House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said “it’s no surprise” that the Justice Department recommended to President Trump that he block the release of the Democratic memo without redactions.
“Along with other Intelligence Committee Republicans, I had warned that the Democratic memo contains many sources and methods,” Nunes said in a statement late Friday. “Ranking Member [Adam] Schiff pledged to seek the input of the Department of Justice and FBI regarding the memo’s public release, and it’s no surprise that these agencies recommended against publishing the memo without redactions.”
In a letter transmitted to the House Intelligence Committee late Friday, White House counsel Don McGahn explained Trump was “inclined to declassify” the memo, but he wouldn’t be doing so over national security concerns, following a review by top spy and law enforcement officials, including Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, FBI Director Christopher Wray, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
McGahn also said Trump directed the Justice Department to give “technical assistance” to the intelligence committee if they decide they want to “revise” the memo to “mitigate the risks identified,” and that the White House is ready to review any new draft offered in the future.
Nunes indicated his support for this process and the eventual release of the Democratic memo with the proper redactions.
“Intelligence Committee Republicans encourage the minority to accept the DOJ’s recommendations and make the appropriate technical changes and redactions so that no sources and methods are disclosed and their memo can be declassified as soon as possible,” Nunes said.
Democrats raged Friday at what they view to be a double standard by Trump for declining to release the memo prepared by Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee. Democrats say their 10-page memo provides much-needed context and details missing from the GOP memo released last week, despite protests from Democrats, the DOJ, and the FBI, which details alleged surveillance abuse by the U.S. government.
In a statement after Trump’s decision, Schiff, the California Democrat who spearheaded the minority party’s memo, decried the move and said Democrats on the House intelligence panel will “be reviewing the recommended redactions from DOJ and FBI,” pointing to possible concerns over “sources and methods.”
Earlier in the week, after the House Intelligence approved the release of the Democratic memo, pending Trump’s OK, Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., an instrumental member of the panel who helped put the GOP memo together, suggested that Democrats may have purposely included classified or sensitive information in their report.
“I think the Democrats are politically smart enough to put things in the memo that require either the [FBI] or the Department of Justice to say it needs to be redacted. Therefore, it creates this belief that there’s something being hidden from the American people,” Gowdy told Fox News. “Unfortunately, we are in an environment where you would include material that you know has to be redacted and you know responsible people are going to redact just so that questions will be asked.”
Schiff called this notion Republican “spin.”
“It sets the context. And there’s a lot we left out,” he told Bloomberg News. “So, I’m not surprised they would like to see some omitted from our response.”
