President Donald Trump knows how to make a political nickname stick — and uses them to exploit his opponents’ insecurities and hurt them at the ballot box. Just ask “Low Energy Jeb” or “Crooked Hillary.”
His latest target: The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee Monday, Adam Schiff.
Or as he’s now known across every news media outlet, “Little Adam” — one of the biggest liars and leakers in the government, according to Trump.
Little Adam Schiff, who is desperate to run for higher office, is one of the biggest liars and leakers in Washington, right up there with Comey, Warner, Brennan and Clapper! Adam leaves closed committee hearings to illegally leak confidential information. Must be stopped!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 5, 2018
The House intelligence panel plans to meet Monday afternoon to consider whether to release a Democratic rebuttal memo, days after the House released the GOP written memo detailing numerous FISA wiretap abuses targeting the Trump president campaign in 2016.
The committee rejected that move last week, with one Republican member saying revisions were needed so the memo would not endanger national security. Trump would decide whether to release the memo if it contains classified information.
A White House official said Monday that the administration would consider releasing the Democratic memo, subjecting it to a similar review process as the Republican memo.
House Speaker Paul Ryan has said he supports the release of the Democrats’ memo, if sensitive intelligence information is removed.
The memo released Friday alleges misconduct on the part of the FBI and the Justice Department in obtaining a warrant under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to monitor former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser Carter Page. Specifically, it takes aim at the FBI’s use of information from former British spy Christopher Steele, who compiled a dossier containing allegations of ties between Trump, his associates and Russia.
Republicans cited the memo in their arguments that Mueller’s investigation is politically tainted. Fox News contributor and New York Post editor Michael Goodwin said the memo is proof that Deep State exists, and is a danger to American democracy.
The memo’s central allegation is that agents and prosecutor failed to tell a judge that the research that provided grounds for the FBI’s suspicion was funded by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
Steele’s research, according to the memo, “formed an essential part” of the warrant application.
Republicans say a judge should have been told that “political actors” were involved in allegations. The FBI agents that submitted the wiretap request knowingly hid that information, according to the memo.
The memo confirms the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign began in July 2016, months before the surveillance warrant was sought, and was “triggered” by information concerning campaign aide George Papadopoulos. He pleaded guilty last year to lying to the FBI.
The confirmation about Papadopoulos is “the most important fact disclosed in this otherwise shoddy memo,” Schiff said Saturday.