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Saturday, January 28, 2023

Giving Schiff the Boot

Background

House Speaker Andrew McCarthy, fulfilling a campaign promise, booted three Democrats from three committees yesterday. The reasons for each varied and have been mentioned but are worth laying out in full.

David Winston already did a great job going through the precedent argument, namely that McCarthy's action broke long-standing precedent. As Winston lays out in detail, this just isn't true, it was Nancy Pelosi who broke the precedent and McCarthy has acted differently from Pelosi in his application of this new power that Speaker Pelosi employed.

Firstly, it should be understood that while Pelosi kicked Marjorie Taylor Green and Paul Gossar off of all of their committees, preventing them from serving in any, McCarthy is blocking the three Democrats in question from one committee each, relevant to the criticisms against them. Also consider that the rationale used to prevent the Republicans from serving on committees were all based on their past rhetoric not any actions taken by them.

Adam Schiff

The case against Adam Schiff is made based on his actions during Trump's presidency--particularly the Russia collusion investigation and the impeachment trials. As the chair of the Intelligence Committee, Schiff had access to confidential information on a host of topics, and he used his access to persuade the country that there was proof of Trump's collusion. In one month, he went from "circumstantial evidence of collusion" and "direct evidence of deception" to "more than circumstantial evidence" which "would prompt a prosecutor to begin working with a grand jury." In sum, he used his position as Chair of the Intelligence committee, to amp up the charges against Trump and feed the media frenzy, despite the true evidence being well below what he suggested. He was a vital part in inflating the Trump-collusion bubble that popped when the Mueller Report was released. As an example of how he fed this frenzy, in the story covering Schiff's comments, CNN goes on to say "The tension on the Intelligence Committee comes a day after CNN reported that the FBI has information that may indicate associates of Trump communicated with suspected Russian operatives to possibly coordinate the release of information damaging to Hillary Clinton's campaign, according to US officials." demonstrating that Schiff likely timed his announcement to keep building up the story. This communication alluded to, was obviously mistaken.

As part of his endeavor, he also fought against any truth that damaged Democrats or helped Trump being revealed. He was adamantly opposed to releasing the Nunes Memo. For those who have forgotten, the Nunes Memo is where we learned that the Steele Dossier was the core of the Russia Collusion investigation and the warrants on Carter Page, and was paid for by the Clinton campaign. Read this hyperbolic coverage warning about the consequences of releasing it. Schiff himself warned releasing it would increase the "risk of a constitutional crisis." The FBI was obviously against releasing it because it showed how problematic their behavior had been. Why did Schiff? While some quibble over the details of exact accuracy.1

Finally, while he was Chair, oftentimes the subjects of his investigations would be interviewed and information gleaned that was supportive of his arguments would leak to the press, while the full interview, including information that contradicted his position would be sealed. It happened with Donald Trump, Jr. in December 2017, during Trump's first impeachment hearings, text messages from Kurt Volker were selectively leaked while the rest of his testimony was not, while the testimony of the inspector general was kept completely secret, Mark Meadow's text messages. And the accusations continue.2

In sum, Adam Schiff has shown himself to be a serial abuser of his power as Chairman of the Intelligence Committee and hence why nearly every Republican supports McCarthy's decision to exclude him from that committee.

Eric Swalwell

The case against Swalwell being on the Intelligence Committee is much more straight-forward. Republicans believe he is a security risk and exercised very poor judgment for someone in charge of national secrets by conducting a relationship with a Chinese spy. It was serious enough that the FBI provided a briefing to Pelosi and McCarthy on the subject. This NY Post article lays out almost all that is known. He definitely had a professional relationship with her, where she would donate money and advise him on personnel, and she definitely was a spy who had physical relations with others. It's notable that his defense of himself argues that he didn't break the law, he didn't share confidential information, and he cooperated with FBI once they told him about her. He does not deny a personal or physical relationship, however.

Ilhan Omar

The case against Omar is the weakest of the three, but also the most similar to the cases for Greene and Gossar. Omar is being excluded from the Foreign Affairs Committee. Her infractions comprise remarks she made which some consider antisemitic. She also argued that US and Israeli actions were as bad as those of Hamas and the Taliban. In my view, committee assignments should not be denied due to opinions, unless their truly egregious. Omar's, Greene's, and Gossar's comments do not rise to that level and they should be free to serve on any committee.

Footnotes

1 For example, the Nunes Memo contends the FISA application for the Carter Page warrant did not "disclose or reference the role of the DNC, Clinton campaign or any party/campign in funding Steel's efforts", the truth is that the application included a footnote that Steele was hired by an identified U.S. person to conduct research regarding "Candidate #1"'s ties to Russia and that the FBI "speculates" that this U.S. person was likely looking for information that could be used to discredit the Trump campaign. (taken from IG report p. 11). I would say that technically Nunes is correct, there's no specific mention of DNC or Clinton even using pseudonyms common in applications like "Opposition Party #1" or "Candidate #2". But detractors contend that referencing the goal of the source suffices. I suppose that's up for debate, but I think Nunes's memo is closer to accurate.

2 Note that this story doesn't mention the long history of leaks under Schiff's leadership.