The House Intelligence Committee meets at 5 p.m. Monday in the Capitol, Byron York said at the Washington Examiner. And the committee could take a vote on releasing the controversial FISA memo that details abuses which have been called “worse than Watergate.”
According to York:
The meeting will give the committee its first opportunity to vote on the question of releasing the so-called “FISA abuse” memo that has captured Washington’s attention in recent days. Since the GOP holds a 13 to 9 advantage on the committee, the overwhelming likelihood is that if there is a vote, the panel will decide, along party lines, to release the memo.
At that point, York said, “House rules call for the committee to await a decision by the president on whether he supports or opposes release of the memo. President Trump has made clear he supports release, so the memo could be made public quickly.”
That doesn’t mean Democrats won’t do anything. York said that Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., will ask that a Democrat version of the memo be made available:
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
The public might also learn committee Democrats’ plans for a counter-memo. Ranking member Rep. Adam Schiff has accused Republicans of cherry-picking and distorting the intelligence underlying the GOP memo, and last Wednesday announced that Democrats would “draft our own memorandum, setting out the relevant facts and exposing the misleading character of the Republicans’ document.”
Schiff said that at Monday’s meeting he will move for a committee vote to make the Democratic memorandum available to all members of the House — a mirror image of the committee’s Jan. 18 vote to make the Republican memo available to the House.
It is unclear what the Republican majority’s reaction will be if Democrats produce a memo and demand a vote. Obviously, Democrats will not win if the two parties disagree, but it’s not clear what each side’s tactics will be.
We have a pretty good idea, but York concludes:
The next 72 hours could be critical in the case of the memo: a possible vote to release it, a presidential go-ahead, and, most importantly, public evaluation and analysis of its contents. Does it live up to some Republicans’ characterizations of it? Are Democratic criticisms accurate? Does its release, in fact, damage national security? It could be a very eventful week.
Much more, here…
Related:
- Calls grow for Trump to read FISA memo at State of the Union
- Schiff, Feinstein blame Russian bots for #ReleaseTheMemo hashtag, demand investigation
- ‘Worse than Watergate’: ‘Shocking’ memo allegedly reveals FISA abuse by senior FBI, DOJ officials
- Video of the Day: #ReleaseTheMemo because it’s #AboutToHitTheFan on #FISA, worse than Watergate
- CNN says Russians used Pokemon Go to meddle in our democracy
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