Congress has long agreed to wait for special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia report before taking up its issues in earnest. That time is here. A few central principles should guide legislators and the executive branch going forward:

First, full transparency. Mueller's newly delivered report must be made public as soon as possible. Second, Congress should ignore the din of distraction from President Donald Trump, with his false declarations that the probe has exonerated him. Trump contradicted himself Sunday by denouncing the investigation as illegitimate while praising its findings.

Most importantly, Republicans must be willing to follow the inquiry wherever it goes — and Democrats must be ready to acknowledge where it doesn't.

Mueller was assigned in May 2017 to investigate whether Trump's presidential campaign colluded with Russia in its meddling in the 2016 election. Despite Trump's insistence that no collusion occurred, it was always a fair question.

During the campaign, Trump publicly called on Russia to hack Hillary Clinton's emails — and Russia did. Trump's campaign met with a Kremlin-linked lawyer seeking dirt on Clinton, and shared polling data with Russian intelligence. Trump's disturbing habit of siding with Russian leader Vladimir Putin over America's allies and U.S. intelligence added weight to the collusion question.

Mueller's voluminous report remains secret, but Attorney General William Barr wrote in a short summary that Mueller didn't find proof of collusion. Congress must review the evidence, but given the widely expressed respect for Mueller's integrity and professionalism, overcoming his conclusion would require something like a new smoking gun. Democrats who strain to claim such evidence if it doesn't exist will be seen as cravenly partisan, and rightly so.

Obstruction of justice is another matter. Mueller's report doesn't conclude that Trump did that, but it "also does not exonerate him." It's an ironic stance, given that Mueller's own appointment occurred because Trump admitted he fired FBI Director James Comey to end the FBI's Russia investigation — seemingly a textbook definition of obstruction.

Barr doesn't agree. Since Mueller punted on the issue, it was left to Barr to make the call. Barr has declared there is no evidence of obstruction — hardly shocking considering he's a recent Trump appointee. Barr's critics feared he was chosen as attorney general specifically because of a memo he wrote last year arguing that Mueller shouldn't even be allowed to investigate possible obstruction. Given that starting point, Barr's conclusion on that issue should mean close to nothing.

That Trump and his surrogates are now waving around their own attorney general's words as if that's the final word is dishonest and irresponsible. Congress must ignore these distractions and dig into the substance of Mueller's report with the same seriousness and sobriety with which it was compiled. Too many questions remain to justify keeping the public in the dark.

REPRINTED FROM THE ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH