Chaffetz: I don't understand why Adam Schiff continues to have a security clearance
Fox News contributor Jason Chaffetz and Andy McCarthy react to House Intelligence transcripts on Russia probe.
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The internal memos released from the FBI’s investigation of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn represent a “smoking gun” against the FBI under James Comey's leadership, former House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz said Monday.
“I do think it is the smoking gun,” Chaffetz told “America’s Newsroom's" Ed Henry.
Chaffetz recalled a meeting - before President Trump was inaugurated - involving President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, former National Security Adviser Susan Rice, Comey and Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates in which they discussed matters "very specific to General Flynn.”
Chaffetz also said FBI agents went to the White House to interview Flynn without clearance and without abiding by protocol.
“It’s hard to believe that there is anything other than direct acknowledgment and direction from the president of the U.S. to the FBI director, who then does things a couple of weeks later that is totally unprecedented in storming, in that the White House, putting this ambush together, and going after General Flynn like we’ve never seen before,” Chaffetz said.
Meanwhile, President Trump on Sunday intensified his criticism of former President Obama by tying him to the Flynn investigation and blasting his predecessor's recent criticism aimed at his administration's coronavirus response.
Last week, Attorney General William Barr’s Justice Department dismissed the case against Flynn, Trump's first national security adviser. Trump, along with some other Republicans, claimed the decision was an example of a plot by Democrats to remove him from office.
Trump retweeted Eli Lake, a columnist at Bloomberg, who said he’s been reviewing the recently released interview transcripts in the collusion investigation. Lake wrote, “It’s now clear why every Republican on [Rep. Adam Schiff’s] committee in 2019 called for his resignation. He knew the closed door witnesses didn’t support his innuendo and fakery on Russia collusion.”
Chaffetz said “what bugs him” was that the FBI did not give the incoming president the “courtesy and respect” of giving him a “one-on-one” defensive briefing.”
“They totally bypassed that,” Chaffetz said. “That is fundamentally and totally wrong, and shame on Barack Obama for doing that.”
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Chaffetz also said that “at the core, the thing that scares Obama and Biden is the truth.” He touted Barr and U.S. Attorney John Durham for leading an investigation that's coming closer to uncovering what happened.
“The more that’s revealed, the more nefarious this is, the more fundamentally wrong it is. If it were the other way on the Democrats, they would be screaming bloody murder, but they’re such hypocrites in this situation.”
Fox News' Edmund DeMarche contributed to this report.
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