Ranking Democrat of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, on Sunday said the FBI director has increasingly started to work with his group’s investigation into Russia’s role in hacks during the 2016 presidential election.
“I have been critical of the FBI and their willingness to cooperate in the investigation. I can say that’s changed. I’m very pleased with the level of cooperation we’re getting from the FBI. I hope that continues. There’s more to be ironed out. But it’s moved in a positive direction,” Schiff told George Stephanopoulos, host of ABC’s “This Week.”
The California lawmaker had told reporters on Capitol Hill 10 days earlier that the committee charged with probing any connection between President Trump’s campaign and Russia knew “less than a fraction of what the FBI does.”
“I appreciate we had a long briefing and testimony from the director today, but in order for us to do our investigation in a thorough and credible way, we’re going to need the FBI to fully cooperate, to be willing to tell us the length and breadth of any counterintelligence investigations they are conducting,” Schiff said on March 2. “At this point, the director was not willing to do that.”
Despite the FBI’s cooperation, Schiff said he is still concerned about the committee reaching a collective conclusion and hopes a March 20 briefing by FBI Director James Comey continues the new line of open communication Democrats have recently seen.
“To be honest, George, I don’t know whether we’ll be able to conduct it to its completion — if we’ll have the bipartisan cooperation we need,” Schiff said. “We’re being walled off from certain areas of investigation. … One of the significant obstacles we’ll have is whether we have the resources to do it in the way we should. For that reason, think we should have an independent commission.”
Schiff did not rule out the need for Trump’s tax returns as part of the committee’s investigation. He called for the documents to be disclosed if “evidence leads in that direction.”
Schiff deflected from Stephanopoulos’ question of whether he has seen any evidence of Trump colluding with Russia, but did state he has not seen proof former President Barack Obama’s administration wiretapped the Republican’s campaign headquarters last fall.
