Senate Judiciary Committee Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) told the
committee's chairman, Sen. Chuck Grassley, in a letter Friday that he does not
think the panel is "presently on a path" to help defend against
potential Russian interference in the 2018 midterm elections — and
beyond.
That is because the committee is elevating "peripheral
issues," Whitehouse said, such as Hillary Clinton's relationship with the
opposition research firm Fusion GPS.
Fusion hired a former British spy during the campaign to investigate President Donald Trump's ties to Russia.
Fusion hired a former British spy during the campaign to investigate President Donald Trump's ties to Russia.
Though Senator Grassley was not named
in the article pointed out by Whitehouse, he IS one of the Senators currently
calling for a second Special Counsel to investigate Hillary's connection to
Fusion GPS and relationship with Russia.
Grassley also called the insinuation by Whitehouse that a Senator had been "nudged" by the White House to be "baseless."
Which is exactly how you would expect
somebody who was nudged by the White House to respond.
And of course the House Intelligence
Committee, supposedly also investigating the Russian interference, has
also wandered way off target:
The House Intelligence Committee has only issued one subpoena to
a financial institution in the 11 months since it opened its investigation into
Russia's election interference and potential collusion between President Donald
Trump's campaign team and Moscow.
The subpoena wasn't to Deutsche Bank — which was fined last year
over its involvement in a major Russian money-laundering scheme and has been
the Trump family's bank of choice for decades. Rather, the subpoena was
delivered to the primary bank for the Washington, DC-based opposition research
firm Fusion GPS.
Republican Rep. Devin Nunes, the committee's chairman, stepped
aside from the Russia probe in April amid an ethics investigation into whether
he'd disclosed classified information in a press conference. But he was cleared
earlier this month, and has spearheaded a months-long investigation into who
paid Fusion for its work during the 2016 election.
Sounds like the Republicans in
Washington are about to go all Benghazi again.