Despite FBI Director Christopher Wray “raising hell” over Devin Nunes’ memo, President Trump will drop those 3 1/2 classified pages. He’s reportedly been bragging to friends about how this memo will “discredit” the FBI, although even the Justice Department has warned that the release would be “extraordinarily reckless.” Trump will do this thing, and those pages will become public.
The New York Times reports word from the White House, which said that Trump had decided not to block the memo’s release for reasons of national security. He will give Congress the green light on Friday, thereby giving Republicans permission for the release, and he “would likely not request any material be redacted,” per a White House official. Trump’s using this rationale:
Mr. Trump wanted the memo out. He had told people close to him that he believes it makes the case that law enforcement officials acted inappropriately in seeking the highly classified warrant on one of his campaign advisers, Carter Page.
Both House Democrats and Wray preemptively opposed the release due to “cherry-picked facts” and “material changes” made by Nunes before Trump received the memo. As a result, the release could be incredibly damaging, not only prompting the possible loss of another FBI director but the targeting of Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein — who followed proper procedure when he ordered surveillance of Page due to his numerous Russian ties and is overseeing the Russia probe.
However, it’s no secret that Trump would simply prefer for the Russia probe to evaporate … although he doesn’t seem to realize that firing everyone and releasing a classified memo won’t make that happen.
(Via New York Times)