Tag: GOP House

House panel clears release of Democrats’ rebuttal to GOP memo, forcing showdown with Trump

The following article by Karoun Demirjian and Devlin Barrett was posted on the Washington Post website February 5, 2018:

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) on Feb. 5 said the House Intelligence Committee voted to release Democrats’ response to a GOP memo alleging surveillance abuses. (The Washington Post)

The House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously Monday to release a Democratic rebuttal to GOP accusations that the FBI misled a secret surveillance court. President Trump now has five days to decide whether the information will become public.

The vote means the political rancor roiling Congress is likely to continue. Each party has accused the other of misrepresenting sensitive intelligence surrounding the ongoing probe into whether any Trump associates coordinated with Russia to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. Continue reading “House panel clears release of Democrats’ rebuttal to GOP memo, forcing showdown with Trump”

Lawmakers dispute ‘vindication’ for Trump in Intel memo

The following article by Mallory Shelbourne was posted on the Hill website February 4, 2018:

Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) said: “I think it is fair to ask the deputy attorney general, ‘What did you know at the time you signed one of the applications?'” Credit: AP Photo

Democrats on Sunday argued that the release of a controversial memo accusing the Justice Department of surveillance abuses does not vindicate President Trump in the Russia investigation — and Republicans are also avoiding declarations of Trump’s exoneration.

Trump made the claim that the memo “totally vindicates” him in the Russia investigation in a Saturday tweet following the memo’s release the day before.

But Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas), a member of the House Intelligence Committee, told ABC on Sunday that he doesn’t believe the memo vindicates Trump. Several other Republicans argued that the memo was not about the ongoing investigation. Continue reading “Lawmakers dispute ‘vindication’ for Trump in Intel memo”

Paul Ryan celebrated the tax cut with a tweet about a secretary saving $1.50 a week

The following article by Avi Selk was posted on the Washington Post website February 4, 2018:

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) touted the new GOP tax reform law and outlined his party’s agenda ahead of the new year. (Reuters)

Never mind all the Democrats who call the GOP’s tax bill a deficit-busting giveaway to the rich; House Speaker Paul D. Ryan has been enthusiastically promoting it as a middle-class tax windfall.

He’s been coaching other Republican lawmakers to sell the $1.5 trillion tax cut to voters, and telling people on Twitter to check their paychecks for wage hikes. The bill — which was deeply unpopular when it passed along party lines in December — is now breaking even in a new opinion poll. Continue reading “Paul Ryan celebrated the tax cut with a tweet about a secretary saving $1.50 a week”

Kashyap Patel, Main Author of Secret Memo, Is No Stranger to Quarrels By

The following article by Katie Rogers and Matthew Rosenberg was posted on the New York TImes website February 2, 2018:

Kashyap Patel in a photograph posted in 2014.

WASHINGTON — Kashyap Patel is a lawyer who has sometimes run afoul of the rules.

As a lawyer in Florida, Mr. Patel, 37, entered and then dropped out of a charity bachelor auction featuring some colleagues after a blogger pointed out that his license to practice in the state appeared out of date. In 2016, as a counterterrorism prosecutor for the Justice Department, he was berated by a federal judge who then issued an “Order on Ineptitude” directed at the entire agency. And over the summer, in a trip arranged outside official channels, he traveled to London, where he tried unsuccessfully to meet with Christopher Steele, the author of the dossier that purported to details links between the Trump campaign and Russia, according to multiple people with knowledge of the trip. Continue reading “Kashyap Patel, Main Author of Secret Memo, Is No Stranger to Quarrels By”

The Only Thing the Nunes Memo Proves is That It was Massively Overhyped

The following article by Abigail Tracy was posted on the Vanity Fair website February 2, 2018:

Trump miscalculated, badly, by advocating to #ReleaseTheMemo. Will it backfire?

Credit: Olivier Douliery/Pool/Bloomberg

The much-anticipated Nunes memo, released Friday after weeks of feverish build-up on the far-right, appears to be a dud. The declassified report accuses a group of current and former Justice Department and F.B.I. officials—including James Comey, his former deputy Andrew McCabe, and current Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein—of approving applications to surveil Trump campaign adviser Carter Page without disclosing that ex-British intelligence spy Christopher Steele, who compiled an intelligence dossier used in the warrant, was paid by Democratic sources and harbored anti-Trump bias. The most damning piece of evidence is the allegation that McCabe had testified in December that the warrant would not have been sought without the dossier, although two sources subsequently told The Daily Beast that particular claim is not true. Nowhere in the four-page memo is it noted that Page had already been on the F.B.I.’s radar, after he was targeted for recruitment by Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service years earlier. Continue reading “The Only Thing the Nunes Memo Proves is That It was Massively Overhyped”

A process that tarnishes the House

The following commentary from the Editorial Board of the Washington Post was posted on their website February 1, 2018:

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.). (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)

“WHAT THIS is not is an indictment of our institutions, of our justice system,” House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) said Thursday about the now infamous “Nunes memo.” “It does not impugn the Mueller investigation or the deputy attorney general,” the speaker insisted. Is this cynicism or naivete?

Discrediting law enforcement is the memo’s transparent purpose and why it has been embraced by President Trump. Written mainly by the staff of Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the loose-cannon chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the memo reportedly makes the case that the FBI abused spying authorities as it sought permission to surveil a former Trump adviser. The Justice Department called its potential release, which Mr. Trump reportedly intends to approve, “extraordinarily reckless.” The FBI released its own startling public statement citing “grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy.” Adam Schiff (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, wrote in a Post op-ed that the Nunes memo “cherry-picks facts, ignores others and smears the FBI and the Justice Department.” Continue reading “A process that tarnishes the House”

Fired FBI Director Comey Slams GOP Memo: ‘That’s It?”

The following article by Eric Tucker and Chad Day was posted on the Associated Press website February 2, 2018:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former FBI Director James Comey scorned the memo that was released by House Republicans after being declassified Friday by President Donald Trump, saying it doesn’t add up to much. “That’s it?” Comey said on Twitter.

“Dishonest and misleading memo wrecked the House intel committee, destroyed trust with Intelligence Community, damaged relationship with FISA court, and inexcusably exposed classified investigation of an American citizen. For what?” Comey wrote, adding: “DOJ & FBI must keep doing their jobs.” Continue reading “Fired FBI Director Comey Slams GOP Memo: ‘That’s It?””

Republicans vote to release memo alleging FBI missteps in surveillance of Trump campaign operative

The following article by Karoun Demirjian and Devlin Barrett was posted on the Washington Post website January 29, 2018:

Created by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the four-page memo is critical of the Justice Department and the FBI’s handling of the Russia investigation. (Victoria Walker/The Washington Post)

The House Intelligence Committee voted Monday to release a memo detailing alleged surveillance abuses by the FBI and the Justice Department, escalating a political fight between conservatives and the nation’s intelligence agencies.

The vote, which proceeded along party lines in the Republican-controlled committee, means that President Trump now has up to five days to review the material and decide whether to keep it secret, though he could agree to the release anytime before that deadline. If he does nothing, the committee can release the memo publicly. Continue reading “Republicans vote to release memo alleging FBI missteps in surveillance of Trump campaign operative”

House GOP intensifies assault on Mueller probe

The following article by Katie Bo WIlliams was posted on the Hill website January 6, 2018:

© Getty Images

House Republicans are intensifying a multipronged assault to chip away at special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the U.S. election.

A vocal group of conservative members has for weeks blitzed the airwaves decrying bias in Mueller’s investigation and on Thursday, two prominent members called for Attorney General Jeff Sessions to step down from the Department of Justice (DOJ) — a resignation that could clear the way for the special counsel’s dismissal.

On Wednesday, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), secured the backing of Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to enforce a swath of subpoenas probing the Justice Department’s use of the so-called Steele dossier in the probe. Continue reading “House GOP intensifies assault on Mueller probe”

Top FBI, DOJ officials huddle with Ryan to talk dossier

The following article by Karoun Demirjian and Matt Zapotosky was posted on the Washington Post website January 4, 2018:

Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, left, leaves the Capitol in Washington on Wednesday after a meeting with House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.). (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Top federal law enforcement officials huddled with House Speaker Paul D. Ryan on Wednesday afternoon to discuss a request from congressional investigators for documents related to a dossier alleging connections between President Trump and Russia, according to people familiar with the meeting, and hours later, a deal was apparently reached.

Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher A. Wray requested the meeting, according to Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong. A spokeswoman for the Justice Department declined to comment. Continue reading “Top FBI, DOJ officials huddle with Ryan to talk dossier”