Representative Eric Swalwell, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, urged on Wednesday the Republican chairman Devin Nunes to “step down,” ABC News reports. He also said that the only way to salvage the “irreparable damage” Nunes has done is by having a new leader replace him.
“I hate to say that because Devin Nunes is someone that I worked with pretty well before, but I think that the harm is irreparable. But the committee is still salvageable with a new leader,” Democrat Swalwell said.
His call for Nunes to resign comes amid controversy connected to the memo the Republican and his colleagues on the committee released. The memo, which was declassified by President Donald Trump, alleges bias and abuses of government surveillance powers at the FBI and Justice Department.
It further raised suspicions regarding the process leading to the court-approved surveillance of former Trump presidential campaign adviser Carter Page, who was suspected at the time of being a Russian operative.
Swalwell deemed the decision to release the memo “poisonous” to the probe into Russian interference with the 2016 election, maintaining that Democrats need to be able to release their rebuttal memo in response to the Nunes memo.
“What the Republicans did was poisonous to the investigation and we think clearing it up with our rebuttal memo is the best antidote. Just to make sure point by point we rebut what they have asserted, to show the seriousness of the investigation,” said Swalwell who additionally noted that the Democratic memo would undergo scrutiny from the Department of Justice.
He did, however, warn against politically motivated redactions to the Democratic memo, reminding that the GOP memo was released despite objections from the highest levels of the FBI.
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