The Democratic and Republican leaders of the House Judiciary Committee agree: Robert Mueller must testify about his nearly two-year inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Where Judiciary Chair Jerry Nadler of New York and ranking GOP member Doug Collins of Georgia diverge is on the timing.
Collins released a letter to Nadler Monday urging that Mueller testify "without delay." If Mueller's testimony is "inevitable," as Nadler has said, Collins would clearly like that testimony to take place before Democrats have all the information they need to ask informed questions. One major piece of that information includes the grand jury material Attorney General William Barr has promised to redact from Mueller's report before providing it to Congress.
Nadler, however, isn't about to rush the process to the detriment of transparency. "In order to ask Special Counsel Mueller the right questions, the Committee must receive the Special Counsel’s full report and hear from Attorney General Barr about that report on May 2," Nadler wrote in a Monday tweet. "We look forward to hearing from Mr. Mueller at the appropriate time."
Nadler has a subpoena in his hip pocket to seek the release of the full Mueller report. Barr is expected to release his redacted version of the report sometime within the next week or so. Judiciary Democrats are clearly waiting to see how much and which parts of that report will be blacked out before they dive headlong into questioning the author of that report. Asking uninformed questions of Mueller would be a fool's errand—exactly what Collins is hoping for.