Democrat on House Intel Committee to Question Flynn over Russia

Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Getty
Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Getty

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) says he has a few questions for retired Gen. Michael Flynn, who resigned as President Donald Trump’s national security advisor last week.

Schiff, the top Democrat on both the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Select Committee on Benghazi, plans to question Flynn on his communication with Russia should he be forced to testify before Congress.

“I’d like to ask him whether that conversation he had with the Russian ambassador was a one-off conversation or there were others? Who in the White House instructed him to have those conversations? Whether he debriefed people in the administration after those conversations?,” Schiff said during a Sunday interview on ABC’s “This Week.”

He added, “Essentially, who was aware that he had reported falsely to the vice president, and then the vice president, in turn, had misled the American people?”

Reports alleging that Flynn had misled Vice President Mike Pence on discussions he had with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak before Trump took office surfaced in the media. However, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) ruled out any charges against him, “barring new information that changes what they know.”

Last week, 20 Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs Committee penned a letter to the committee’s chairman, Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA) urging him to call on Flynn to testify before them.

“We believe General Flynn must appear before the Committee, under oath as soon as possible,” they wrote. “General Flynn’s resignation leaves many questions unanswered about his and President Trump’s ties to Russia and wether American national security and intelligence operations have been compromised.”

The letter was signed by Democratic Reps. David Cicilline (D-RI), Brad Sherman (D-CA), Gregory Meeks (D-NY), Albio Sires (D-NJ), Gerald Connolly (D-VA), Theodore Deutch (D-FL), Karen Bass (D-CA), William Keating (D-MA), Ami Bera (D-CA), Lois Frankel (D-FL), Joaquín Castro (D-TX), Robin Kelly (D-IL), Brendan Boyle (D-PA), Dina Titus (D-NV), Norma Torres (D-CA), Thomas Suozzi (D-NY), Adriano Espaillat (D-NY), Ted Lieu (D-CA), Bradley Schneider (D-IL) and Tulsi Gabbard(D-HI).

In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News Friday, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R.-CA), a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Flynn was treated unfairly – and perhaps illegally – in the scandal that forced his resignation as Trump’s National Security Advisor.

President Trump has consistently denied attempts to tie him to Russia.

In October, following months of investigation into suspected foreign meddling in the U.S. election, Breitbart News reported that the FBI determined Trump did not have ties to the Russian government.

Follow Adelle Nazarian on Twitter and Periscope @AdelleNaz

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