All nine GOP members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) penned a letter to Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., lambasting him for hiding documents related to Democrats’ impeachment inquiry.
“We are concerned that the Majority is knowingly withholding Committee documents related to your so-called ‘impeachment inquiry’ from the Minority,” the letter reads. “…it has come to our attention that the Majority is not uploading (or providing physical copies of) certain Committee documents related to your ‘impeachment inquiry’ to its document repository, thus withholding the existence of such documents from the Minority.”
GOP HPSCI members counted 20 documents that have yet to be shared with the Minority. In the letter, the Minority requests the Majority release all documents to all committee members regardless of party identification.
GOP HPSCI members call this move unprecedented.
We expect that the Majority adhere to the Committee’s past precedents and that appropriately cleared staff have immediate access to all documents generated or received by the Committee related to your impeachment inquiry. We see no reason for your withholding of these documents except as a deliberate attempt to hinder the Minority’s participation.
Republican HPSCI members conclude by asking Schiff why the Intelligence Committee is investigating impeachment given the about-face he’s taken on the importance of a whistleblower complaint. Schiff abruptly moved from demanding the anti-Trump complainant testify to preventing the testimony, following reports that the complainant and Schiff’s staff had worked with each other prior to the complaint being lodged.
The result of the flip-flop, Republicans say, is that the inquiry no longer has jurisdiction within the important Intelligence Committee:
Further, given that you have recently acknowledged that the Committee no longer needs to receive testimony from the whistleblower, your ‘impeachment inquiry’ lacks any relationship with the jurisdiction of this Committee. As you are aware, the Committee was established to conduct crucial oversight of the Intelligence Community, and we are increasingly concerned our normal work is being overlooked in favor of partisan activities best suited for another Committee.
Schiff has previously been criticized for falsely claiming to have evidence that Trump had treasonously colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election.
