Donald Trump Jr. Rebuffs Senate GOP Subpoena for More Russia Hoax Testimony
Donald Trump, Jr., President Donald Trump’s eldest son, is rebuffing a subpoena from the Senate Intelligence Committee attempting to compel him to testify again before Congress on the Russia hoax scandal, setting off a major internal battle inside the Republican Party.
“The Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee has subpoenaed Donald Trump Jr. to answer questions about his previous testimony before Senate investigators in relation to the Russia investigation, sources with direct knowledge told Axios,” Axios reported on Wednesday afternoon.
“It’s the first congressional subpoena — that we know about — of one of President Trump’s children,” Axios added. “The subpoena sets up a fight that’s unprecedented in the Trump era: A Republican committee chair pit against the Republican president’s eldest son.”
“We do not discuss the details of witness engagements with the Committee,” the Senate Intelligence Committee spokesperson said in a statement to Axios. “Throughout the investigation, the Committee has reserved the right to recall witnesses for additional testimony as needed, as every witness and witness counsel has been made aware.”
Despite the Senate Committee’s claim that it does not discuss witness engagements with the media, Breitbart News is aware of several reporters who were told of this by the committee in an effort to push this into the news in the wake of McConnell’s claim that the case is closed on Russia. These reporters are aware of who they are, and more investigation into the Senate Intelligence Committee leaks on this front is likely.
Attorney General Bill Barr, who testified last week before a different Senate panel, has come under serious criticism by Democrats in Congress for the way he has characterized the report. Nonetheless, most of the report is public despite some redactions and Barr’s characterizations of it are essentially immaterial at this stage. Indeed, Mueller himself apparently was not happy with the initial media coverage of Barr’s first letter on the top-line conclusions of the Mueller report–he made that clear to Barr in a letter and phone call–but did not find Barr’s four-page letter to be inaccurate in any way. Mueller’s full report, with redactions for different reasons including protecting ongoing case matters and grand jury proceedings, has since been released publicly, so Mueller’s objections to the original coverage are essentially a moot point now, the Department of Justice contends.
The move on Trump, Jr., by Senate Republicans also comes as House Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday moved to hold Barr in contempt of Congress over his refusal to appear last week before the committee and his refusal to provide the full un-redacted Mueller report to Congress despite the need to protect sources and methods and classified information. Barr did testify, however, before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week.
Chief among them is Burr, who is chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and has been in the wake of the Mueller report attempting to bring Trump, Jr., before his committee for more questioning. Trump, Jr., previously testified for more than 9 hours before the Senate Intelligence Committee, staying there until senators had no more questions to ask him and answering every single question senators had for him, while also producing hundreds of thousands of documents to Congress including more than 30,000 to this committee alone. Trump, Jr., also testified before two other congressional committees–totaling more than 22 hours of congressional testimony adding up to more than 1,000 pages of transcript. When it came to the Senate Intelligence Committee, too, Burr had previously agreed that Trump, Jr., would testify once–stay as long as senators needed answering all their questions until they had no more–and then that would be it and it would be over.
When Trump, Jr., and his attorneys–in light of all that substantial cooperation with Congress that found no wrongdoing by Trump, Jr., and the Special Counsel report clearing him of any allegations of wrongdoing–refused Burr’s requests for Trump, Jr., to appear again in contravention of Burr’s original promises that he would only have Trump, Jr., testify once, Burr moved to subpoena Trump, Jr. Burr’s behavior, a source close to Trump, Jr., told Breitbart News, will not be forgotten and will have deep wide-ranging consequences for all Senate Republicans.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/05/08/donald-trump-jr-rebuffs-senate-gop-subpoena-for-more-russia-hoax-testimony/