Sally Yates was originally scheduled to appear before the House Intelligence Committee in a public hearing over a month ago. It was to be the committee’s second such hearing, following the one in which FBI Director James Comey rocked Republican expectations by revealing that, yes indeed, there was an active, ongoing investigation into Trump’s Russia connections within the FBI.
At the time, rumors swirled around Yates’ possible testimony, which was said to contain some hard to ignore information on how the White House had kept then National Security Advisor Michael Flynn in place despite repeated warnings from Yates. There were even suggestions that the hearing might be cancelled, specifically to keep Yates from making a public disclosure about what she knew.
Interesting—Jeremy Bash implies Sally Yates had revelations for House Intel about when she told WH that Flynn lied. Nunes nixed the hearing.
Then committee chair Devin Nunes did his from-the-White House, to-the-White House briefing and series of press conferences and, what do you know, the hearing where Yates was scheduled to testify really was cancelled, along with every other hearing before the committee.
But Sally Yates is going to make that public appearance last, on the other end of Capitol Hill.
Former acting attorney general Sally Yates is scheduled to appear at a congressional hearing next month on Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a Senate committee announced Tuesday.
Yates is to appear May 8 along with James Clapper, the former director of national intelligence, at an open hearing of the crime and terrorism subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
So while Yates may have moved from the House to the Senate, it seems we’ll finally get a chance to hear if what she has to say was reason enough for the actions taken by the White House and Devin Nunes.
Scheduling Yates to testify represents some welcome movement by the Senate committee and its Republican chair, Richard Burr. Despite a great deal of talk about setting aside partisanship, Burr has kept the Senate committee understaffed and failed to issue subpoenas to bring in needed witnesses.
Yates is likely to appear again on the House side, as well. Earlier this week, Adam Schiff made it known that the now Nunes-free investigation into Trump–Russia connections by the House Intelligence Committee had sent out a fresh round of invites. Included in those invitations was one addressed to Yates.
Sally Yates is the former acting attorney general who issued an order to the Justice Department not to support Donald Trump’s illegal Muslim Ban—and was promptly canned for doing the right thing. She also provided a warning to the White House that National Security Advisor Michael Flynn’s Russian activities did not match what the White House was saying publicly about the frequency or nature of Flynn’s meetings with the Russian ambassador.