Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Sunday the FBI was not justified in convincing the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to allow the government to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.
Graham said the FBI relied too heavily on a dossier compiled by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer hired by a research firm funded in part by former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
[Also read: Trump calls on Republicans to ‘get tough now’ after release of FISA documents on Carter Page]
“If the dossier is the reason you issued the warrant, it was a bunch of garbage,” Graham said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “The dossier has proven to be a bunch of garbage.”
Late Saturday evening, the Justice Department released top-secret documents related to the surveillance warrants used to wiretap Page under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The heavily redacted documents showed the FBI believed Page was collaborating and conspiring with the Russian government.
The documents show the FBI told the court it considered Steele a trusted, reliable source and believed the source of funding for the Steele research was “likely looking for information that could be used to discredit” Trump, but did not name the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee as being behind it.
Democrats note the application also included evidence against Page unrelated to the Steele dossier.
Graham on Sunday said the FBI’s disclosure of the origins of the Steele dossier was not transparent enough.
“The FISA warrant process needs to be looked at closely by Congress,” Graham said. “The main reason they issued the warrant was the dossier prepared by Mr. Steele. They never told the court he was a paid operative of the Democratic Party. The substance of the dossier to this day is a bunch of garbage.”
Meanwhile, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said on CNN’s “State of the Union” that he didn’t think the FBI “did anything wrong” and emphasized that Page’s ties to Russia were suspicious.
