Senate intelligence leaders pledge bipartisan Russia election probe

By Patricia Zengerle

REUTERS
 

FILE PHOTO: Committee Chairman U.S. Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) questions former U.S. Senator Dan Coats (R-IN) as he testifies before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on his nomination to be Director of National Intelligence in Washington February 28, 2017. REUTERS/James Lawler Duggan

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican chairman of the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday promised a thorough investigation into any direct links between Russia and Donald Trump during his successful 2016 run for the White House.

 

Committee chairman Richard Burr and Mark Warner, its top Democrat, pledged at a joint news conference that they would work together, in contrast with the partisan discord roiling a similar probe by the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee.

 

Burr was asked if the Senate panel wants to determine if there is anything suggesting a direct link to Trump and responded, "We know that our challenge is to answer that question for the American people."

 

Trump's young presidency has been clouded by allegations from U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia sought to help him win while connections between his campaign personnel and Russia also are under scrutiny. Trump dismisses such assertions and Russia denies the allegations.

 

The Senate committee intends to begin interviewing as many as 20 people, including Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and one of his closest advisers, beginning as early as Monday.

 

Burr served as a security adviser to Trump's campaign but said he has not coordinated with him on the scope of the committee's investigation. He insisted he could remain objective.

 

Burr declined to go along with the White House's denial of collusion between the campaign and Russian hackers, who U.S. intelligence officials believe favoured Trump in last year's campaign at the expense of Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton.

 

"We would be crazy to try to draw conclusions from where we are in the investigation," Burr said. "Let us go a little deeper into this before you ask us to write the conclusions. That's clearly something we intend to do down the road."

 

Burr and Warner would not comment on the investigation in the House, where the chairman of the intelligence committee, Trump ally Devin Nunes, has been under fire over his handling of the matter.

 

Many Democrats, including Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House intelligence panel, called for Nunes to recuse himself from the investigation after he met last week with an unidentified source at the White House complex, accusing him of colluding with the White House.

 

Before telling his committee colleagues, Nunes met with House Speaker Paul Ryan, and then Trump, and told reporters the source provided him with evidence that information on Trump's transition team had been collected during legal surveillance of other targets.

 

Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have said the discord surrounding the House committee has made the Senate investigation more important than ever. "Clearly in the Senate, it appears that both Democrats and Republicans are acting like adults and taking this matter seriously," Democratic Representative Jim McGovern told Reuters.

 

'PAID INTERNET TROLLS'

 

Warner and Burr both stressed the importance of exposing the activity of Russian hackers, which Warner said included reports of "upwards of 1,000 paid Internet trolls" who spread false negative stories about Clinton.

 

Warner and Burr did disagree slightly, with Warner alluding to some difficulties getting particular documents from intelligence agencies, and Burr defending them.

 

The two senators also indicated they had communicated with Michael Flynn, Trump's former national security adviser, who was fired last month after misrepresenting meetings with the Russian ambassador.

 

"It would be safe to say we have had conversations with a lot of people and it would be safe to say General Flynn is a part of that list," Burr said.

 

Neither Burr nor Warner gave a timeline for finishing the investigation.

 

"This is one of the biggest investigations the Hill has seen in my time here," said Burr, who has been in Congress since 1995.

 

The senators said they also wanted to call attention to what they described as Russia's attempts to influence upcoming elections in France and Germany.

 

(Additional reporting by David Alexander; Editing by Toni Reinhold and Bill Trott)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2017-03-30

1 hour ago, webfact said:

The Republican chairman of the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday promised a thorough investigation into any direct links between Russia and Donald Trump during his successful 2016 run for the White House.

Seems Numes is causing problems. By not saying who gave him recent intelligence.  Rumors are he's in cahoots with the White House.  Makes sense.  Another coverup?

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/28/politics/jackie-speier-devin-nunes-recuse-cnntv/index.html

 

Quote

 

A Democrat on the House intelligence committee said Tuesday she wants the panel's chairman, Republican Rep. Devin Nunes, to resign his chairmanship over his handling of the investigation into alleged ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.

 

Nunes infuriated Democrats last week when he told the press and the White House -- before informing his Democratic colleagues on the panel -- that he saw evidence that President Donald Trump's advisers may have been swept up in surveillance of other foreign nationals.

 

 

2 hours ago, craigt3365 said:

Seems Numes is causing problems. By not saying who gave him recent intelligence.  Rumors are he's in cahoots with the White House.  Makes sense.  Another coverup?

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/28/politics/jackie-speier-devin-nunes-recuse-cnntv/index.html

 

 

 

Agree with you!

 

I'd like to take this a step further.  I cannot believe that Nunes went through all the trouble he did (e.g., several news sources have reported that he even switched cars in traffic on the way to the White House like in a bad spy movie) merely because he's a loyal Republican.  He could have accomplished that without all that trouble and also avoid appearing obviously very biased to the public. 

 

Thus, I have to wonder what kind of leverage the White House, or someone associated with them, has on Nunes.  It may not be the Russians, but I do not know who are major contributors to his campaign.  What are the connections?

Edited March 30, 20179 yr by helpisgood
added ending

I just saw a news report where the administration is saying they have no idea whom Nunes met with at the White House.  Which is actually a lie as every visitor, even those with high clearance levels, get logged upon entry.  What a BS administration.

It just keep getting crazier:

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/29/politics/kushner-russian-bank-veb-agent/index.html

 

Quote

 

Bank that Kushner met with paid Russian intelligence agent's legal tab

 

As federal prosecutors in New York prepared their case against a man accused of covertly working for Russian intelligence two years ago, they began raising questions about an unidentified "third party" paying the defendant's legal bills.

 

The defendant's benefactor turned out to be VneshEconomBank, the same financial institution at the center of a recent controversy over its chairman's meeting with Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law and one of his top White House advisers.

 

 

57 minutes ago, craigt3365 said:

It just keep getting crazier:

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/29/politics/kushner-russian-bank-veb-agent/index.html

 

 

And from another CNN article:

 

"VEB is a state-owned Russian corporation formed in 2007 that is closely tied to the Russian government. Its chairman is appointed by the Russian president. The Russian prime minister is chairman of the bank supervisory board." 

 

How is that different from being an agent of Putin?

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/27/politics/kushner-meeting-russian-banker-tied-to-putin/

 

Also, it seems to me that these Russian connections are never above-board, but carefully hidden away.  What are they hiding?  For example, Sessions' oft-noted testimony with Sen. Franken about meeting with Russians.  Sessions is an attorney.  He must have known that failing to mention that he had those two meetings with the Russian ambassador could very well appear to be misrepresenting the truth.  And, he's now the AG? 

 

By the way, I can't remember where I saw it (maybe The Daily Show?), but check out if you can Sessions' body language and face immediately after he made that statement to Franken.  It reads so much like, "Oops, I have really screwed up this time."

 

Of course the U.S. NEVER interferes with the elections of autonomous nations, just ask Netanyahu and Obama.

If, (and I say if), because there are many governments around the world who are not fond of the Clinton dynasty; If Russia is responsible for release of the Wikileaks documents that exposed the corruption in the U.S. election process, and its political parties, for U.S. citizens and all the world to see, is called "interference" with the U.S. elections. Thank You for your service to the American people!

3 minutes ago, KenKadz said:

Of course the U.S. NEVER interferes with the elections of autonomous nations, just ask Netanyahu and Obama.

If, (and I say if), because there are many governments around the world who are not fond of the Clinton dynasty; If Russia is responsible for release of the Wikileaks documents that exposed the corruption in the U.S. election process, and its political parties, for U.S. citizens and all the world to see, is called "interference" with the U.S. elections. Thank You for your service to the American people!

What corruption was exposed?  Other than that of a hostile foreign power hacking servers with the intent to potentially influence the US election.  Which is what this probe is about.  Luckily, a majority of Americans support this investigation.

6 minutes ago, friendofthai said:

I hope Clinton will finally finish Trump and become the president of the US.

How will Clinton become president?  As I recall, the constitutional line of succession for the presidency of the USA does not include a losing candidate.  Some organization like the NCAA cannot just vacate Trump's electoral victory as if it was a basketball game and award it to Clinton.  The US Constitution decides that.  

Nothing will come from any of these investigations. The system protects itself and will never do harm to the mechanisms that operate under the veil. The Warren Commission,  The 9-11 Commission,  The WhiteWater investigation, nothing, nothing, nothing. No matter what was done and how much harm was done to Democracy, the greater harm would be to expose the corrupt nature of our state. Nothing will come of if.. Ever. 

A worthwhile read here. A bit long but very revealing imo:

 

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/03/exhaustive-history-donald-trump-russia-scandal-timeline

 

 

On 3/30/2017 at 8:14 AM, craigt3365 said:

Seems Numes is causing problems. By not saying who gave him recent intelligence.  Rumors are he's in cahoots with the White House.  Makes sense.  Another coverup?

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/28/politics/jackie-speier-devin-nunes-recuse-cnntv/index.html

 

 

Guess they're not worried about the leaks that benefit them

On 3/30/2017 at 0:08 PM, craigt3365 said:

I just saw a news report where the administration is saying they have no idea whom Nunes met with at the White House.  Which is actually a lie as every visitor, even those with high clearance levels, get logged upon entry.  What a BS administration.

And, are followed around by a security detail

On 3/30/2017 at 7:11 PM, friendofthai said:

I hope Clinton will finally finish Trump and become the president of the US. Because Trump has become a big big problem for our president V. Putin.
Russia is now ruled by 2 opposite forces:
1) The first is oligarchs. They are ruled by US and EU and are ready to fight for their interests. Just because their money and all the things they have are stored in US and EU.
2) The second is Vladimir Putin who is in the state of never-ending permanent war with oligarchs
Before Trump become president, Vladimir Putin managed to convince oligarchs that it is impossible to have a deal with US - they simply want to destroy Russia completely. But the oligarchs understand that they lost all their power with the death of Russia. And without power they will loose their money too. Vladimir Putin prepared new people for upcoming dramatical political changes inside the country:  pro-Western ministers would be removed, all the Western economic consultants would be completely removed, the constitution of Russia (that was written by the USAID in 1993) would be sterilized.
But when Trump became president, the oligarchs changed their mind and said that they did not allow Putin to trigger these political changes. Because Trump says that he is ready to have a deal with Russia. Of course we understand that there will be no deal and he is just lying. Trump will act exactly the same as Obama but less straightforward and more accurately. But Vladimir Putin lost 1 year and EU and US win 1 year of priceless time....

Huh, what?  You think Clinton has a parallel government like Obama supposedly has?  I doubt any Clinton is going to be president.  Are you a Russian expert?  What is your background to come up with these conclusions?  Really, what Russia does is up to them.  The US government has nothing against the Russian people.  Sure the CIA and intelligence agencies have programs to change the government there, this we all know.  Most of the oligarchs are world travelers and pretty smart right?  They are attempting to get money out of the country.  Trump has benefited from Russian money through his business dealings.  This is becoming more and more clear.  If his tax returns are ever leaked, this will be most apparent.  Even so, more and more will come out.