In closed-door testimony before the House Judiciary Committee, former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks cited the chaos created by the Steele dossier as her reason not to accept opposition research from a foreign government if she were to again work on a political campaign.
In part of an exchange intended to highlight the recent controversial interview by President Trump, in which he said he would be open to accepting political dirt in 2020, Hicks made clear she still has some alignment with the president since leaving the White House.
Wednesday’s interview by the panel, led by longtime Trump foe Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., was primarily focused on special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible obstruction by President Trump and his associates.
The 273-page transcript, released Thursday, shows instances of Hicks snapping at the questions she faced — for instance, at one point she remarked to a lawyer representing the majority party, “we have this thing called Google now, so it’s certainly helpful, I guess, to have it all in one place,” when asked about opposition research from the opposing part, even when it is available to the public.
Meanwhile, Democrats were frustrated by the constant objections and appeared to fixate on former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, whom Hicks was rumored to have dated during the 2016 campaign.
After the White House asserted executive privilege over any information Hicks might have been asked to give related to her work in the Trump administration, Democrats came out of that deposition complaining about Hicks’ refusal to answer their questions while Republicans called it a “political stunt” and Trump said Hicks was put through “hell.”
In one tense back-and-forth, Norm Eisen, counsel for the House Judiciary Democrats, pressed Hicks on foreign interference, bringing up Trump’s July 2016 remarks calling on Russia to find emails from Hillary Clinton, his 2016 rival.
Hicks said that “was not a comment that was intended as an instructive or a directive to a foreign government” and characterized it as “a joke” and said it was “intended as a light-hearted comment.”
Pivoting, Eisen brought up Trump’s ABC interview with George Stephanopoulos from last week in which the president signaled an openness to accepting foreign assistance in the next president campaign. “Do you think that was a joke?” Eisen asked.
Hicks responded, “I don’t think that was a joke based on what I saw.”
Eisen asked Hicks whether she would “take foreign oppo information from a foreign government, if that were offered when working on a political campaign.”
“You know, knowing how much chaos has been sowed as a result of something like the Steele dossier, no, I would not,” Hicks replied.
The Steele dossier, which contained unverified claims about Trump’s ties to Russia and that former intelligence officials have said may have contained Russian disinformation, was used by the FBI in its investigations and in Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act applications targeting former Trump campaign associate Carter Page. It was put together by British ex-spy Christopher Steele while he was working for the opposition research firm Fusion GPS, which was being paid by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee through the Perkins Coie law firm.
In his line of questioning, Nadler focused almost exclusively on issues related to Lewandowski. Throughout the session, Lewandowski’s name was mentioned 68 times. Nadler even referred to Hicks as “Ms. Lewandowski” on three separate occasions until Hicks was forced to correct him. “My name is Ms. Hicks,” she said.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Hicks,” Nadler replied. “I’m preoccupied.”
It was Michael Wolff’s book, Fire and Fury, claimed that Hicks was romantically linked to Lewandowski. After the deposition, Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., who is not a member of the committee, said his sources in the room noted how “old, pervy” Democrats pressed Hicks about her love life.
Democrats asked Hicks about Trump’s directive to Lewandowski, outlined in Mueller’s report, to deliver a message directing Attorney General Jeff Sessions to “unrecuse” from the Russia investigation. Mueller’s team, which interviewed Hicks, found that she typed up Trump’s words. Hicks told the committee that she found the request “odd” but was blocked from providing much else information.
Hicks was accompanied by two private attorneys, three lawyers from the White House, and one lawyer from the Justice Department.
By the Democrats’ count, Trump’s lawyers entered 155 objections on the basis of “absolute immunity” for senior White House officials. “These interruptions are a gimmick designed to interfere with the Committee’s investigation,” said a press release from the House Democrats. They also claimed Hicks “confirmed that the Trump Campaign welcomed the Russian attack on the 2016 presidential election.”
The committee’s top Republican, Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, called the hearing a waste of time, accuses the Democrats of mischaracterizing Hicks’ words and pushed for Nadler to subpoena Mueller to testify.
“Eight hours and 273 pages later, we’ve learned nothing new from a witness who has been cooperating with this committee for months,” Collins said in a statement. “Ms. Hicks testified there was no collusion. She noted clearly when Democrats mischaracterized her words, and, ultimately, Ms. Hicks testified she doesn’t believe she provided any new information that she hadn’t already provided to multiple different bodies investigating the president. If Chairman Nadler were truly interested in gathering new facts, he would issue a subpoena to Robert Mueller, since no privileges or immunities would apply to his appearance or testimony, and Congress has yet to hear from him.”
Hicks, 30, is a former model who became a longtime employee at the Trump Organization prior to Trump’s presidential run. When Trump launched his campaign in 2015, Hicks worked as a press secretary and communications director for the successful effort, and served as the national press secretary for Trump’s presidential transition team in late 2016 and early 2017.
In the White House, Hicks served as director of strategic communications from January 2017 through September 2017 and as communications director from August 2017 until her resignation on March 29, 2018. She is now working at the Fox Corporation as its chief communications officer. Hicks told the committee that she has only spoken to Trump five to 10 times since leaving the White House, the most recent time being at a dinner in April during which she said they mainly reminisced about the campaign.
In closed-door congressional testimony in front of the House Intelligence Committee in February 2018, Hicks said she occasionally told “white lies” for Trump. She told the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday that she had “never been asked to lie about matters of substance or consequence.”
