PRESS RELEASE

Rep. Nunes Charges FBI and DOJ with ‘Obstruction,’ Prepares Contempt Citations

Dec. 3, 2017 (EIRNS)—House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) issued a statement yesterday which rips into the months-long stonewalling and "obstruction" by the FBI and the Department of Justice, in refusing to answer questions and hand over materials demanded by the Committee, regarding to the relationship of the FBI to the scurrilous dossier prepared by British intelligence agent Christopher Steele, and the brazen conflict of interest of Robert Mueller and his team with their assigned mission.

The statement begins by noting the

"press reports that Peter Strzok, the top FBI official assigned to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe of collusion between Russia and Trump officials, had been removed from the probe after exchanging anti-Trump and pro-Hillary Clinton text messages with his mistress, who was an FBI lawyer working for Deputy Director Andrew McCabe."

The Nunes statement charged that

"the FBI and DOJ engaged in a willful attempt to thwart Congress’s constitutional oversight responsibility. This is part of a months-long pattern by the DOJ and FBI of stonewalling and obstructing this committee’s oversight work, particularly oversight of their use of the Steele dossier."

Nunes continued:

"The DOJ has now expressed—on a Saturday, just hours after the press reports on Strzok’s dismissal appeared—a sudden willingness to comply with some of the committee’s long-standing demands. This attempted 11th-hour accommodation is neither credible nor believable, and in fact is yet another example of the DOJ’s disingenuousness and obstruction. Therefore, I have instructed House Intelligence Committee staff to begin drawing up a contempt of Congress resolution for DOJ Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray. Unless all our outstanding demands are fully met by close of business on Monday, December 4, 2017, the committee will have the opportunity to move this resolution before the end of the month."

President Trump tweeted this morning about the Strzok revelations: "Now it all starts to make sense," adding that the FBI’s reputation "is in Tatters—worst in History!"