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Top Democrat ‘Increasingly Worried’ GOP Will Shut Down House Intelligence Investigation at End of the Month

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‘Republicans Have Scheduled No Witnesses After Next Friday and None in 2017’

The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee is warning Republicans appear poised to shut down the investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, collusion or cooperation between members of the Trump team and Russia, and any other possible illegal acts.

“I’m increasingly worried Republicans will shut down the House Intelligence Committee investigation at the end of the month,” Rep. Adam Schiff, the Ranking Member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said Friday afternoon via Twitter.

President Trump and many Republicans have been engaging in a false and dangerous campaign to try to discredit the FBI and Special Counsel Robert Mueller. The attacks include the invasive reveal of text messages of an FBI agent who called candidate Trump and “idiot.” But even the Rupert Murdoch owned Wall Street Journal exposed that attacks s unfair – the FBI agent also made similar remarks about other presidential candidates, including Bernie Sanders, and former Obama Attorney General Eric Holder.

Remember that the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee is Rep. Devin Nunes, who destroyed his credibility earlier this year with his fraudulent “unmasking” claims designed to divert attention and protect the White House, via information fed to him by the White House. His actions were so egregious he was forced to recuse himself from all things Russia, something he slowly rescinded. 

The California Democrat explains that “Republicans have scheduled no witnesses after next Friday and none in 2017. We have dozens of outstanding witnesses on key aspects of our investigation that they refuse to contact and many document requests they continue to sit on.”

Suggesting GOP lawmakers are aiding the Trump administration, Rep. Schiff says Republicans have “declined to issue subpoenas in numerous avenues of the investigation, where there’s simply no other way to get the information.”

And he points to Speaker of the House Paul Ryan as the one who is ultimately responsible for ensuring the Committee does its job.

Thursday night MSNBC discussed Schiff’s concerns (video above,) and Schiff appeared on CNN to share his warning (below).

(Please see update below.)

Here’s Schiff’s entire Twitter thread:

UPDATE: 3:33 PM ET –
Very disturbing tweet from the Congressional correspondent for Bloomberg News:

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RNC Chair Falsely Claims ‘Biden White House’ Killed Hunter Laptop Story in 2020

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The head of the Republican National Committee is claiming the “Biden White House” killed the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020, before Joe Biden was elected President. The embattled RNC chair, Ronna McDaniel, is again taking criticism, but her false allegations resurface events some may have forgotten.

“This is a Biden White House that was meeting with social media companies, dictating what they put on their platform before the 2020 election,” McDaniel told Fox News on Monday.

“That to me is suppression,” she continued. “This is a White House that killed the Hunter Biden story that we now know is true, that prevented voters from knowing that before the 2020 election.”

That is false.

But it’s also important to take a look back at reporting from 2020 which debunks McDaniel’s false statements.

READ MORE: ‘Denied’: Trump Loses Latest Gag Order Effort

Just days before the 2020 election, NBC News reported that “Trump and his allies say there is evidence of corruption in emails and documents allegedly found on a laptop belonging to Democrat Joe Biden’s son. They say those and other documents show that Hunter Biden used his father’s influence to enrich himself through business deals in Ukraine and China, and that his father not only facilitated that, but may have benefited financially.”

“But the Wall Street Journal and Fox News — among the only news organizations that have been given access to key documents — found that the emails and other records don’t make that case. Leaving aside the many questions about their provenance, the materials offered no evidence that Joe Biden played any role in his son’s dealings in China, let alone profited from them, both news organizations concluded,” the NBC News report states.

Now, despite nearly a year of intense Republican investigations by three House committees and a GOP-majority House leadership that appears determined to make the case to impeach President Joe Biden, those findings in the NBC News report are just as true today as they were when they were published more than three years ago.

In that same report, NBC News also stated, “many questions remain about how the materials got into the hands of Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who has met with Russian agents in his effort to dig dirt on the Bidens.”

READ MORE: Comer Says Biden’s Bank Records ‘Don’t Lie’ but His Claims Are Quickly Debunked

“U.S. intelligence agencies have informed the White House that Giuliani has been in contact with alleged Russian intelligence agents. The FBI has been looking into whether the Russians played any role, and no official has ruled that out.”

At the time, that was the Trump White House, not the Biden White House. Bill Barr was the Attorney General.

One year earlier, in October of 2019, Politico reported, “2 Giuliani Ukraine associates indicted on campaign finance charges.” And just weeks ago, The Guardian reported, “Ukrainian authorities have arrested a controversial MP who was at the heart of efforts by Rudy Giuliani to dig up compromising material about Joe Biden, and placed him in pre-trial detention.”

McDaniel claimed Joe Biden dictated to social media companies “what they put on their platform before the 2020 election.”

Again, that is false. Nor does a presidential candidate have the power to do so.

What actually happened?

“The background here is that the FBI came to us,” Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg told Joe Rogan last year, as the BBC reported, “and was like ‘hey, just so you know, you should be on high alert. We thought there was a lot of Russian propaganda in the 2016 election, we have it on notice that basically there’s about to be some kind of dump that’s similar to that’.”

READ MORE: ‘Authoritarianism’: Florida Says Its Public Schools Exist to ‘Convey Government’s Message’

The BBC added, Zuckerberg “said the FBI did not warn Facebook about the Biden story in particular – only that Facebook thought it ‘fit that pattern’.”

The BBC also pointed to the New York Post report that it says “claimed that a laptop, abandoned in a repair shop by Hunter Biden, contained emails which included details of Hunter introducing a Ukrainian energy tycoon to his father and arranging a meeting.”

“There is no record on Mr Biden’s schedule that such a meeting ever took place,” BBC adds.

“More than a year after the story appeared, the Washington Post conducted its own analysis and concluded the laptop and some emails were likely to be authentic – but the majority of data could not be verified due to ‘sloppy handling of the data’.”

That New York Post “article remains controversial. The hard drive at its centre was provided to the Post by Donald Trump’s own lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.”

Watch McDaniel below or at this link.

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‘Denied’: Trump Loses Latest Gag Order Effort

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A New York State appellate judge has denied Donald Trump’s latest attempt to have his very narrow gag order loosened, ruling his request must be heard by a panel of judges, and will not be taken up until at least the day he is scheduled to testify in the $250 million civil business fraud case.

“The application for interim relief seeking an expedited grant of leave to the Court of Appeals is denied, as such motion must be decided by a full panel of this Court. Further, the movant seeks an interim application for a preference is likewise denied, as such determination must be made by a full panel of this Court,” the judge ruled.

MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin reported, “Trump will not be free from the gag order any sooner than late 12/11, the same day he is scheduled to testify” in the State of New York’s civil business fraud case against the ex-president.

READ MORE: Comer Says Biden’s Bank Records ‘Don’t Lie’ but His Claims Are Quickly Debunked

Katie Phang, MSNBC anchor and legal contributor, added, “the fact that the highest court in New York told Trump it wouldn’t let him say whatever he wants to say in the meantime is noteworthy.”

The Messenger‘s Adam Klasfeld suggests the gag order “likely” will not be lifted “during the defense case” either.

The gag order bans Trump and his attorneys from publicly commenting on Judge Arthur Engoron’s court staff, including his principle law clerk.

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Comer Says Biden’s Bank Records ‘Don’t Lie’ but His Claims Are Quickly Debunked

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Republican House Oversight Committee Chairman Jim Comer has been ramping up his media campaign attacking President Joe Biden as GOP Speaker Mike Johnson signals he is readying a vote for a formal impeachment inquiry. On Monday, Chairman Comer released a two-minute video alleging President Biden has been lying and alleging “corruption” related to payments the President’s son, Hunter Biden, sent his father, claiming it is evidence of foreign money flowing to the President.

Reporters were quick to punch holes in the Kentucky Republican’s allegations.

“Today the House Oversight Committee is releasing subpoenaed bank records that show Hunter Biden’s business entity, a Owasco PC, made direct monthly payments to Joe Biden. This wasn’t a payment from Hunter Biden’s personal account, but an account for his corporation that received payments from China and other shady corners of the world,” Comer says in his latest video (below.)

But journalists are calling out Comer, and debunking his claims.

READ MORE: ‘Authoritarianism’: Florida Says Its Public Schools Exist to ‘Convey Government’s Message’

Pointing to Comer’s video, Public Notice founder Aaron Rupar writes, “this is a bold claim for which absolutely 0 evidence is presented in the video.”

“So, these three payments of $1,380 each (totaling $4,140) appear to be Hunter Biden paying his dad back for truck loan/lease payments that his dad paid on his son’s behalf when Hunter was low on cash,” explains journalist Yashar Ali, noting his “source is an NY Post article about Hunter’s finances and emails from the Hunter Biden email archive.”

Responding to Ali’s post, Rupar adds, “James Comer said these payments were linked to China. James Comer is lying. Don’t be like James Comer.”

“These appear to be monthly payments (already reported in the media) of $1,380 for a truck,” writes Mother Jones’ D.C. Bureau Chief David Corn. “I don’t think fronting a son money for a truck is an impeachable offense. Another swing and a miss.”

Even the right-wing Washington Examiner on Monday reported, “An email found on Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop suggests Hunter Biden had listed the $1,380 payments to his father as reimbursements for a Ford Raptor truck.”

READ MORE: ‘Given My Experience’: Gaetz Waiting to ‘Render Judgment’ on Florida GOP Chair Accused of Rape

Watch Chairman Comer’s video below or at this link.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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