Kansas Secretary of State and gubernatorial candidate Kris Kobach says the memo released by the House Intelligence Committee is “almost identical to Watergate” but “ten times bigger.”
In an interview with Breitbart News’s Deputy Political Editor Amanda House on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Saturday, Kobach said the released memo — which uncovered alleged abuse by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Justice Department — raises “huge questions” about senior officials at the FBI.
KOBACH: Well you know we often attach the suffix “gate” to just about any political scandal, but this political scandal is almost identical to Watergate in multiple respects and it’s ten times bigger. This is a scandal in the middle of a presidential election; it’s a scandal involving the collection of information by the side in power against the opposing campaign. And it’s a scandal that involved multiple levels of cover-ups. But the amazing thing is, the current scandal is one where you have the tools of the surveillance state, the FBI, being used against the other party.
In Watergate, it was just five burglars who were not government employees who had been hired by the Nixon campaign. Here you’ve got the actual surveillance being done by the government itself. And you know, it raises huge questions about the whole FISA court, the whole FISA process, and the political leanings of very senior people at the FBI and the Department of Justice who abused this power. There was no similar question of our surveillance state abusing its power in Watergate. So it’s a very similar scandal but very much more significant consequences.
In a Breitbart News column, Kobach said the memo scandal made Watergate “look like child’s play,” writing:
They bear little similarity to the circumstances of the actual Watergate scandal itself. But the House Intelligence Committee memorandum on the abuses of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) by the Obama FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) sheds light on a scandal that is strikingly similar to Watergate. Only it is far more sinister.
Both scandals occurred in the middle of a heated presidential campaign. In Watergate, President Richard Nixon was seeking re-election against Sen. George McGovern (D-SD). In FISA-gate, Hillary Clinton was seeking to retain Democrat control of the White House against Donald Trump.
As Breitbart News reported, the findings of the memo revealed, among other things:
- The anti-Trump dossier funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee formed an “essential” part of the initial and all three renewal surveillance applications against Trump campaign adviser Carter Page;
- The political origins of the dossier were “known to senior DOJ and FBI officials,” but those origins were not included in applications to obtain the warrant;
- Also used to justify the surveillance warrants against Page was a news story supposedly corroborating the dossier that was pushed by the dossier author Christopher Steele himself — yet the FISA application incorrectly says Steele did not provide the information in the article;
Listen to Kobach’s full interview here:
Breitbart News Saturday airs on SiriusXM’s Patriot channel 125 from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Eastern (7:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. Pacific).
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.