If the FBI and DOJ fails to comply with the House Republicans’ subpoena request, after months of stonewalling and impeding the Congressional investigators, there will be daunting repercussions, House Oversight Committee Chairman Gowdy, R-S.C., warned Sunday.
Republicans have charged the DOJ and FBI are deliberately impeding their investigation into the the bureau’s handling of the Hillary Clinton email probe and the surveillance of the Trump campaign during the 2016 presidential election by refusing to avail more than a million documents the House Judiciary Committee has requested pertaining to probes.
The FBI and DOJ has justified the stonewalling and refusal to comply with the House GOP’s request, claiming the sensitive documents requires careful review before they are disseminated.
House Speaker Paul Ryan led a meeting Friday night with senior members of the DOJ and FBI, cautioining the Justice Department will face “the full panoply of constitutional weapons available to the people’s house,” including contempt of Congress.
“Under the heading of minor miracles, you had members of the House working on a Friday night,”Gowdy said. “Paul Ryan led this meeting. You had [House Intelligence Committee Chair] Devin Nunes, [House Judiciary Committee Chair] Bob Goodlatte, myself and everyone you can think of from the FBI and the DOJ, and we went item by item on both of those outstanding subpoenas.
And Paul made it very clear; there’s going to be action on the floor of the House this week if the FBI and DOJ do not comply with our subpoena request,” he continued. “So [Deputy Attorney General] Rod Rosenstein, [FBI Director] Chris Wray you were in the meeting, you understood him just as clearly as I did. We’re going to get compliance or the House of Representatives is going to use its full arsenal of constitutional weapons to gain compliance.”
“I don’t want the drama; I want the documents,” Gowdy added.
Gowdy also expressed disdain with FBI leadership in light of the damning DOJ IG report released Thursday, confirming FBI officials vowed to “stop” the Trump campaign and presidency.
“I don’t know what [Special Counsel Robert] Mueller has,” he said. “I do know this: that bias is so pervasive and everyone who has ever stood in front of a jury and had to explain it in a way will tell you it is the most miserable feeling in the world and I’ve never seen this level of bias.”
The IG report also delegitimized the FBI’s surveillance of the Trump campaign and the bureau’s accusations of Trump, Russian collusion, Gowdy argued.
“The only person in the universe who claims to have evidence of collusion is Adam Schiff and unlike any other secret he’s ever had, he’s never told anyone what evidence he has – there is no evidence of collusion,” he said. “Obstruction of justice? Good luck having your star witness being Jim Comey in any prosecution from shop lifting to obstruction of justice – good luck if that’s your star witness.
The IG does not exonerate Trump from the Russia probe, but “it certainly helps him,” Gowdy said.
“The same people, the same players that were involved in the Clinton probe, later moved to the Russia probe. John Brennan, who said [Trump] ‘should be in the dust bin of history.’” “Comey, who said ‘impeachment was too good of a remedy.’ Lorretta Lynch, who wanted Hillary Clinton to win. And then we’ve got Peter Strzok and Lisa Page — they presumed and pronounced Donald Trump’s guilt before the investigation even began.”
