Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (left) and panel member Lindsey Graham are urging FBI officials to disclose documents. | AP Photo Grassley, Graham want the FBI’s Russia surveillance warrants

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and panel member Lindsey Graham are asking the FBI to turn over some closely guarded secrets: its applications for warrants to spy on people suspected of helping Russia meddle in last year’s presidential election.

Grassley’s panel is currently investigating Russia’s election interference, including the circumstances behind the firing of former FBI Director James Comey.


In a letter released Wednesday, Grassley (R-Iowa) and Graham (R-S.C.) asked the Justice Department and FBI to turn over all proposed and final applications for surveillance warrants submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, along with the court’s responses, related to the FBI’s Russia probe.

The surveillance court is in charge of approving requests by intelligence agencies to spy on people suspected of acting as agents of foreign powers.

Their letter cites a report in The Guardian that the FBI applied for warrants last summer to monitor four members of the Trump campaign but that the surveillance court turned down the application, asking the FBI to narrow its request. The Washington Post later reported that the FBI obtained approval to monitor the communications of Carter Page, a former foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign.

“We are writing to request information regarding FISA-related actions by the FBI and the Justice Department in the course of the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, including the investigations into allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians,” Grassley and Graham wrote in their letter to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe. FISA is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

