With no firm conclusions yet on whether US President Donald Trump’s election campaign might have coordinated with Russia, the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence could delay answering that question and issue more bipartisan recommendations early next year on protecting future elections from foreign tampering.
Recommendations on how to counter the threat from attempted election hackers could be the first written product from congressional committees examining Russian interference into last year’s election that put Trump in the White House.
An early bipartisan report could be an attempt to boost confidence in the panel’s probe, as lawmakers worry that other issues could be lost if they are not able to agree on the most anticipated questions such as collusion.
A new poll by The Associated Press and the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows more than half of Americans have expressed skepticism about multiple congressional investigations, with just 13 percent saying they are very or extremely confident they would be fair and impartial.
There has been concern from both Democrats and Republicans that if members cannot agree, the final report would be dismissed by an already skeptical, partisan public.
“The more bipartisan it is, the more it will be believed,” said Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the committee, of a final report.
Warner has worked closely with the committee’s Republican chairman, Senator Richard Burr, who said on Wednesday in an interview that he is considering an early report, which could also include other areas of consensus among senators.
A final report addressing collusion would come later next year.
Despite hesitation from Trump on the issue, most members of US Congress agree with intelligence assessments that the Russians interfered in the election.
There also is consensus on the need to tighten voting security after the US Department of Homeland Security notified several states of attempts to hack their systems.
Next year’s congressional primaries begin in early spring.
“We would have an additional report, if not more, but I think it’s reasonable to believe we could take everything that we have concluded, if we’ve got buckets we’ve concluded, election security recommendations being one of them, why wouldn’t we finish those and push them out the door?” Burr said.
Warner agreed.
“The idea of trying to get recommendations out early in the new year around elections, where I think there is very broad consensus, makes a lot of sense,” Warner said.
The committee, along with the US House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary, since early this year has been investigating the Russian interference and whether Trump’s campaign was in any way involved.
That question of collusion might not be definitively answered at all in US Congress, as lawmakers are unlikely to agree on it.
Burr said the panel has started broad organization of a final report, but suggested the final product is more likely to be a series of findings, rather than a firm conclusion on whether there was collusion.
He said committee members would likely lay out the facts, “but from a standpoint of taking a vote on some list of conclusions, I’m not sure we’re going to do that.”
It is unclear whether the reports could be pre-empted in any way by special counsel Robert Mueller, who is also investigating the interference and has the ability to prosecute, unlike US Congress.
Mueller’s probe has moved rapidly, and his investigators have finished interviewing current and former White House officials they had initially requested to speak to, White House lawyer Ty Cobb said on Thursday.
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS