I don’t know about you, but I had some hope for the Senate Committee on Intelligence and its probe into the Russia situation. Run by Richard Burr (R) and Mark Warner (D), the committee’s investigation sounded like it was being done professionally, especially relative to the House shenanigans.
But here is something about Richard Burr I think I just figured out. He seems to have known about the Trump decision to declassify intelligence that would essentially expose foreign intelligence assets to Russia. If you tell a hostile government what city an operative works in and what information that operative learned, you are nine tenths of the way to burning a valuable operative likely embedded with ISIS.
And according to Buzzfeed, not only is it “much worse than what has been reported” but it is something that was shared with one member of the Senate Committee on Intelligence:
Two US officials who were briefed on Trump’s disclosures last week confirmed to BuzzFeed News the veracity of the Washington Post report, with one noting that “it’s far worse than what has already been reported.”
At least one member of the Senate Intelligence Committee was also briefed on Trump’s disclosures, an intelligence committee staffer said. Sen. Mark Warner, the ranking Democrat on the committee, was not briefed, according to his office. Other members of the committee also said they did not receive a briefing.
So who was the one committee member that was briefed? One has to assume that the ranking member, Richard Burr, was briefed. And yet:
After Comey’s firing, some people are calling for a special prosecutor to take over the Russia investigation. Burr says there is no need for that. He says getting an independent team would delay the investigation and they wouldn’t have the kind of access the Senate Intelligence Committee has.
So that was Burr probably speaking after he found out about Trump leaking classified information to the Russians. So does Burr care that Trump is compromising our intelligence to Russia, and trying to neutralize the FBI to keep it from finding out about Russian interference in the election? Looks like he does not.
Does he only want to promote the White House line that an independent investigation would just “delay” the Senate investigation, a blatantly transparent excuse for keeping the investigation in the political arena where the Republicans have complete control? Looks like he does.
Is Richard Burr complicit in the ever-expanding coverup into collusion by his party and a hostile foreign government to corrupt the presidential election? Clearly.