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THE REPUBLICAN LEADER of the House investigation into Russian interference in the US election stepped aside today after being criticized for compromising the probe in visits to the White House.
Devin Nunes, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, had sought to turn the investigation away from Russia and toward President Donald Trump’s allegations that the previous Obama administration had abused its powers by spying on Trump and his advisers.
Rancor over this, and over Nunes’s sharing top secret intelligence reports with Trump but not members of his own committee, had driven the committee’s probe to a halt.
The committee was originally tasked with examining how Russia interfered in last year’s presidential campaign and whether any Trump aides or associates collaborated with Moscow.
Democrats accused Nunes of seeking to protect Trump by focusing on allegations of abuse by president Barack Obama’s staff.
Trump himself has repeatedly branded the idea that Russia may have helped him to victory in the November election as “fake news,” while demanding attention to whether Obama staff combed top secret intercepts to dig up information on Trump’s team.
Nunes said he was temporarily stepping aside from the probe to answer allegations made to Congress’s ethics body by Democratic groups that he had revealed classified information to the public.
“The charges are entirely false and politically motivated, and are being leveled just as the American people are beginning to learn the truth about the improper unmasking of the identities of US citizens and other abuses of power,” he said in a statement.
Getting ‘back on track’
Adam Schiff, the Democratic vice chairman of the committee, said Nunes’ move would allow the Russia probe to get “fully back on track.”
“The important work of investigating the Russian involvement in our election never subsided, but we have a fresh opportunity to move forward in the unified and nonpartisan way that an investigation of this seriousness demands,” he said.
Nunes’ move ends weeks of very public tensions between himself and Schiff that had draw criticism from all quarters of Congress.
The House panel is one of several bodies examining the Russia scandal. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been investigating the issue since June, when it became clear to US intelligence that the Russian government was behind hacks of Democratic Party communications and a misinformation campaign that targeted Trump rival Hillary Clinton.
In January, after the election, US intelligence chiefs said they had concluded that Russian President Vladimir Putin had masterminded the effort to damage Clinton.
In Congress, the House and Senate intelligence committees have been leading separate probes, and the open fight between Nunes and Schiff had raised concerns that the House investigation would be subsumed by politics.
Abuse of intelligence intercepts?
Nunes further raised doubts after he went to the White House on March 21 to view top secret files he said indicated abuse of intelligence by the Obama administration.
The files were intelligence intercepts of the communications of foreign officials, which were either with US officials, or mentioned their names. Under US privacy laws, the names of Americans in such intercept files have to be masked.
But Nunes said publicly he had discovered files where the names had been unmasked by unnamed Obama officials, and he took his discovery to Trump, while not sharing it with his committee.
The move appeared to boost Trump’s claims that Obama officials had misused intelligence powers to spy on Trump’s administration before and after the election.
“Trump Russia story is a hoax,” the president tweeted on 27 March.
The real story turns out to be SURVEILLANCE and LEAKING! Find the leakers.
While Democrats blasted Trump and his supporters for trying to change the direction of the investigation, Obama’s National Security Advisor Susan Rice added fuel to the fire on Tuesday when she acknowledged reports that she had done some of the unmasking.
Rice said what she had done was legal and was done as part of an intensified look into how Russia had interfered in the election.
“The allegation is that somehow Obama administration officials utilized intelligence for political purposes. That’s absolutely false,” she told MSNBC television.
“From basically August through the end of the administration (20 January) we were hearing more and more, getting more and more information about Russian interference in our electoral process. It was of grave concern,” she said.
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The photo doing the rounds of Housing Minister O’Brien socializing with Developers at a FF fund raiser tells us all where priorities are. Photos don’t lie
@Jim O’Sullivan: indeed, it doesn’t make any sense that economists are deriding these new policies!!!….. Are the govt being advised by the dogs on the street? Are they taking any advice from qualified people? Or is it vested interests? ……we deserve better either way
@Jim O’Sullivan: Fianna Fail are the proverbial Leopard.
@another one? what’s going on is the semi state sec:
You better believe they’re taking advice from those with the right qualifications. “It’s a big club” as George Carlin used to say, “and you ain’t in it”
4 billion for housing and feeding Ukrainians though
Is that all, really….nah!?
Sure that’s not far off what the likes of Ronans and McNamaras et al each got away with dumping on the books after the credit crash in 08. They then got paid munzo to manage/massage their NAMA portfolios, bought back in for a song and are since back at the high rollers table with few limits and only token liability!! C’est la guerre…. actuellement!
Whataboutery at it’s finest there.
Slava the BaNAMA Free State!
@: did you think up that all by yourself or did you do some research .. parrot
@: in fairness, now that draft dodging Ukrainian men are coming (40% of 18- 24 year olds arriving are males, the majority of whom would be eligible for the draft) we’ll probably need that four billion. Also, let’s not forget the fund will also provide for those seeking international protection arriving without documents from war torn countries like the UK, Belgium, France, Germany.
@: 4 billion of tax payers money is now whataboutery
@casio shock: not whataboutery that should read
@casio shock: Comparing giving it to developers to justify it is.
@Tomasso San Roque: can you point out the German, French Belgian or UK citizens that have claimed asylum in Ireland?
@Martin Mongan: who said anything about citizens from them countries arriving clown.
@Tomasso San Roque: you did. You specifically listed those countries
And as pictures circulate today of Darragh O Brien cosying up to his big developer buddies at another classic FF golf fundraiser you realise that things really haven’t changed at all since the crash and in the case of FF they never will.
@paulgurney:
Where any/all birdies or better are vultures and all/any worried looking bankers are bogies!
Maybe we could clamp down on the widespread tax evasion by landlords. Large landlords should be tax at a far higher rate. And small cash in hand landlords with every single room in the house split into multiple bed should be find massive amounts. We’ll see how quickly landlords register. Tax is paid and tenants at least get some form of relief….. it’s not tackled because there all at it in the government
@Nathen: stand on your own two feet.
Be interesting to see the comparison of percentage of landlords claiming their tax measure vs renters claiming theirs. I’d say a lot more renters will be furnished leases all of a sudden. This is not a country to be a renter in
Yea true but they had to do something and time will tell if these policys will work. A few million into a state ran construction company and apprenticipe scheme would have been good too
@Dan Danny: how inconsiderate of you towards BAM!
@Kieran Menon: A poor ole BAM is right, will they survive another Christmas
FFG have no interest in housing other than facilitating developers and privately owned foreign investment to gouge us . We pay mor for everything from mortgages to groceries than our so called EU counterparts
There are many people renting without the RTB knowing about it, there are also long term lettings where the landlord forgets to renew the registration after five years. Mentioning RTB when applying to a rental advert is often a sure way to guarantee that someone else will get the place.
Not registering is an all round win for landlords that can pretty much deprive the tenants of all rights because it’s not a proper tenancy. If the landlord dumps properly on the street and changes locks the tenant has nowhere to go.
Another issue is that SUSI when asking a mature student for proof of independent living won’t accept a tenancy agreement, only an RTB letter.
RTB would work better if the tenant did the registering, but it’s a way of extracting money from landlords to pay swivel servants.
Nonsense graph, the ‘wealth’ is not money sitting in the bank, it’s equity people have in their homes after paying mortgages for 15-20 years. Unless you’re willing to become homeless, it’s not available. House valuations now are still lower than 2006, when house buyers had to inflate mortgages borrowed to cover the huge stamp duty being charged at the time.
If they could look at how much it costs to actually build each house and analyse the extortion profit margins that people are gaining from them which is the root of the issue of unfordable houses!
But there is a policy here. It’s to continue to pump more money into demand side measures to ensure that prices continue to go up and up as they can’t countenance a fall in asset prices. The only problem with this is that it can only go on for so long and there will be a fall eventually one way or the other. Property owners have been prioritised over those who don’t own property who have been thrown to the wolves. That’s the calculation that has been made and they are hoping it will be enough to keep the current configuration or something close to it government at the next election.
Assets like a house are not cash in hand but my house is worth 400k and my mortgage is 80k left to pay very hard to feel sorry for most house owners above a certain age, maybe late 40s onwards
have your say