Devin Nunes, who was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee in 2020 when the members of Congress produced a report concluding America’s intelligence community completely lacked reliable evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to help President Donald Trump win in 2016, has charged that there’s been a grand Democrat conspiracy against Trump.
That wild Putin claim was used in the “Russiagate” lies about Trump and his campaign, and Nunes’ work now is a key reference point for investigators looking into how the nation’s intelligence officers actually came up with the allegations they adopted.
Nunes has suggested that parts of the scheme were the elements of Hillary Clinton’s email scandal, Robert Mueller’s Russiagate investigation that failed to produce evidence, the Democrats’ 2019 and 2021 failed impeach-and-remove attempts against Trump, the FBI’s 2022 search of Mar-a-Lago and more.
A grand jury, in Florida, now is reviewing the evidence.
“You have intentionality. And the question is, what was the goal here? … The intentionality was to disrupt and undermine the normal functioning of the American government,” charged Peter Schweizer, who made the comments during a recent joint appearance with Nunes on television.
A report at the Washington Examiner explains how the work of a grand jury, being run by U.S. Attorney Jason Reding Quinones, “has been building for months and now involves a large volume of compulsory process. More than 130 subpoenas have been issued as part of the inquiry, according to an NBC News tally, targeting a range of former intelligence and law enforcement officials tied to the Trump-Russia investigation.”
The result at this point is “renewed pressure” on Trump adversaries, as classified transcripts of a congressional interview with Barack Obama’s CIA chief, John Brennan, are being sent to prosecutors and ex-FBI chief James Comey has been subpoenaed.
The report explained the theory is that “starting during the Obama administration, top officials coordinated actions against Trump and his allies, stretching from the 2016 Russia investigation through criminal cases brought during the Biden administration. The investigation, centered in a Fort Pierce grand jury, is emerging as the administration’s clearest path to test that grand conspiracy case in court.”
It was Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard who last year declassified the work of Nunes’ committee.
Nunes told Fox, “This is a conspiracy that’s gone on for a decade. The victim in this is President Trump, his family, his associates, campaign members.”
The status of an “ongoing” enterprise is significant, as the criminal statute of limitations for many of the actual actions involved in the persecution of Trump have passed.
“But tying alleged crimes from 2016 to events that happened much more recently could allow prosecutors to build a case that includes evidence of a targeted effort to manufacture a criminal investigation into Trump based on fabricated Russian collusion allegations,” the report said.
Already, the report said, Brennan and ex-FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page had been under subpoena.
The grand jury has been working for weeks already, and now House Republicans have approved sending classified interview transcripts tied to Brennan to the DOJ at the department’s request.
Comey already was under subpoena, the report said.
Those two were senior Obama administration officials when the Russiagate lies were assembled and used against Trump.
“Trump allies have long argued the document was shaped by flawed or politically motivated intelligence, particularly surrounding the inclusion of material tied to the Steele dossier. CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Gabbard have both declassified evidence over the past year that supports those arguments,” the report said.
The unsupported conclusion that Putin supported Trump was one of the effects of the scheming, the report said. “At the same time, the CIA under Brennan sat on evidence that the Clinton campaign developed a plan in the summer of 2016 to create a controversy tying Trump to Russia for Clinton’s political advantage.”
Other politicized investigations into Trump followed, including the “Arctic Frost” agenda that attacked Trump for his First Amendment-protected statements about the 2020 election.
That later was used to support the failed special counsel cases brought by the anti-Trump special counsel Jack Smith.
Trump allies suggest all of those events show a “continuity” between the earlier intel community decisions to make false claims against Trump to later events that could result in a conclusion of a “criminal conspiracy.”
Ironically, some of those in the alleged conspiracy, like New York Attorney General Letitia James who accused Trump of fraud but saw an appeals court determine the penalty was unconstitutional, now is accused of fraud herself.
And Comey was accused of making false statements to Congress, and while a local judge dismissed the case, that decision is on appeal.
