Senate Intelligence Committee to provide Russia investigation update

Capitol Hill’s leading investigation into Russian election meddling in the 2016 election will gather next week to provide a public update on their inquiry, in addition to issuing a warning that foreign entities continue to pose a major threat to America’s political system.

On Wednesday, Oct. 4, the Senate Intelligence Committee will hold a press conference featuring committee chairman Sen. Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican, and vice chairman, Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, according to a statement by the committee.

While the probe has held multiple impromptu media availabilities after congressional hearings, next week’s update will be only its second official press conference, according to the committee.

The probe has thus far conducted more than 100 interviews spanning the Russia election meddling spectrum — from grilling fired FBI Director James Comey over his handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails to possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Kremlin to the Department of Homeland Security’s inability to reveal which states Russian hackers targeted during the 2016 polls.

Recent weeks have seen its members increase their scrutiny of social media companies Facebook and Twitter, as evidence continues to surface that Russian operatives appeared to manipulate the digital platforms to spread propaganda during the campaign. Earlier this month Facebook disclosed that roughly 3,000 ads were purchased by entities with apparent connections to the Kremlin.

After a closed-door hearing on Thursday with Twitter executives, Mr. Warner lashed out the firm for failing to properly explain how its 140-character platform had been prey to a massive disinformation campaign. The company’s presentation, he said, “showed an enormous lack of understanding from the Twitter team of how serious this issue is, the threat it poses to democratic institutions and again begs many more questions than they offered.”