The acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, says he will not comply with a House subpoena issued by the Intelligence Committee to testify about a whistleblower’s complaint that may allege “serious misconduct.”

The complaint was brought to the attention of the committee’s chairman Rep. Adam Schiff, who issued the subpoena last week ordering Maguire to supply the complaint to the committee or testify on Thursday about it.

The Washington Post reports that “Maguire’s general counsel, Jason Klitenic, informed Schiff in a Tuesday letter obtained by The Washington Post that the director was ‘not available on such short notice’ and that the hearing ‘would not be a productive exercise’ while the office is deliberating about how to handle the panel’s demands.”

Why the mystery? Schiff is largely blowing smoke, hoping to cast aspersions on Trump and the administration with absolutely no evidence whatsoever.

The intelligence panel has detailed little about the complaint publicly, except to reveal that while the whistleblower works in the intelligence community, the case “concerns conduct by someone outside of the Intelligence Community,” as Schiff stated in a letter to Maguire last week accompanying the subpoena. In that letter, Schiff also pointed out that Maguire’s office refused to state whether White House officials and lawyers were involved in the decision not to transfer the complaint.

The fact that Maguire’s office “refused to state whether White House officials and lawyers” are the subject of the complaint is a ludicrous and lame attempt to throw mud where mud may not even exist. Maybe the acting DNI thinks the information is so sensitive that loudmouth, partisan numbskulls like Schiff don’t need to know what’s in it?

But Klitenic has pushed back against Schiff’s reading of the whistleblower law as it applies to the current case. In a Sept. 13 response to the panel obtained by The Post, Klitenic argued that “there were serious concerns about whether the complaint met the statutory definition of an ‘urgent concern.’ ” Those concerns, he explained, led to consultation with the Justice Department. “Based on those consultations, we determined that the allegations did not fall within the statutory definition of an ‘urgent concern’ and that the statute did not require the complaint to be transmitted to the intelligence committees,” Klitenic wrote.

I would conclude that the chances that this complaint has nothing to do with Trump or anyone high up in his administration are pretty good. It’s likely that the complaint will eventually be leaked or handled through appropriate channels by the DNI, meaning the question becomes what purpose would it serve for Maguire to lie about it when the information will be exposed at some point in the future anyway?

“The information within the present complaint is different from that involved in any past cases of which we are aware,” Klitenic continued, adding that “because the complaint involves confidential and potentially privileged communications by people outside the intelligence community, the DNI lacks unilateral authority to transmit such materials to the intelligence committees.”

Schiff is still peeved that glory escaped him because his Russian collusion narrative fell apart. It appears he’s found another dead horse to beat.