Robert Mueller III has agreed to testify publicly on July 17 at the U.S. House Judiciary and Intelligence committees about his two-year assignment as the special counsel leading the Russia investigation, two Democratic leaders said late Tuesday.

Mueller had expressed an unwillingness to appear in Congress to talk about his role leading the investigation and prosecution team investigating Russia's interference in the 2016 election and President Trump's alleged efforts to derail the probe.

The former Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr partner and FBI director said last month that the 448-page report his office produced, showing the Trump campaign's connections to Russian actors and alleged obstructive acts taken by the president, “speaks for itself.”

“Any testimony from this office would not go beyond our report,” Mueller said in May at a press conference at Main Justice. “It contains our findings and analysis, and the reasons for the decisions we made.”

Democratic lawmakers for weeks had called for Mueller to testify. Appearing on Rachel Maddow's MSNBC program on Tuesday night, U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-California, chairman of the Intelligence Committee, described the command for Mueller's public testimony as not a “friendly subpoena.”

Schiff and U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-New York, chairman of the judiciary committee, said in a statement Tuesday: “Americans have demanded to hear directly from the Special Counsel so they can understand what he and his team examined, uncovered, and determined about Russia's attack on our democracy, the Trump campaign's acceptance and use of that help, and President Trump and his associates' obstruction of the investigation into that attack.”

They added: “We look forward to hearing his testimony, as do all Americans.”

Mueller's report did not recommend criminal charges against Trump, but the special counsel did not exonerate the president.

Mueller pointed to longstanding Justice Department policy against charging a sitting president in declining to say one way or the other whether Trump committed obstruction of justice. William Barr, the U.S. attorney general, later said the actions Mueller described in the report did not amount to obstruction.