Trey Gowdy: House Oversight opening investigation into Rob Porter’s White House employment

Gowdy was asked during an interview on CNN whether the committee would be opening an investigation into the White House’s handling of Porter’s employment, as well as who in the White House knew of the allegations of domestic violence made by two of Porter’s ex-wives and when they became aware of the accusations.

The South Carolina Republican told CNN the committee “did last night.”

“You can call it official. You can call it unofficial. Those words don’t mean anything to me. What means something to me is I’m going to direct questions to the FBI that I expect them to answer,” Gowdy said. “If they don’t answer them, then they’re going to need to give me a really good reason. You’ll learn that reason, and you can judge whether or not it’s a sufficient reason or not.”

Gowdy said he is not only troubled by the fact that Porter had been working with an interim security clearance for his year-long tenure at the White House, but is more concerned the Trump administration employed someone who faced allegations of domestic violence.

“The security clearance is a separate issue. It’s an important issue, but separate,” Gowdy said. “How do you have any job if you have credible allegations of domestic abuse? Again, I am biased towards the victim. I spent two decades believing them. But you don’t have to be biased towards the victim to ask, ‘How in the hell did this happen?'”

Two of Porter’s ex-wives told the FBI in January 2017 during interviews as part of Porter’s background check he had abused them during their respective marriages.

During a hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray told lawmakers the White House received the results from Porter’s completed background check in July.

“The FBI submitted a partial report on the investigation in question in March and then a completed background investigation in late July,” Wray said. “Soon thereafter, we received requests for follow-up inquiry and we did the follow-up and provided that information in November. And then we administratively closed the file in January. And then earlier this month we received some additional information and we passed that along as well.”

Porter resigned last week, and his departure has roiled the White House as many have begun questioning which White House officials knew about the allegations and when.

Gowdy said he is “troubled by almost every aspect” of the controversy surrounding Porter, and would be interested in hearing from White House counsel Don McGahn and White House chief of staff John Kelly about the extent of their knowledge of the allegations against Porter.

The South Carolina Republican sent a letter to Kelly on Wednesday asking for information about the White House’s policies related to issuing interim security clearances for White House personnel, as well as whether those procedures were followed regarding Porter’s interim and final security clearance.

Gowdy also asked for the date on which any employee in the White House learned of “potential derogatory or disqualifying information” on Porter.