The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee has some concerns with relying on a select committee to investigate President Trump’s ties to Russia.
In an interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews Thursday evening Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., said he is “wide open” to a special prosecutor. But when it comes to a select committee, which has been floated by some prominent politicians, Warner didn’t seem to get on board.
“My concern with a select committee would be both sides would end up picking their most partisan members, and it would take them literally months to get where we are already,” Warner said, referring to the investigation by the Senate Intelligence Committee.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes stirred controversy on Wednesday when revealed that he shared information with Trump that was withheld from his committee.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., later remarked that it is “bizarre” that Nunes went to Trump, not his committee first, with the information about officials in his transition team — and perhaps Trump himself — having their identities “unmasked” after their communications were intercepted by U.S. intelligence officials. He called for a select committee or an independent commission. Former Vice President Joe Biden tweeted a shoutout to McCain on Thursday, calling for a select committee.
Other Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and House Intelligence ranking member Adam Schiff have also echoed the need for an independent investigation.
While the credibility of the House intelligence panel is now in question, the FBI and Senate Judiciary Committee also have their own investigations related to Russia. During the interview, Warner touted his own committee’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election as one that is successfully making headway.
“We are having a public hearing next week. We’ve started interviews, we’ve got a lot of folks that we got to talk to,” he said. “We got to get some additional information from a couple of the agencies, but we are doing this in a way that I think that is methodical and we will follow the intel wherever it leads and candidly, I was surprised as everybody else was about what Mr. Nunes did yesterday.”
Warner stressed caution because lawmakers owe the president “the benefit of the doubt.”
“That’s why we got to do this bipartisan, because no matter what we come up with, there’s going to be a whole lot of Americans that don’t believe our report unless we are transparent, unless we do it as much in public and also as long as we keep it bipartisan,” Warner said.
