The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee will meet Thursday behind closed doors with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein rather than drag the attorney general and FBI director before the the committee to testify about their failure to turn over subpoenaed documents related to the ongoing Russia investigation.
Rep. Devin Nunes will sit down Thursday with Mr. Rosenstein to talk about ongoing negotiations regarding what information the Justice Department will provide in response to the subpoenas, according to a Justice Department official, marking the first time the two men have met as part of the discussions.
The California Republican is seeking documents that would explain the Justice Department’s and FBI’s relationships with former British spy Christopher Steele, who authored an unsubstantiated and salacious dossier of President Trump’s supposed activities in Russia, as well as any copies of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act applications that relied upon information provided by Mr. Steele.
He submitted a pair of subpoenas in August seeking the documents, but after an initial deadline passed without any documents provided, Mr. Nunes threatened to drag Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director Chris Wray before the committee to explain why the information had not been handed over.
The House committee’s website initially indicated that a “document production” hearing was scheduled for Thursday. A notice on the website not indicates that the hearing has been postponed and “will be rescheduled for a later date.”
The discussion comes as Special Counsel Robert Mueller and numerous congressional probes are examining Russian meddling with the presidential election and the possibility of collusion with members of the Trump campaign. The simultaneous progression of the probes has at times led to tension between the Justice Department and congressional investigators.
The last deadline issued by Mr. Nunes in connection with the subpoenas was Sept. 14. His spokesman has declined to comment on any back and forth with the Justice Department.
Meanwhile a DOJ spokeswoman has said that while discussions are ongoing, officials “have asked that the subpoenas that had compliance dates continue to be on hold.”
Republican lawmakers have sought to understand more about how Mr. Steele’s 35-page dossier was compiled and how law enforcement used it in their Russia investigation. Meanwhile, Democrats have been critical of the line of inquiry, saying it’s a distraction from the real matters under investigation.
Mr. Steele was paid to assemble the dossier by Fusion GPS, an opposition-research firm that was commissioned to collect intelligence on Mr. Trump. The investigation was reportedly initially financed by a Republican donor who opposed Mr. Trump’s nomination, but later backed by Democrats.
The dossier was circulated among top Washington officials for months, with Sen. John McCain passing the documents along to the FBI for investigation before they were eventually published by Buzzfeed in January. Mr. Trump vehemently denied the allegations contained in the dossier.
According to former CIA Director John Brennan, the FBI made efforts to understand whether or not the information contained in the dossier was valid, but he said the dossier was not relied upon as a basis for the intelligence community’s assessment of Russian interference in the election.
• Andrea Noble can be reached at anoble@washingtontimes.com.
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