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Two top Republican lawmakers have called for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate whether the Obama administration manipulated intelligence reports to falsely suggest that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to help President Trump.
Some shit you should know before you read: Two days ago, President Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that President Obama, along with then-Vice President Joe Biden and top intelligence officials including James Comey, James Clapper, and John Brennan, had engaged in what he called a “treasonous conspiracy” to undermine the 2016 election. Trump claimed Obama had been “caught directly,” alleging that the former president orchestrated an effort to manipulate intelligence and sabotage Trump’s presidency before it began. As justification, Trump pointed to documents recently declassified and released by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, which she claims reveal that intelligence officials deliberately suppressed an assessment in December 2016 stating that Russia had not impacted the election outcome. Gabbard alleged the report was pulled from the President’s Daily Brief “based on new guidance,” suggesting an attempt to conceal contrary intelligence and lay the groundwork for what she described as a multi-year “coup” against Trump. Gabbard has since submitted the materials to the Justice Department for potential criminal investigation.
What’s going on now: In a notable development, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) have called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to appoint a special counsel to investigate the findings released by DNI Gabbard. In a joint statement, both lawmakers said, “With every piece of information that gets released, it becomes more evident that the entire Russia collusion hoax was created by the Obama Administration to subvert the will of the American people.“ They insisted that appointing an independent special counsel would “do the country a tremendous service.”
Former intelligence officials named in the declassified documents are now preparing for possible legal issues. In an interview with CNN, former DNI director James Clapper said he had “lawyered up.” Clapper added, “You know, after eight and a half years of this, and I don’t know of an intelligence product that was more scrutinized, more investigated than that product was by numerous people. You know, it’s very disconcerting. And I take seriously when the President of the United States accuses me of being a participant in a treasonous conspiracy, which is ridiculous.”
This all comes as the Department of Justice announced the formation of a new “Strike Force” to investigate the recently declassified documents and determine whether further legal action is warranted. Attorney General Bondi has since praised Director Gabbard for her disclosures, stating, “We will investigate these troubling disclosures fully and leave no stone unturned to deliver justice.”
