Schiff Issues Subpoena for Whistleblower Complaint Being Unlawfully Withheld

[ewdotson]

“A month ago, a whistleblower within the intelligence community lawfully filed a complaint regarding a serious or flagrant problem, abuse, violation of law, or deficiency within the responsibility or authority of the Director of National Intelligence. The Inspector General of the Intelligence Community found that complaint not only credible, but urgent. More than ten days since the Director was obligated to transmit the complaint to the intelligence committees, the Committee has still not received the disclosure from the Director, in violation of the law.

“A Director of National Intelligence has never prevented a properly submitted whistleblower complaint that the IC IG determined to be credible and urgent from being provided to the congressional intelligence committees. Never. This raises serious concerns about whether White House, Department of Justice or other executive branch officials are trying to prevent a legitimate whistleblower complaint from reaching its intended recipient, the Congress, in order to cover up serious misconduct.

News Item | Permanent Select Committee On Intelligence

So, this is kind of a big deal. Fun fact: the whistleblower complain was apparently filed August 12th. Coats resigned on the 15th. Complete coincidence, I'm sure.

 

[darkswordsman17]

This just keeps getting more and more interesting. Wonder what's going on that we haven't learned of yet. This, then Bolton. Something's definitely up, or else these rats wouldn't be so keen to try and escape Turmp's black hole and he wouldn't be so desperate to cover up whatever is going on. Turmp is in full shit his pants mode (as evidenced by him trying to cover up simple idiocy by using sharpie to support his bullshit).

 

[dawp]

when the clog is finally cleared out (trump) the swamp will finally begin to drain.

 

[UNCjigga]

Sounds like this whistleblower complaint is very much related to the timing of Dan Coats’ dismissal and Susan Gordon’s resignation. According to one report, Coats actually interrupted a meeting on election security (!!) to pull Gordon aside and ask her to resign. This was 2 days after the complaint was filed with OIG.

As Maddow is fond of saying, “watch this space”...

 

[UNCjigga]

This part of Schiff’s memo is pretty interesting

 

[hal2kilo]

View attachment 10784View attachment 10784
This part of Schiff’s memo is pretty interesting

Just start the F'n impeachment hearing already. We have enough of his public tweets for obstruction of justice charges and general abuse of power. Remember folks, impeachment is political, not criminal. Nancy, get off of your ass.

 

[Maxima1]

I wonder if it has to do with that spy that was recently extracted from Russia. Outing a spy for Putin is something Team Donnie would love to do.

 

[interchange]

Damn.

 

[Commodus]

Really want to see more info before pronouncing a definitive claim on the severity of this, but if Schiff is right, I can't help but think of the contrast between Republicans circa Watergate and Republicans circa today -- even in the 1970s, Republicans were willing to take action against one of their own when there was evidence of crime. Today, they would happily cover up any crime on the President's part so long as they think they can get away with it.

 

[woolfe9998]

I'm curious as to why media coverage of this so far has been relatively light. It strikes me as a potential big deal.

 

[Vic]

There is no excuse for withholding this from Congress.

 

[interchange]

I'm curious as to why media coverage of this so far has been relatively light. It strikes me as a potential big deal.

It is a big deal even if the complaint is a nothing burger.

 

[Jhhnn]

There is no excuse for withholding this from Congress.

The theory of the unitary executive as embraced by the GOP means the President coan do anything he fucking wants that doesn't get him impeached & removed from office.

 

[woolfe9998]

This is about Trump. More information here which sheds light on why Schiff believes that this involves the POTUS:

Whistleblower complaint found to be both 'urgent' and 'credible'—but the White House is hiding it

House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff has issued a press release and a subpoena to the acting Director of National Intelligence over a subject that looks deeply concerning. A month ago, someone inside the U.S. intelligence community filed a...

www.dailykos.com

Possibly even more concerning are the grounds on which Maguire argued he could do something that no past DNI has done: He refused to produce the complaint by saying it contained “potentially privileged communications.” Which sparked Schiff to issue a new demand for the complaint and this bold declaration.

Macquire is withholding it because he claims it contains privileged communications. It's hard to argue that this means anything other than that the alleged misconduct involves communications between Trump and someone else in the administration.

What has Trump done now that he doesn't want the Congress and the general public to know about?

 

[fskimospy]

It is hard for me to imagine a benign reason where the IG would find a whistleblower’s allegation of improper or illegal activity both credible and urgent and then not only did the DNI not hand it over immediately, he pretended it didn’t even exist and then refused to comply with the law.

 

[woolfe9998]

It is hard for me to imagine a benign reason where the IG would find a whistleblower’s allegation of improper or illegal activity both credible and urgent and then not only did the DNI not hand it over immediately, he pretended it didn’t even exist and then refused to comply with the law.

Yeah, and based on "privilege" which in this context almost certainly means executive privilege meaning it involves the conduct of Trump directly.

 

[fskimospy]

Yeah, and based on "privilege" which in this context almost certainly means executive privilege meaning it involves the conduct of Trump directly.

I also share your feeling of ‘oh fuck what now’.

 

[woolfe9998]

I also share your feeling of ‘oh fuck what now’.

The question I've been asking for awhile now is how can an administration refuse to comply with Congressional subpoenas and get away with it the way this administration has been doing all year. Why don't we have laws which unequivocally require it? This is fuckin' scary.

Also, the IG's description of this complaint as "urgent" suggests this isn't just about punishment for a past bad act. That it's causing a current problem related to intelligence. If this was Trump, I want to know what potentially illegal orders he's given. Did he tell someone to out one of our agents to the Russians?

 

[fskimospy]

The question I've been asking for awhile now is how can an administration refuse to comply with Congressional subpoenas and get away with it the way this administration has been doing all year. Why don't we have laws which unequivocally require it? This is fuckin' scary.

I mean even when we do have laws that require it they ignore them too like with Trump’s tax returns.

I don’t know if you saw this but in a recent pleading the DOJ is now arguing that if the executive branch declines to enforce congressional subpoenas then it is a ‘political question’ and is therefore outside of the purview of the courts.

Yes, the DOJ is now claiming that Congress can only oversee the executive as far as it wishes to be overseen. This is literal banana republic dictatorship shit.

Also, the IG's description of this complaint as "urgent" suggests this isn't just about punishment for a past bad act. That it's causing a current problem related to intelligence. If this was Trump, I want to know what potentially illegal orders he's given. Did he tell someone to out one of our agents to the Russians?

It sure does seem bad that the executive is covering up some sort of misconduct related to the president is both credible and of urgent national importance.

This is another reason Trump must be impeached. If our country is going to go down we should at least go down fighting.

 

[alien42]

could this finally be the straw the breaks the camel's back?

hopefully this unfolds quickly.

 

[ewdotson]

Nothing to see here. This is all perfectly normal.

The whistleblower complaint that has triggered a tense showdown between the U.S. intelligence community and Congress involves President Trump’s communications with a foreign leader, according to two former U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

Trump’s interaction with the foreign leader included a “promise” that was regarded as so troubling that it prompted an official in the U.S. intelligence community to file a formal whistleblower complaint with the inspector general for the intelligence community, said the officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/trumps-communications-with-foreign-leader-are-part-of-whistleblower-complaint-that-spurred-standoff-between-spy-chief-and-congress-former-officials-say/2019/09/18/df651aa2-da60-11e9-bfb1-849887369476_story.html

https://twitter.com/x/status/1174447709736058883

 

[K1052]

Uh....

https://twitter.com/x/status/1037464177269514240

 

[interchange]

How is a President tweeting "TREASON?" somehow now within the realm of normal?

Edit: on second thought, refusing to perform the legal obligation to release the complaint to Congress making us vulnerable to a foreign government might actually be Treason. Somehow I don't think Trump was referring to actions by the acting DNI here, though.

 

[ewdotson]

In fairness (such as it is), that's a 2018 tweet from Trump, presumably dredged up for effect. (There's *always* a tweet.)

 

[UNCjigga]

Apparently they have Trump promising “a foreign leader” something that compromised American/Allied defenses.

Let’s all guess who that foreign leader might be...