Washington, D.C. (Feb. 9, 2017)—Today, Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, issued the following statement in response to a new report by the Washington Post that President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, secretly discussed U.S. sanctions with the Russian Ambassador to the United States the month before Trump took office, despite public assertions to the contrary by Flynn and other Trump officials:

"If this new report is accurate, it raises grave questions about whether General Flynn was dishonest with the American people, whether he misled his own White House colleagues, or whether White House officials knew about his secret dealings with Russia and misled the public themselves. To this day, General Flynn refuses to disclose how much he was paid when he had dinner with Vladimir Putin in apparent violation of the Constitution's ban on foreign emoluments. Last week, we asked Chairman Chaffetz to obtain General Flynn's security clearance application and any updates, and now there is more urgency for the Oversight Committee to make this request. If this new report is true, we need to ask not only whether General Flynn should be leading our national security efforts, but whether he should even hold a security clearance."

Cummings sent a letter last week with Reps. Adam Smith, John Conyers, Jr., Bennie G. Thompson, Adam Schiff, and Eliot L. Engel, the Ranking Members of the Committees on Oversight and Government Reform, Armed Services, Judiciary, Homeland Security, Intelligence, and Foreign Affairs, requesting that the Department of Defense investigate whether Flynn violated the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution by receiving payment for dining with Russian President Vladimir Putin.