The investigation into Donald Trump’s RussiaGate scandal is back on track.
On Friday, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence announced that it sent letters inviting the testimony in regards to Russia’s active measures during the 2016 campaign of FBI Director James Comey, National Security Adviser Admiral Mike Rogers, former CIA Director John Brennan, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates.
Comey and Rogers were invited to a closed hearing on May 2, and Brennan, Clapper and Yates were invited to an open hearing to be scheduled after May 2nd, according to the press release sent to PoliticusUSA.
“Back on track: sent letters with @ConawayTX11 inviting Comey, Rogers, Brennan, Clapper and Yates to testify before House Intel Committee,” Ranking Member of the House Intelligence Committee Democrat Adam Schiff wrote, sharing the letter.
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Yates is the big news here, as it was a hearing that she was scheduled to testify at that was abruptly canceled by Devin Nunes. Yates is the person who told the Trump White House about Mike Flynn, and it is her testimony that the Trump administration tried to squash.
As the United States slowly works its way into maybe investigating Russia’s interference in the U.S. election, an act of modern war, Russia is pushing fake news via social media in France in the lead up to the French presidential election.
The Kremlin’s goal wasn’t to get Donald Trump elected. Their goal is to undermine Western Democracy and the united front from the U.N. Russia saw Donald Trump as “soft” on Russia, and therefore a much better choice for them than Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, both of whom were much tougher on Russia than Trump is.
Moscow’s goal requires many steps, one of which is to make Americans question their news, question reality, until they give up and disengage. That’s one reason why Donald Trump, who seems to follow the Kremlin’s playbook rather directly, keeps calling the news here “fake news.”
The news isn’t fake. Developing stories, like this Russia story for example, are full of twists and turns, clarifications, corroborations, detours, and wrong turns. That’s not fake news. That’s called gathering evidence, checking it against other known facts, and being very careful to let the facts dictate the story instead of the other way around.
The testimony of leading intelligence experts on Russia’s interference in the 2016 election is just another step forward in an excruciatingly long process. And another step forward to determining if indeed Donald Trump and his associates colluded with Russia as has been alleged multiple times now by credible sources.
Donald Trump will keep distracting the media, but the investigation into Russia’s interference in the election is so much bigger than Donald Trump. This shouldn’t be a partisan issue – it’s a patriotic issue, it’s a matter of national security and the foundation of western democracy.
We can’t afford to let Republicans derail this investigation.
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Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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