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The two leading members on the House Intel Committee had ‘something of a bromance.’ And then came the Russia probe.

Years ago, House Speaker Tip O’Neil proposed a Permanent Select Committee Intelligence Committee (HPSCI). Many of his colleagues were wary. Tip promised that it would be totally nonpartisan that there would be ‘nothing partisan about its deliberations. But as S.E. Hinton would say that was then this is now

Since then we’ve had 9/11, and then Benghazi-which was pursued on a very partisan basis by Republicans. Then there was the Trump-Russia probe.

Natasha Bertrand:

“The committee’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election so divided the panel’s Republicans and Democrats that the chairman considered building a physical wall between staffers. In dueling memos, members clamored to declassify information about one of the intelligence community’s most sensitive national security tools. And Democrats claim the probe ended prematurely, with key witnesses and lines of inquiry—such as the possibility that Russia holds financial leverage over the president—left unpursued, a charge Republicans adamantly deny.”

How do they deny it adamantly-it’s a simple matter of fact-they didn’t inquire into Russian financial leverage over Herr Trump reasoning that somehow it’s out of bounds-but they DID inquire into the finances of: Glen Simpson.

“Earlier this month, with a vote to send their conclusions to the intelligence community to declassify and release, Republicans officially ended the panel’s year-long investigation into Russia’s election interference. No Democrats voted to release the GOP report, which the committee’s ranking member, Adam Schiff, condemned as partisan and characterized as a “fundamentally unserious effort.” “It’s Cat in the Hat,” said Democratic Representative Eric Swalwell, referring to the famous children’s book. “Simple. An embarrassment.” Republican Representative Mike Conaway, who took the lead on the probe last April, said the Democrats were on “a fishing expedition” with no end in sight. “We’ve found no evidence of collusion,” he told reporters. Just “some bad judgment.”

No end in sight? How about simply interviewing some of the most important witnesses regarding possible collusion from the Trump campaign-Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and George Papadopoulos?

They had 11 investigations into Benghazi and Whitewater-which led to Monica Lewinsky-went on for most of Bill Clinton’s term in Office.

The embarrassing and unserious effort by the GOP-claimed to have found no evidence of collusion but on the other hand they didn’t actually look for it where there was any likelihood of success.

“The House Intelligence Committee has not always been a model of bipartisanship and cooperation—its Senate counterpart has traditionally been far more unified, mostly by virtue of longer term limits and different rules. But the degree to which the committee’s infighting and dysfunction has spilled into public view over the last year—through leaks, television appearances, and press conferences—has been remarkable. And it is a case study in how Russia’s election interference has only deepened divisions among the political leaders tasked with responding to it.”

But the divisions between the two parties on the Committee is not hard to figure out; as Schiff says, clearly the two sides had different objectives going in:

“…I viewed our mission as getting to the truth of what the Russians did, the chairman viewed his mission as protecting the president…”

A few months back Schiff offered a very interesting anecdote: when Comey spoke before them in March, 2017-where he announced for the first time that there was an investigation into Russian intefrerence-and wether the Trump campaign colluded-in the days and weeks after, the Republicans claimed that that was a terrible day. Why was it so bad? Clearly because Herr Trump was publicly exposed and embarrassed.

The GOP was more concerned about saving him from future embarrassment than getting at the truth of what happened in that election. Certainly Nunes didn’t find this a difficult choice-the integrity of our election system on the one hand and protecting so-called ‘President Trump’ on the other.

But any chance of cooperation between the parties ended with Nune’s infamous ‘Midnight Run’

Schiff, as well as current and former staffers who spoke to me for this article—several off the record and most on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press either by the panel or by their current employers—identified a particular tipping point: Republican Chairman Devin Nunes’s late-night excursion to the White House last spring. That excursion, referred to as “the Midnight Run” among committee members and staff—triggered a chain of events that left Schiff and Nunes, as well as their respective staffs, profoundly at odds, these people said. “They used to get on really well before the Midnight Run,” said a current aide, referring to Schiff and Nunes. At least one outlet described their relationship as “something of a bromance.” Now, Nunes tweets regularly about “fake news,” “leaks from Congress,” and Democrats’ obsession with “Russia conspiracy theories.” In a recent Fox News appearance, he said he has “no faith” in Special Counsel Robert Mueller because he has not investigated the “felony” leaks coming from the intelligence community. It is not clear how Nunes knows what Mueller is or is not investigating. His spokesman did not return a request for comment.

While Nunes has worked so hard to undermine the Russia probe he was gung ho in pursuing Benghazi-which was a fake scandal in any case.

“On March 4, 2017, Trump claimed that Barack Obama wiretapped Trump Tower during the election. The claim faced significant pushback, including from members of Nunes’s own party who said they had seen no evidence of any illegal wiretapping.”

“Weeks later, the White House took Trump’s claim in a slightly different direction, with at least one official—who has never been publicly identified—telling Nunes in a late-night, private briefing on the White House grounds that certain Obama advisers had improperly “unmasked” Trump transition officials’ identities in classified intelligence reports. Schiff later described the episode as a “peculiar midnight run” because Nunes had been traveling home from a night out when he dashed out of the Uber he’d been sharing with a staffer and resurfaced at the White House, where he was told about the unmaskings. Bypassing his committee colleagues, Nunes briefed House Speaker Paul Ryan on the intelligence the next day. He then held a press conference about it, and later briefed the president directly. “I had a duty and obligation to tell [Trump] because, as you know, he’s taking a lot of heat in the news media,” Nunes said later. He insisted that he couldn’t have brought the documents back to the Capitol because it would have jeopardized their “proper chain of custody.”

“Was it shocking? Yeah, big-time,” said the former high-level committee staffer. “It was also shocking to his staff.” Nunes’s unusual decision to circumvent his committee fueled speculation that the White House had orchestrated a stunt to distract the press from the recent revelation—made by former FBI Director James Comey at an open House Intelligence Committee hearing—that the bureau was investigating potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Moscow. “They were talking all the time,” said the staffer who left last year, referring to Trump and Nunes, who served as an adviser on Trump’s transition team. “Nunes was still helping Trump staff the White House.”

Then Nunes begun tabling important hearings for the Russia probe:

“Nunes subsequently tabled a critical hearing scheduled for March 28, 2017, in which former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former CIA Director John Brennan and former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates were scheduled to testify. The blowback was swift: Both Democrats and some Republicans were dismayed by the chairman’s actions, saying that by going to the White House grounds he had delegitimized the investigation. Republican Representative Walter Jones of North Carolina asked Nunes to recuse himself from the investigation, but Ryan resisted those calls, calling them “politics.”

Paul Ryan also has chosen to put saving Trump political embarrassment over getting to the truth of Russia and following the facts where ever they lead.

“Paul Ryan is remarkably at the heart of all of this,” said the committee staffer who left last year. Eoyang agreed, noting that Ryan “is the sole person who controls Devin Nunes’s fate as chair. He could ask Nunes to go and replace him at any moment.” Ryan, who reappointed Nunes after succeeding former Speaker John Boehner, has shown little interest in taking up concerns about the chairman’s unusual methods, said the Democratic staffer who left last year. A spokeswoman for Ryan, AshLee Strong, vigorously denied that Ryan has been disengaged on intelligence committee issues. “This partisan assertion is not only slanderous but ludicrous and false. The speaker has been deeply dedicated to these issues since taking the office and insists on weekly briefings from the IC.”

I think it’s worse than that-I don’t think Ryan’s been inattentive; rather he feigns inattentiveness to feign his complicity.

It’s clear that after the embarrassment Trump suffered in Comey’s March testimony the GOP was determined to make sure it doesn’t happen again-the hearings have been scaled back affairs behind closed doors where many important witnesses weren’t called, and those who were weren’t followed up with; no effort was made to see their communications-emails, phone, etc-to attempt to verify their testimony.

Now after a closed door hearing, the GOP expects to hand over a ‘totally innocent’ verdict on Herr Trump like a fait accompli and that the American people will accept it. There is acute public interest in this case and this is not going to fly.

Yes, thank goodness, Mueller is on the case, but there’s a Congressional piece to this too-as there was in Watergate alongside Leon Jaworski. At the end of the day the decision Americans face on Trump-Russia will be mostly political not just legal which is why we need a Democratic Congress ASAP.

UPDATE: Over a year later-today is May 26, 2019 and we now have the Democratic Congress. While we no longer have a Congress and HSPCI dedicated to defending ‘President Trump’ there have been understandable concern if the Dems are being aggressive enough. There is the raging impeachment debate which saw many more rank and file Dems come out for in the last week-including the majority of House Judiciary Dems

There have been several big court victories for the House Dems over the past week suggesting the law is n their side in most of these fights-though there is still the issue of timing. We’ve seen the courts move expeditiously on the subject of Trump’s finances but it still arguable the Democrats should officially open an impeachment inquiry to forestall Herr Trump running out the clock.

Certainly you have to feel pretty confident with Schiff minding the store at HPSCI. Just last week his threat to hold Coverup AG Barr in contempt-on top of the House Judiciary’s vote to hold him in contempt-caused Barr to reconsider and has now agreed to release a lot more of the underlying counterintelligence and foreign intelligence evidence on Trump-Russia.

The now minority GOP HSPCI  members rather laughably demanded Schiff step down in late March which led to Schiff’s viral speech you might think it’s ok….

FWIW-and I don’t know that it’s worth that much-Mike Conaway later seemed to change his tune.

How long will that go on for? Certainly not holding my breath.

I mean the Dems could have with much greater Justice demanded Nunes step down but they didn’t and now as usual the Dems are showing themselves to be the party of restraint and have declined to investigate him. 

Nor is it simply a question of things Nunes did in the rearview mirror-just recently he huddled with Coverup AG Barr to urge him to investigate the investigators in Trump-Russia. 

He probably didn’t have to push very hard to convince Barr who Trump has now handed unprecedented powers to declassify any intelligence secrets regarding the Russia probe that they think will help Trump politically.

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October 28, 2016: a Day That Will Live in Infamy Copyright © by . All Rights Reserved.

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