Speaker Paul Ryan is out there today saying, “We Need to Look at the Facts” on Trump and Comey.
Lindsey Graham agrees, so and his Democratic counterpart are trying to get some:
Judiciary Committee Leaders Seek Copies of Reported Comey Memos and Possible Trump Tapes
WASHINGTON – Senate Judiciary Crime and Terrorism Subcommittee Chairman Lindsey Graham and Ranking Member Sheldon Whitehouse, along with Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein, today called on the FBI to provide all memos relating to former FBI Director Comey’s interactions with his superiors in both the Trump and Obama administrations. They also called on the White House to provide records of interactions with former Director Comey, including any audio recordings.
The requests follow news reports that Comey authored internal memos following meetings and conversations with President Trump in order to document what he perceived to be improper behavior by the President with respect to ongoing investigations at the FBI. The president implied in a tweet last week that the White House may have recordings of interactions with Comey.
In a letter to Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, the Judiciary Committee leaders request “all such memos, if they exist, that Mr. Comey created memorializing interactions he had with Presidents Trump and Obama, Attorneys General Sessions and Lynch, and Deputy Attorneys General Rosenstein, Boente, and Yates regarding the investigations of Trump associates’ alleged connections with Russia or the Clinton email investigation.”
The letter from the senators to White House Counsel Donald McGahn, seeks “all White House records memorializing interactions with Mr. Comey relating to the FBI’s investigation of alleged ties between President Trump’s associates and Russia, or the Clinton email investigation, including all audio recordings, transcripts, notes, summaries, or memoranda.”
The Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism, led by Chairman Graham and Ranking Member Whitehouse, is currently conducting an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Committee leadership expects to hold a hearing on these matters.
Full text of both letters follows.
May 17, 2017
VIA ELECTRONIC TRANSMISSION
The Honorable Andrew McCabe
Acting Director
Federal Bureau of Investigation
935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20535
Dear Acting Director McCabe:
Yesterday, the New York Times reported that former Director Comey created memos regarding his interactions with President Trump, “a paper trail Mr. Comey created documenting what he perceived as the president’s improper efforts to influence an ongoing investigation.” The article stated that “Mr. Comey created similar memos – including some that are classified – about every phone call and meeting he had with the president.” More generally, the article stated “Mr. Comey was known among his closet advisers to document conversations that he believed would later be called into question.” Presumably, this means that Mr. Comey created similar memoranda relating to other controversial conversations, whether with officials in the current administration or the prior one.
We are writing to request that the FBI provide the Committee with all such memos, if they exist, that Mr. Comey created memorializing interactions he had with Presidents Trump and Obama, Attorneys General Sessions and Lynch, and Deputy Attorneys General Rosenstein, Boente, and Yates regarding the investigations of Trump associates’ alleged connections with Russia or the Clinton email investigation. Please provide these documents by no later than May 24, 2017.
We anticipate that some of these documents may be classified, some may not, and others may contain both classified and unclassified information. Please deliver any documents containing classified information to the Office of Senate Security and provide all unclassified documents directly to the Committee. If you have any specific requests with regard to the Committee’s handling of unclassified material, please raise those with us in advance.
Thank you for your prompt attention to this important matter. If you have any questions, please contact Patrick Davis of Chairman Grassley’s staff at (202) 224-5225, Heather Sawyer of Ranking Member Feinstein’s staff at (202) 224-7703, Lee Holmes of Chairman Graham’s staff at (202) 224-5972, or Lara Quint of Ranking Member Whitehouse’s staff at (202) 224-2921.
Sincerely,
Charles E. Grassley Dianne Feinstein
Chairman Ranking Member
Committee on the Judiciary Committee on the JudiciaryLindsey Graham Sheldon Whitehouse
Chairman Ranking Member
Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism
Committee on the Judiciary Committee on the Judiciary
May 17, 2017
VIA ELECTRONIC TRANSMISSION
The Honorable Donald McGahn
White House Counsel
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr.McGahn:
Yesterday, the New York Times reported that former FBI Director Comey memorialized the content of his phone calls and meetings with President Trump in a series of internal memoranda. In particular, the article alleged that Mr. Comey had memorialized a conversation with the President in which the President made statements that have been interpreted as asking the FBI to clear Mr. Flynn of alleged wrongdoing. The article noted that Mr. Comey was known among his closet advisers to document conversations that he believed would later be called into question. Last week, the President tweeted a message implying that the White House may have audio recordings of interactions with Mr. Comey.
The Judiciary Committee has already written to the FBI requesting all memos, if they exist, that Mr. Comey created memorializing interactions he had with Presidents Trump and Obama, Attorneys General Sessions and Lynch, and Deputy Attorneys General Rosenstein, Boente, and Yates regarding the investigations of Trump associates’ alleged connections with Russia or the Clinton email investigation. In order for the Committee to fully assess these allegations, we are also asking that the White House please provide the Committee all White House records memorializing interactions with Mr. Comey relating to the FBI’s investigation of alleged ties between President Trump’s associates and Russia, or the Clinton email investigation, including all audio recordings, transcripts, notes, summaries, and memoranda. To the extent the prior administration’s records of interactions with Mr. Comey about these topics may now be housed at the National Archives or elsewhere, we ask that you make the relevant personnel there aware of the request and authorize them to release the records to the Committee.
Please provide the records by May 24, 2017. Thank you for your prompt attention to this important matter. If you have any questions, please contact Patrick Davis of Chairman Grassley’s staff at (202) 224-5225, Heather Sawyer of Ranking Member Feinstein’s staff at (202) 224-7703, Lee Holmes of Chairman Graham’s staff at (202) 224-5972, or Lara Quint of Ranking Member Whitehouse’s staff at (202) 224-2921.
Sincerely,
Charles E. Grassley Dianne Feinstein
Chairman Ranking Member
Committee on the Judiciary Committee on the JudiciaryLindsey Graham Sheldon Whitehouse
Chairman Ranking Member
Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism
Committee on the Judiciary Committee on the Judiciary
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Dianne Feinstein and Lindsey Graham… that tells me all I need to know.
Yes, it does. It tells you this is a bipartisan investigation.
More evidence of bipartisanship (emphasis added, obviously):
We are writing to request that the FBI provide the Committee with all such memos, if they exist, that Mr. Comey created memorializing interactions he had with Presidents Trump and Obama, Attorneys General Sessions and Lynch, and Deputy Attorneys General Rosenstein, Boente, and Yates regarding the investigations of Trump associates’ alleged connections with Russia or the Clinton email investigation.
Might as well cover all the bases…
He isn’t just covering all the bases in a nonpartisan way. He has now said that since Mueller is taking on the Trump investigation the Senate can return its attention to investigating Hillary Clinton’s emails. Lord have mercy. Have they not beaten that horse to an indistinguishable mass of flesh and blood, without finding anything criminally actionable? Does he have any reason to argue that further investigation serves the public interest, either with respect to Clinton herself or to the general concept of whether public officials should use private email servers? Does he care that an infinitely prolonged partisan prosecution of an ex-public official without evidence of criminal activity will amplify the sense that running for national office is insane, because inflamed partisans will come after you until you are in your grave over things that have long since had all the attention they deserve? If Lindsey Graham does reopen that investigation, then we should look into Article 25 proceedings for senators.
I don’t disagree. Comey settled that question, and then some…
By “cover all the bases,” I meant that some things relevant to the Russia investigation happened during the Obama years, and some since Trump took office, and all should be examined…
Yep. The walls are slowly closing in. The Realclearpolitics POTUS approval average dipped below 40% today. My prediction – if it hits 35% the Republicans in congress start to bail in mass. With the DOW shedding 370 points and Ford laying off 10% of white collar workers the economy, which until now has buttressed Trump’s base, is starting to show cracks. Recession dooms Trump and the Trumpublican Party. This has all the looks of the perfect political storm. Where does it end? Fasten your belts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride!
You need to look more closely at those numbers.
Trump won’t be in REAL trouble until Republicans see his base deserting him. That hasn’t yet happened, not in any numbers that would reassure the GOP members who are terrified of those people.
And you won’t see any moves toward impeachment or invoking the 25th Amendment until the GOP knows those people won’t come after them in their next primaries.
Remember, Trump has ALWAYS been unpopular with most voters. But the ones that count, in terms of the calculations of the Republicans who control the government, are the ones who vote in GOP primaries — or rather, the subset of those people who have loved Trump from the start…
35% is my arbitrary metric that shows his base deserting him. It may be lower but at some point the less crazy members of the GOP become more concerned with non-Trump voters who could hold their nose and vote Dem or not vote at all in a general election. 40% is still too high to consider that calculus. Apparently love of country doesn’t come into play for Republicans anymore.
According to a report on MSNBC, Washington Republicans believe that the key percentage is 80% — when Trump’s support among Republicans drops below 80%, Senators and House members will start deserting him.
REALLY? That sounds uncharacteristically brave of them. They are really, truly scared of those people…
The Dow never dipped when Obama was President. Ask any professional financial advisor and he’ll tell you that we’re overdo for a massive correction. It wouldn’t surprise me if we see a correction of 20%, most stocks are overvalued and that bubble is about to burst.
“The Dow never dipped when Obama was President.”
WAIT a second — that sounds like something Bud would say…
Not really, Lindsey will step in front of a camera and put his name on any document that’ll give him publicity. He’s taken the place of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
Of course that’s not true — not even close to true — but I know you and Doug and Bud are going to keep on thinking that…
Yeah… because Lindsey Graham is so camera shy. He’s suffers from the political version of Napoleon Complex… he so wants to be viewed as a big player on Capitol Hill.
He doesn’t have to want it. He IS a big player on Capitol Hill. It’s so weird the way some of my friends here talk about Lindsey chasing cameras. No. The cameras chase him…
Rosenstein has appointed Robert Mueller special counsel. Suddenly, it’s like there’s an adult in the room.
Yep, that’s the way it feels to me…
The more I read about Meuller, the more I like him. He’s not one to be cowed by power.
Reading about the June 2016 tape of Kevin McCarthy and Paul Ryan this morning was an eye-opener. Why is every morning these days an expose of the danger’s of one party rule?
SSSHHHHH! You’re not supposed to mention that!
Remember, the Speaker said:
… which sounds to me more like the Corleone family than the Waltons…
Party before country…
Are you talking about Democrats or Republicans?
Oh, I think he’s talking about both. That’s the way I would mean it if I said it…
The legislation the Republicans should be pushing through Congress at this moment is a reapportionment bill for the House of Representatives. The only thing that can save them from themselves is to turn away from the illogical conclusion that they should be driving the party into the hands of the the most extreme Primary voters.
If, as a Republican, >75+% of your voters (nationally) are to the left of the “party”, the GOP has a fatal structural problem.