Wednesday, January 31, 2018
WASHINGTON (AP)
In a remarkably public clash of wills with the White House, the FBI declared Wednesday it has "grave concerns" about the accuracy of a classified memo on the Russia election investigation that President Donald Trump wants released.
The FBI's short and sharp statement, its first on the issue, laid bare a Trump administration conflict that had previously played out mostly behind closed doors in meetings between top Justice Department and White House officials.
"As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy," the FBI said.
The agency's stance on the memo, conveyed in a two-paragraph statement, escalates the dispute and means that Trump would be openly defying his hand-picked FBI director by continuing to push for the memo's disclosure. It also suggests a clear willingness by FBI Director Christopher Wray, who in the early stretch of his tenure has been notably low-key, to challenge a president who just months ago fired his predecessor, James Comey.
The FBI statement came the day after Trump was overheard telling a congressman that he "100 percent" supported release of the four-page memo, which was drafted by Republicans on the House intelligence committee. The Republicans have said the memo reveals surveillance abuses by the FBI and the Justice Department in the early stages of the investigation into potential ties between Russia and the 2016 Trump presidential campaign.
Democrats have called the memo a "cherry-picked" list of GOP talking points that attempts to distract from the committee's own investigation into Russian meddling in the election that sent Trump to the White House.
The drama comes as special counsel Robert Mueller also is investigating whether the Trump campaign improperly coordinated with Russia during the campaign and whether Trump sought to obstruct the inquiry by, among other actions, firing Comey.
Under the House committee's rules, the president has five days to object to the memo's release, which the panel voted to authorize on Monday. But Trump himself already has urged the release, and it could come sooner. By late Wednesday, it had not yet been settled whether the White House or the committee would handle the actual release.
Earlier this week, Wray and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein made a direct appeal to White House chief of staff John Kelly not to release the memo, warning that it could set a dangerous precedent.