The House Intelligence Committee voted Friday to release the transcripts of witness interviews conducted as part of its Russia investigation, which wrapped up earlier this year.
In the closed meeting set up under the orders of Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., the measure, passed unanymously by voice vote, sends 53 transcripts to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence for a classification review.
“Transcripts will be scrubbed for personally identifying info then sent for declassification review,” a committee spokesman told the Washington Examiner. The documents could be made public within the next few weeks.
Included in the list of transcripts that have been queued up for review and release are a number of Obama administration officials, including former Attorney General Loretta Lynch, former deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power, and former White House counselor John Podesta, who went on to become chairman of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign.
Ex-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, who was fired by President Trump last year, and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, are also on the list.
A number of Trump associates and current and former officials are there as well, including: first son Donald Trump Jr., Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, presidential son-in-law and White House adviser Jared Kushner, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, former White House communications director Hope Hicks, former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, Trump confidante Roger Stone, and Trump’s ex-personal lawyer Michael Cohen.
Here are the 53 witness interview transcripts the House Intelligence Committee will vote Friday to release — including Kushner, Trump Jr., Hope Hicks, Roger Stone pic.twitter.com/JHJrDJ1QDO
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) September 27, 2018
Democrats on the panel had called for the release of the transcripts in the past, claiming they would show the majority only halfheartedly questioned witnesses. But now they are suspicious of the timing and scope of the move to release them.
“The GOP does not want ALL of the transcripts released and wish to conceal certain interviews from the public, including key interviews with [ex-FBI] Director [James] Comey, [National Security Director] Admiral [Mike] Rogers, [ex-CIA] Director [John] Brennan, and Rep. Rohrabacher. Apparently, the Majority does not want the public to see the testimony of these agency heads, as well as that of Rep. Rohrabacher,” Ranking Member Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said in a statement Friday. “This is not transparency, only a further subterfuge.”
The Democrats also failed to secure the authorized release of an interview transcript with Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, D-Fla.
All told, the House Intelligence Committee interviewed 73 people for its Russia probe.
In a recent interview, Nunes said he wanted the transcripts to be released to the public before the 2018 midterm elections. “We believe that the depositions that we took I think for nearly about 70 people, those need to be published and they need to be published, I think before the election … put out for the American people to review, so that they can see the work that we did and they can see all of the people that were interviewed by us and their answers to those questions,” he said on Fox News earlier this month.
The panel released their final report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election in April, concluding that there was no “collusion, coordination, or conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.” The report also cited “poor judgment and ill-considered actions by the Trump and Clinton campaign.”
Democrats accused Republicans of conducting an incomplete and misleading investigation and since it wrapped up have continued to conduct questioning on their own, including with Simona Mangiante Papadopoulos, the wife of former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, and Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie.
Democrats have said they additionally wish to interview Papadopoulos and former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, among others.
In his statement Friday, Schiff condemned the GOP majority in the committee for rejecting the “immediate release of all unredacted transcripts to Special Counsel Mueller, so that his team would have the benefit of the evidence they contain and so that he may determine which witnesses may have perjured themselves before our committee. They have no wish to assist in the Russia investigation by either our committee or the Special Counsel, and apparently wish to protect those witnesses who may have lied to protect themselves or the President.”
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation looking into Russia interference in the 2016 election and possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin is ongoing, as is the Russia inquiry being conducted by the Senate Intelligence Committee.
