Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., announced on Sunday he is ready to send eight criminal referrals to the Justice Department next week related to the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation.
“We’re prepared this week to notify the attorney general that we’re prepared to send those referrals over and brief him if he wishes to be briefed,” Nunes said on Fox News.
The ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee has been teasing a referral of Justice Department and FBI officials for months and previously predicted its delivery by the end of last week.
However, Nunes backed away from that deadline, hinting that his team of investigators found more people, potentially up to two dozen, who could be connected to a criminal referral. Nunes said on “Sunday Morning Futures” that the people ensnared in his eight-person referral “may not be all of them.”
Nunes did not disclose any names, but he did break down three categories in which they fall.
“Five of them are what I would call straight up referrals so just referrals that are, that name someone and name the specific crimes. Those crimes are lying to Congress, misleading Congress, leaking classified information,” Nunes said.
The other three, he said are more complicated, related to charges of conspiracy to lie to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
“There are three that I think are more complicated so you mentioned conspiracy. So the question on conspiracy is what, there’s the conspiracy statute, and then what do they need to look at under that statute. So on the first one, is FISA abuse and other matters we believe there is a conspiracy to lie to the FISA Court, mislead the FISA court by numerous individuals that all need to be investigative and looked at,” Nunes said. “The second conspiracy one is involving manipulation of intelligence. That also could [involve many] many Americans and we are, so that’s kind of the second one. As you know, we’ve had a lot of concerns with the way intelligence was used.”
The third referral Nunes called a “global leak referral.”
That “global leaker “could be spelled S-C-H-I-F-F.
More at the Washington Examiner
