in terms of counterintelligence then we can't make the kind of report and recommendations that we need to make in terms of how we prevent this from happening. (Reporter) Have you asked for that? (Warner) We are, we are, our requests for information are very, very extensive and we've tried to cover all our bases."

8. Reporter listening

FOR CLEAN VERSION SEE STORY NUMBER: apus116741

The top Democrat on the Senate intelligence panel, Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, would not comment on whether the panel had issued a subpoena to Donald Trump Jr. but said the committee is going to "follow the truth wherever it leads."

Two people familiar with the subpoena who discussed it on condition of anonymity say the Senate intelligence committee has subpoenaed Trump Jr., calling him in to answer questions about his 2017 testimony to the panel as part of its probe into Russian election interference.

It's the first known subpoena of a member of President Donald Trump's immediate family, and a new sign that the Senate panel is continuing with its own Russia investigation even after the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report on the same subject.

It's unclear if Trump Jr. will comply with the subpoena from the committee, which is chaired by Republican Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina.

A person close to the president's eldest son, who requested anonymity to discuss the matter, said Wednesday that Trump has continued to cooperate by producing documents and answering written questions.

Warner, said the committee reserves the right to call witnesses back if they see inconsistencies in testimony. Warner made the comments at a breakfast Thursday hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

Warner said that the intelligence panel also wants to see the underlying evidence in Mueller's report, a request that House lawmakers have also made. Trump on Wednesday invoked the principle of executive privilege over that material, claiming the right to block lawmakers from receiving it.

Warner said his panel knew about "90 to 95 percent" of the Russian contacts mentioned in Mueller's report, and in other areas the committee had "much more extensive" information.

POOL

Washington - 9 May 2019

1. SOUNDBITE (English) Reporter:

"I want to ask you about the your committee's subpoena to Donald Trump, Junior. Given that it's highly unlikely that Mr. Trump will appear before your committee in person, what was the point of issuing the subpoena?"

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"I'm not going to--as those of you who trail after me on the hill on a regular basis,  I'm not going to talk about our process of which witnesses we've called before us, what we will do on a going forward basis. You can ask that as many ways as you'd like and kind of give, stay with the same answer. I would point out that the witnesses we've called early in the investigation, we've always reserved the right to call them back and many of those witnesses, even significant ones, have have come back because I think they feel, my sense is an obligation to allow us to finish this this effort."

++WHITE FLASH BETWEEN SOUNDBITES++

3. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Mark Warner, (D) Virginia:

"The remarkable thing is almost every path we've led to, has opened up more people, more contacts, more connections. I guess on a good news, bad news, 90 to 95% of what Mueller had determined in terms of the contacts and the effort of the Russians to interfere in our elections, we had that information and we will have other areas that will frankly be much more extensive than what Mueller had and much more, much more descriptive about the organized ongoing effort."