Reps. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Mark Meadows (R-NC) have written an editorial published by the Washington Examiner on Thursday calling for Attorney General Jeff Sessions to step down, claiming his recusal from any investigation into Russia and its connection to the Trump presidential campaign has crippled his ability to direct the agency effectively.
The lawmakers said that the alleged Russia collusion with the Trump campaign had “dominated the headlines” for the first year of the Trump administration despite the investigations coming up empty.
Jordan and Meadows, who is Chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, wrote:
Let’s be clear: The absence of evidence is not due to a lack of examination There have been some six different investigations spent on the collusion narrative — more than the investigative efforts on former President Barack Obama’s IRS targeting of conservatives, the 30,000 missing Hillary Clinton emails, and Benghazi. And through all of that, there is zero (yes, zero) evidence of collusion.
The final straw, the lawmakers wrote, was the FBI leaks about Trump presidential campaign operative George Papadopoulos, which they said begged the following questions:
Question 1: If George Papadopoulos was central to the FBI’s investigation of the Trump campaign, why did the FBI wait more than six months to interview him in late January and again in February? And even if they were trying to keep the probe quiet during the 2016 election, why wait more than two months after Election Day?
Question 2: If Papadopoulos was so critical to the investigation, why did the FBI get a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, warrant on Carter Page in the summer of 2016 but not on Papadopoulos, the alleged central player?