Mistrust, anger and charges of skulduggery between Democrats and Republicans have hobbled the House Intelligence Committee’s Russia investigation for months. Hope Hicks and a pair of frustrated senators may have finally broken it. There are new signs that Republicans may soon conclude a probe that Democrats call far from complete following Wednesday’s testimony by President Donald Trump’s confidante, Hicks. Leaks revealed that Hicks had admitted to sometimes telling white lies on Trump’s behalf — a fact that Republicans called an unfair distortion of the departing White House communications director’s testimony. The next day, House Speaker Paul Ryan’s office confirmed that the top two members of the Senate Intelligence Committee paid an extraordinary visit to Ryan to express their “concerns” about how the House panel is operating — and, according to one report, to accuse Republicans of their own dishonest leaking.
“I want [the House investigation] to end, because we have gone off the rails of being able to objectively do our job,” Rep. Tom Rooney (R-Fla.) said Friday. Rooney said other GOP committee members agree with him, though he did not name them.
The partial leak of Hicks’ testimony “was the tipping point for me,” Rooney said, adding he had “finally come to the realization that we are not going to put together any kind of a bipartisan product that’s going to help the national security apparatus we oversee or to find out objectively what happened in the last election.”
Full Article: ‘Off the rails’: House Russia probe hits new low – POLITICO.