Democrats on the Senate Judiciary and Oversight committees met with Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie on Tuesday and said the interview “raises serious questions and concerns about our security.”
Wylie was a staffer at the British-based data analytics firm until 2014.
Wylie came forward in a story by the Guardian that revealed how Cambridge Analytica — which was hired by President Trump’s 2016 campaign — improperly took the Facebook user data of millions.
“Mr. Wylie’s statements today demonstrate why it is so important that our committees prioritize investigating foreign interference in our elections,” said Democrats on the committees in a joint statement. “We must do more to learn how foreign actors collect and weaponize our data against us, and what impact social media has on our democratic processes.”
Wylie meets with Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday.
Republican members and staffers on the committees have been invited to attend, but have declined, Democrats say.
“I have accepted invitations to testify next week at the US House Intelligence Committee and House Judiciary Committee,” Wylie said on Twitter on Saturday. “Democracies around the world are under threat from malicious actors who seek to use social media as an information battleground. We must take this seriously.”
In an invitation from Rep. Adam Schiff of California — the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee — was a preview of the questions Wylie would likely face.
“If your clients’s account and documentation is accurate,” wrote Schiff in an invitation to Wylie, “this misappropriation of private data is a serious invasion of the privacy interests of the American people by Cambridge Analytica and potentially other individuals and entities, and raises important questions about Cambridge Analytica’s activities on behalf of then-candidate Donald Trump’s campaign during the 2016 U.S. elections, the specific roles of persons of interest, including Steve Bannon and Robert and Rebekah Mercer, as well as the firm’s ties to Russia.”
Bannon was a vice president of Cambridge Analytica’s board before becoming Trump’s chief strategist in the White House.
The revelations about Cambridge Analytica triggered public outcry, and Congress eventually got Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify on Capitol Hill earlier this month.
In March, Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., called on Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, to hold a hearing on Cambridge Analytica and request documents from both the company and key Trump campaign officials.
