Transparency for Fusion and the FBI Democrats vote to keep documents secret but Congress will see them.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/transparency-for-fusion-and-the-fbi-1516319613
The chance that Americans will learn what really happened between the FBI and Fusion GPS is growing with Thursday’s vote by the House Intelligence Committee to give every House Member access to key information. Soon the House should move to declassify all documents in the case that don’t jeopardize intelligence sources and methods so the public can get the complete story.
Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes also moved Thursday to release to the public his committee’s interview with Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson. Every Democrat joined Republicans in voting for that public disclosure. Yet every Democrat voted against letting the rest of the House see a memo that will list the facts about the FBI’s use of FISA warrants to surveil members of the Trump campaign in 2016. Strange. What are Democrats afraid of?
Ranking Democrat Adam Schiff has been a loud voice for accountability regarding the Trump-Russia probe, but his outrage evaporates regarding the role that Fusion GPS and its Democratic financiers may have played in persuading the FBI to seek a warrant to eavesdrop on American civilians. What were the FBI’s reasons and the evidence it used to seek such an extraordinary writ?
All of this is relevant to the House’s recent vote to extend Section 702 that allows law enforcement to monitor foreigners. Mr. Nunes provided two closed briefings to Republicans last week as they prepared to renew Section 702, and he assured Members that he’d seen no evidence that government had abused 702 powers. But he also said he had seen evidence that law enforcement misused powers involving the surveillance of U.S. citizens as part of the FBI’s investigation into the Trump campaign.
Thus the vote to let all Members see a memo describing relevant classified documents at intelligence agencies. The Constitution and Congress impose strict rules on government surveillance of U.S. citizens, and the FISA court relies on the integrity of law enforcement when granting warrants. If a senior Member of the House is attesting to abuse, all of Congress should see the evidence before deciding how to respond.
FBI sources are telling the media that this will endanger national security. But all Members have top-secret clearance and can view any classified information that the House Intelligence Committee grants access to. They must adhere to nondisclosure agreements and are subject to the same criminal penalties for leaking classified information as FBI officials. Recall that former director James Comey leaked by his own admission.
Once the Members have a chance to see the details, the full House can also move to declassify as much as possible and “read in” the American people. The FBI played an extraordinary and troubling role in the 2016 election, and access to the facts of what happened shouldn’t be limited to FBI leakers, their media protectors and partisans in Congress.
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