The Trump administration is refusing to provide details Tuesday to who signed House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes into offices on White House grounds, as the House investigation into Russia's interference in the US elections is stalled, the victim of a partisan showdown.
All meetings of the House Russia investigators were canceled this week shortly before the top Democrat, Rep. Adam Schiff, said Nunes must recuse himself in order for the investigation to continue. Nunes, however, told CNN Tuesday morning he was "moving forward" with the investigation and said he won't recuse himself. "It moves forward just like it was before," Nunes told reporters.
It's a monumental shift from where House investigators planned to be Tuesday, interrogating a trio of former Obama administration officials in a public hearing. But last week's hearing -- the first and so far only public hearing of the House Russia investigation -- sparked a wildfire of partisan fighting after FBI Director James Comey confirmed he is investigating possible coordination between President Donald Trump's campaign aides and Russian officials.
The ensuing days saw Nunes brief Trump privately on new information of potential surveillance of Trump's aides before telling Democrats on the investigation. Nunes then apologized to Democrats, but the following day he canceled Tuesday's public hearing, saying he wanted to hear from Comey and National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers in private, prompting outrage from Democrats.
A Republican House Intelligence Committee source defended the decision to try and move the Comey and Rogers hearing behind closed doors, saying Democrats are trying to kill the investigation.
"We just had 100 questions where Director Comey said that he couldn't answer in that setting, so you think the next step this week would be then 'OK, we'll come down and answer the questions in the closed session,'" the source said. "But from what I understand, we were not able to agree to have that done."
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/28/politics/house-intelligence-committee-devin-nunes/
All meetings of the House Russia investigators were canceled this week shortly before the top Democrat, Rep. Adam Schiff, said Nunes must recuse himself in order for the investigation to continue. Nunes, however, told CNN Tuesday morning he was "moving forward" with the investigation and said he won't recuse himself. "It moves forward just like it was before," Nunes told reporters.
It's a monumental shift from where House investigators planned to be Tuesday, interrogating a trio of former Obama administration officials in a public hearing. But last week's hearing -- the first and so far only public hearing of the House Russia investigation -- sparked a wildfire of partisan fighting after FBI Director James Comey confirmed he is investigating possible coordination between President Donald Trump's campaign aides and Russian officials.
The ensuing days saw Nunes brief Trump privately on new information of potential surveillance of Trump's aides before telling Democrats on the investigation. Nunes then apologized to Democrats, but the following day he canceled Tuesday's public hearing, saying he wanted to hear from Comey and National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers in private, prompting outrage from Democrats.
A Republican House Intelligence Committee source defended the decision to try and move the Comey and Rogers hearing behind closed doors, saying Democrats are trying to kill the investigation.
"We just had 100 questions where Director Comey said that he couldn't answer in that setting, so you think the next step this week would be then 'OK, we'll come down and answer the questions in the closed session,'" the source said. "But from what I understand, we were not able to agree to have that done."
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/28/politics/house-intelligence-committee-devin-nunes/
