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House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) held a news conference on March 30, about their ongoing investigation into links between the Trump campaign and Russian officials. He said that claims of incidental collection "will not distract us from the Russia investigation." (Reuters)

Rep. Adam Schiff (Calif.), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, accused both the White House and the Republican chairman of the Intelligence Committee of attempting to distract from the congressional investigation into whether Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election.

Last month, Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) made a point of racing to the White House to brief President Trump on intelligence he had viewed that, he said, showed that some Trump campaign officials had been caught up in the governments surveillance of foreign nationals and that their identities had perhaps been improperly unmasked.

News reports later revealed, however, that at least three senior White House officials were involved in handling the intelligence information that Nunes had received prompting an outcry from Democrats, and even some Republicans, that Nunes had politicized his committee and was simply acting on behalf of the president to try to buttress Trumps earlier claims, on Twitter, that former president Barack Obama had wiretapped Trump Tower during the election campaign.

So far, the White House has been unable to provide any evidence to support the president's assertion.

Lawmakers of both parties on April 2 faced new questions on congressional probes of Russian meddling in the 2016 election after Michael Flynn, President Trump's former national security adviser, offered to testify in exchange for immunity. (Bastien Inzaurralde/The Washington Post)

Speaking Sunday on CNNs State of the Union, Schiff said Nunes and the White Houses actions proved that they were trying to distract from the broader question of what role, if any, Russia had played in the U.S. election.

It certainly is an attempt to distract and to hide the origin of the materials, to hide the White House hand, Schiff said. The question is, of course, why? And I think the answer to the question is this effort to point the Congress in other directions, basically say, Don't look at me, don't look at Russia, there is nothing to see here. You know, I would tell people, whenever they see the president use the word fake, it ought to set off alarm bells. And I think that is really what has gone on here.

Schiff, who last week went to the White House to view the same intelligence files Nunes had originally seen, also disputed the administrations claim, including from press secretary Sean Spicer, that the files were produced in the ordinary course of business.

Well, the question for the White House and for Mr. Spicer is the ordinary course of whose business? Because, if these were produced either for or by the White House, then why all of the subterfuge? There's nothing ordinary about the process that was used here at all.

[The Trump White House is in deep legal trouble, according to Trumps own standards]

Schiff also said that he has a very healthy skepticism of former national security adviser Michael Flynn's offer to cooperate with congressional investigators in exchange for immunity.

There is a lot we need to learn before entertaining anything like this, Schiff said. We don't want to do anything that will interfere in any case that the Justice Department may decide to bring. We also have to determine whether he really can add value to our investigation, whether we need him to learn information we can't learn from other sources. So, it's very early, I think, even to be considering this.

Asked about Nunes's original claim, that some Trump campaign officials were improperly unmasked in intelligence documents, Schiff declined to comment. At this point, I can't say whether anything was masked or unmasked improperly, he said.

And he also said he was not prepared to answer one of the central questions his committee is investigating: whether Trump campaign officials colluded with Russians to damage Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and her campaign.

I don't think we can say anything definitively at this point, Schiff said. We are still at the very early stage of the investigation. The only thing I can say is that it would be irresponsible for us not to get to the bottom of this.

Originally posted here:
Top Democrat on intelligence panel accuses White House of trying to distract Congress from Russia investigation - Washington Post

The Democrat gunning to unseat Sen. Ted Cruz in Texas is ripping a page straight out of the playbook of Sen. Bernie Sanders, framing himself as an outsider who wants to harness the grassroots and eradicate the corrupting scourge of money in politics.

Texas Rep. Beto ORourke, a mop-haired 44-year-old El Paso native first elected to the House in 2012, embarked on a four-city tour of Texas on Friday to launch his underdog campaign against Cruz, who is up for re-election next year.

Throughout the day, ORourke talked up his people driven campaign for Senate, eschewed big money and party labels and emphasized job creation. He even dropped a few f-bombs in front of a crowd of beer-drinkers at a bar in Dallas.

As Democrats continue soul-searching over the future of a fractured party lacking a coherent message, ORourke is trying to present the image of a candidate who ignores the rules of conventional politics. The particulars of his Senate bid -- the site of his campaign headquarters, for example -- remain up in the air. But what is clear is that the Spanish-speaking Democrat is working hard to show voters he wont take marching orders from the D.C. establishment.

ORourke in the Longworth House Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 26, 2013

MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images

I dont know about the Democratic Party right now, but anytime we are waiting for someone out of central headquarters, waiting to figure something out, we might as well give up, ORourke told CBS News. I just know what Im hearing in Texas, and what I feel as a Texan. There are too many people who want to work and who are skilled and cant find that work.

ORourke chatted by phone Friday as he boarded a commercial flight to Dallas, where he would meet supporters in the crowded backyard of a local brew house. No Democrat has won a statewide race in Texas in since 1994, but ORourke sounded bullish on his ability to connect with voters in a highly partisan environment.

People want a full-time senator. Someone focused on this state -- not on running for President, he said. Someone who puts country before party and isnt chasing big money, and believes public service is a calling and not a career.

ORourke pledged to serve a maximum of two terms in the Senate, echoing the vow he made to serve no more than four terms in the House.

He didnt hesitate when asked to say something nice about Cruz, a conservative provocateur who revels in eliciting scorn from both sides of the aisle. (Cruzs chilly reputation among his Senate colleagues fueled joking accusations throughout the 2016 presidential campaign that he was in fact the Zodiac Killer.)

Ive met [Cruz] and I think he is a nice guy, ORourke said. I think he did a terrific job running for president and almost won the nomination, but did it at the expense of Texas and a Senate seat that should have been focused on the people of this state.

Hes a phenomenal campaigner and a smart guy, he added.

Jeff Roe, Cruzs 2016 campaign manager, wasted no time in attacking ORourke on Twitter after he announced his candidacy, calling him more liberal than [Wendy Davis].

Davis, a former Texas state senator who gained national attention for filibustering an anti-abortion bill, ran for governor in 2014 with the backing of many national Democrats. She was crushed when voters went to the polls, losing to now-Gov. Greg Abbott by more than 20 points.

ORourke does have one thing in common with Cruz: Hes a social media obsessive who believes in the power of the internet to connect directly with voters.

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Rep. Will Hurd (R-TX) and Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-TX) hit the road Tuesday after snow canceled their flights back to D.C. They took advantage of th...

His social media persona is part of his strategy. ORourke made headlines last month when he embarked on an impromptu 1,600-mile, 36-hour road trip from Texas to Washington with Republican Rep. Will Hurd after snow grounded their flights. The duo broadcast the bipartisan marathon on Facebook Live.

To follow him on social media is to become familiar with even the most mundane details of the congressmans life. Hes an avid user of Instagram and Snapchat. On Friday, he snapped his morning run with his dog along the U.S.-Mexico border. Later, he boarded his flight and tweeted a grinning selfie from his middle seat in coach.

ORourke boasted that he has more Snapchat followers than any other member of Congress and says hell continue to be the most accountable and transparent person in Congress, using social media to connect with constituents and voters he would otherwise never get the chance to meet.

But ORourke, who once played in a rock band and lived in Brooklyn, plans to take on Cruz directly on the issue of money in politics.

Cruz raised nearly $90 million from super PACs during his 2016 presidential campaign, with $6 million going to a single analytics firm. ORourke has pledged not to take PAC money from wealthy donors, instead focusing on grassroots small-dollar fundraising.

To win a statewide race in Texas, ORourke will have to walk a tricky line. The Lonestar State still skews Republican despite perennial Democratic dreams of a growing Hispanic population turning the state blue. ORourke said hes confident he can appeal to Trump supporters as well as Democrats.

I cant tell you how many Trump voters have approached me in Texas, ORourke said. Its not a matter of buyers remorse. They are happy with their decision, would vote for Trump again. But theyre disappointed at how ineffective government is.

The road to effective government runs through Texas, he added.

ORourke asks a question during a House Veterans Affairs Committee, Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs Subcommittee hearing on May 29, 2014

Rod Lamkey, Getty Images

This is not to downplay ORourkes national progressive appeal. Shortly after ORourke formally entered the race, Lawrence Lessig, a Harvard academic who has carved out a side career fighting corporate money in politics, endorsed ORourke in a post onMedium.

Beto ORourke wants to challenge one of the very few politicians in America today who actually openly and firmly defends this corrupt system -- Ted Cruz, Lessig wrote.

If a crazy man could be elected because he promised America he would drain the swamp, Im quite sure this incredibly-decent,-former-punk-rocker,-40-something,-takes-no-PAC$,-Congressman-willing-to-drive-1600-miles-in-a-car-with-a-Republican can be Texas next Senator, he concluded.

ORourke isnt the only Democrat with an eye on Cruzs Senate seat. Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Democrat whose district includes San Antonio, may also throw his hat in the ring. If he does, hell benefit from deep connections with national Democrats who could provide key support in the primary.

Castro has been busy with the House Intelligence Committees investigation into Russian interference in the U.S. presidential campaign, and has said he will decide by the end of April whether to jump into the race.

Hes a friend and I think hed be a great candidate, ORourke said of the prospect of a matchup against Castro, which would immediately become one of the most watched primaries in the country. I told him if he runs and joins me, I want to do this in a way we make Texas proud, and Im confident we can do that.

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Beto O'Rourke launches Texas Senate campaign against Ted Cruz ... - CBS News

After five days of early voting in the special election for Georgias 6th congressional district, Democratic voter turnout has significantly outpaced that of Republicans.

That is a good sign for Democrats hoping that the surge in liberal enthusiasm after the election of President Donald Trump will be enough to elect 30-year-old candidate Jon Ossoff. The seat opened up when Trump named former Rep. Tom Price to be his Secretary of Health and Human Services.

Of the more than 8,100 people who have voted so far in the suburban Atlanta district, 44 percent were Democrats and 23 percent were Republicans, according to an analysis by Michael McDonald, a political science professor and election specialist at the University of Florida.

McDonald identified Democrats and Republicans based on the last primary each early voter participated in, information that can be found in state voter files. The remaining voters roughly one-third of the total so far have no record of primary voting in Georgia.

Although voters preferences can change from primary to primary, making that data imperfect, it is the most reliable indicator of partisanship in a state with nonpartisan voter registration.

McDonalds end-of-week estimates are consistent with the findings of New York Times election expert Nate Cohn for the first day of early voting. Using a slightly different methodology, Cohn found that Democrats constituted 60 percent of voters of those who voted on Monday, compared with 28 percent of Republicans.

It is important to note of course that early voting is not a rock-solid indicator of final election outcomes. Early general-election voting patterns in North Carolina and Florida, for example, appeared to favor Hillary Clinton, but she ended up losing both states in November.

And early voting in Georgias 6th district continues until April 14. Election Day itself is April 18.

In Georgias jungle primary system, Ossoff faces many Democratic and Republican challengers. A candidate can win outright in the first round by capturing 50 percent of the vote. Short of that, the top two contenders proceed to a runoff election on June 20.

Democrats across the country have seized on the race as an early opportunity to inflict damage on Republicans after Trumps election. Ossoffs candidacy has attracted millions of dollars in donations, including $1 million alone from the readers of liberal news site Daily Kos.

Television star Alyssa Milano has done her part to pitch in for Ossoff, offering early voters rides to the polls.

Ossoff is campaigning on standard mainstream Democratic priorities. On his campaign website, he declares his commitment to containing health insurance premiums, increasing the minimum wage, and fighting gender and racial discrimination in pay.

Although the 6th district has voted Republican consistently in the past, it is home to a more educated, wealthier type of Republican voter that has typically been more averse to Trumps populist style. While Tom Price cruised to reelection by a 23-point margin in November, Trump defeated Clinton in the district by a mere percentage point.

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The First Week Of Early Voting Bodes Well For Democrat Jon Ossoff - Huffington Post

The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, said he and panel Chairman Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., are "not ready" to give former national security adviser Mike Flynn immunity from prosecution if he testifies.

Flynn has reportedly indicated he would testify in exchange for immunity. "But we are not ready to consider that," Warner said on John Catsimatidis radio show on Sunday out of New York, The Hill reported.

"We are not even publicly acknowledging that he contacted us," Warner said. "We just started reviewing the raw intelligence."

Flynn's lawyers said last week that he would be willing to testify if he was provided with immunity from prosecution. Flynn was fired from his job as national security adviser at the White House after it was found he had misled Vice President Mike Pence about his meeting with the Russian ambassador during the presidential transition period after the election.

Warner also said that the House Intelligence Committee's Republican Chairman Devin Nunes' behavior was "bizarre" at best. Nunes reviewed intelligence at the White House and then later returned to meet with President Trump about it.

"Obviously we should review these materials. It needs to be done in a secure location in the Congress," Warner said.

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Top Intelligence Committee Democrat 'not ready' to consider Flynn's immunity request - Washington Examiner

Anti-corruption protests swept across nearly 100 Russian towns and cities last week, from the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad in the West to Vladivostok in the Far East. They were the biggest demonstrations in Russia since the 2011-12 protests against alleged election fraud.

Police arrested hundreds of protesters and activists, among them Alexey Navalny, an opposition figure and anti-corruption campaigner. Navalny had sparked the protests by releasing a report claiming that Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has built himself an empire of mansions, estates, yachts and palaces.

Navalnys anti-corruption messaging is hitting home and for good reason. Corruption, while certainly not as ubiquitous as it used to be, is still rife in Russia. A man I met in Vladivostok last year, while we were walking through the city, pointed at a half-built church and jokingly told me the reason they had chosen this particular location to construct it was so that city and regional officials could look out their windows and ask Gods forgiveness for their corruption.

The fact that Navalny is a vocal Kremlin critic and ardent opponent of Vladimir Putin has ensured that he has become somewhat of a media darling in the West. He is sometimes hailed as a hero in Western coverage. Time magazine once called him Russias Erin Brockovich.

What is reported less often about Navalny are his nationalist leanings, ties to neo-Nazi groups, xenophobic comments and extreme anti-immigrant views. References to Navalnys nationalism in the West are usually buried or brushed off, while the headlines sing his praises. While we seem somewhat better able to appreciate the complexities of politics and political figures in our own nation, we tend to regard Russia in very simplified terms; theres a bad guy in power and we must therefore support the valiant and oppressed good guy. Many people hear Russian opposition leader and immediately assume this is the person with whom their sympathies should lie.

Ill spare you Winston Churchills Russia is a riddle quote and just say that its never that simple. Russian politics is not a clear-cut case of dictator vs. democrat and Navalny provides a good example of just why we should be careful to avoid oversimplifying events we dont fully understand.

Many Navalny supporters are extremely anti-immigrant, particularly when it comes to newcomers from the Caucasus and Central Asia. Many see Putin as playing a part in the destruction of the traditional fabric of Russia. Navalny himself has played a role in skinhead marches in Moscow and earned the sympathies of extremists. In other words, if he were an American, liberals would hate Navalny far more than they hate Trump or Steve Bannon and yet he is glorified and exalted as Russias last, best hope.

Navalny has been a co-organizer of the Russian March an annual parade that uses slogans like Russia for the Russians andStop feeding the Caucasus. He was expelled from one of the countrys liberal parties (Yabloko) for essentially damaging their brand. One of his former colleagues in that party has claimed that Navalny repeatedly used racial slurs.

In a bizarre video, Navalny appeared to compare people from the Caucasus to cockroaches that need to be exterminated. While cockroaches can be killed with a slipper, he says, for humans he recommends a pistol. Navalny supporters claim its all just a joke. As with most things Russia-related, conspiracy theories also surround Navalny. Many of his supporters in Russia and the West believe the Kremlin has tried to smear him as a dangerous nationalist and to lock him up on trumped-up charges (he has been convicted of fraud and embezzlement). Others believe Navalny himself is a Kremlin plant, working for Putin as controlled opposition. The latter would seem laughable, but if you were to believe everything you read these days, theres very few people left out there that arent somehow working for Putin,

We should not blindly lend our support to opposition figures like Navalny without actually understanding what it is were supporting. A Russia under Navalny would not be one many liberals would admire, despite their professed love for him now.

Ironically, one area where Navalny and Putin do converge is on the issue of Crimea. Navalny has said he would not return the Crimean peninsula to Ukraine. This is also conveniently left out of Western reporting on Navalny as an anti-Putin hero.

Russias current system under Putin is a corrupt and authoritarian one, to be sure though it also displays at least some features of democracy. In an excellent piece for the Guardian on Putins presidency, Dmitri Trenin, director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, calls the Russian leader an autocrat with the consent of the governed.

Our skewed interpretation of Putin as omnipotent ruler controlling every city, town and village with an iron fist is wrong. Whats more, this false interpretation has dangerously spilled into Western discourse about domestic politics in the U.S. and Europe. There appear to now be people out there who think they see Putin on their toast every morning.

It always surprises people to hear that there is a faction of Russian society and political life that actually believes Putin is too pro-Western. Such people feel he has placated the West too much and should do more to stand up for Russia. This flies in the face of everything one would assume through reading only Western headlines, but its one more piece of the complicated reality; another reminder that the alternatives to Putin would not necessarily look favorably on the West, and might even be more hostile to it.

Rarely can we gain a full understanding of another country by relying on our own distanced interpretations of events and figures. This is particularly the case if that country is regarded as an adversary, because we see little reason to challenge our preconceived ideas and established narratives. The case of the two Navalnys the one in the Western headlines and the more complex figure that Russians know reminds us that theres nearly always more to any story than meets the eye.

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Dictator vs. democrat? Not quite: Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny is no progressive hero - Salon