Grassley Probing FBI ‘Political Bias’ In Flynn Investigation

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa,  makes a statement during the second day of a confirmation hearing for Attorney General-designate, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2017. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen)
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, makes a statement during the second day of a confirmation hearing for Attorney General-designate, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., on Capitol Hill in Washingt... Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, makes a statement during the second day of a confirmation hearing for Attorney General-designate, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2017. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen) MORE LESS
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

Less than a week after former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn entered a plea deal admitting that he lied to FBI agents, Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) indicated he was opening a probe into the “reported bias” of an agent said to be involved in Flynn’s questioning, as well as in the FBI’s Clinton email investigation.

Grassley sent a letter dated Tuesday t0 FBI Director Chris Wray seeking communications and records related to the agent, Peter Strzok. His request comes as a handful of Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee, where Wray is scheduled to testify Thursday, amped up their own calls for an investigation into the “unprecedented bias” against President Trump at the FBI.

Strzok, it was reported over the weekend, was booted from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team this summer after it was discovered that he sent texts expressing “anti-Trump political views,” as the New York Times described them. The revelation came as part of an inspector general probe into the Justice Department’s handling of the matters related to the 2016 election, according to the Times.

Grassley’s letter, which was made public Wednesday, noted his previous request to interview Strzok, a request to which Grassley said he had yet not received a response from Justice Department. (The DOJ confirmed to TPM separately earlier this week that Strzok had been cleared for an interview with the House Intelligence Committee, whose chairman, Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) has been threatening to hold top Justice Department officials in contempt of Congress.)

Grassley’s letter went on to request an assortment of records related to Strzok’s reported involvement in the Clinton email probe, the FBI’s Russia investigation and “All communications sent to, received by, or copying Mr. Strzok containing unfavorable statements about Donald J. Trump or favorable statements about Hillary Clinton.” Grassley is also seeking documents related to the FBI’s interview of Flynn, which Fox News reported Tuesday Strzok oversaw, as well as Strzok-related records concerning Christopher Steele, the ex-British spy who put together the Trump-Russia dossier.

Congressional Republicans are joining Trump in their interest in scrutinizing Strzok. After this weekend’s reports, Trump retweeted a tweet calling on Wray to “clean house,” while tweeting himself that the FBI’s reputation was “in Tatters.”

Read the full Grassley letter below:

Notable Replies

  1. Avatar for sjk sjk says:

    Political bias? While felonies are being committed hourly by the White House and its regime of criminal family and cronies?

  2. Avatar for eloise eloise says:

    I assume it will also include the FBI agents who were clearly pro-Trump and were leaking information about the Clinton investigation to Rudy Giuliani.

  3. Fuck off, Mr. “Booze and Women.”

  4. Karma baby! The FBI would be sitting fat and pretty if they’d laid off their real biases, against Clinton, and Comey had acted with a shred of professionalism. If the FBI is listening let me say:

    Fuck you. I don’t believe for a minute you waited for a subpoena to look at the email on that laptop. It ludicrous to believe a gang like you sat there with a laptop loaded with HRC email and waited to do things right. Fuck that. You knew long before the Trump loving Comey wrote his “letter” that Weiner’s laptop was a bust and the only game you had left was exactly the one you played. Feigned concern.

    The FBI’s getting what it deserves. I don’t care that it’s for all the wrong reasons just so long as that agency gets brought back to planet earth. So let what they thought was their Buds have at them. Fucking idiots thay must be to think the GOP is loyal to anybody.

  5. Don’t look too hard at the NY branch office, Chuck. You wouldn’t want to expose all of Giuliani’s pals when they could provide useful dirt in 2020.

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

20 more replies

Participants

Avatar for system1 Avatar for eloise Avatar for richardinjax Avatar for sysprog Avatar for clunkertruck Avatar for micaiah Avatar for sniffit Avatar for explainer Avatar for go2goal Avatar for zosimoff Avatar for jhand Avatar for serendipitoussomnambulist Avatar for benthere Avatar for wagonmound Avatar for sjk Avatar for edhedh Avatar for canary02 Avatar for tiowally Avatar for katscherger Avatar for coprophagoussmile Avatar for moniker Avatar for plebeian

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: