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Democrats in the House are preparing for a new wave of hearings and actions in Congress next week as part of the investigation into Russia. Legislators and presidential candidates in 2020 are increasing pressure on party leaders to initiate impeachment proceedings against President Trump.
Speaker of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, announced Friday that his panel will hold a public hearing on June 12 on the "counter-intelligence implications" of former Special Advisor Robert Mueller's report on Russia, presenting the testimony of two former FBI national security officials. .
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"Our committee will aim to explain to the American people the serious counterintelligence issues raised by the Mueller report, to examine the scope and extent of immoral and unpatriotic behavior that it has." describes and proposes normative solutions to prevent this from happening again, "said Schiff. said in a statement. "It is a difficult task, but it begins with a detailed analysis of the facts set out in the special advisor's report."
Schiff said the hearing was the second in the "series" to garner testimonials from "factual witnesses, national security experts" and other people related to Mueller's investigation. The first concerned the Kremlin's alleged use of oligarchs and money to influence foreign actors. Schiff also said the panel plans to hold another hearing to explore the facts of "intrusions" into the US elections.
Schiff's planned hearing is just one of many scheduled hearings for next week.
Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., Speaker of the Judiciary Committee of the House, announced a hearing on the Mueller report scheduled for June 10, inviting key witness John Dean to testify. Dean was former legal advisor to former President Richard Nixon at the White House and was a key figure in the Watergate scandal.
Nadler's hearing will also be part of the series "Focusing on Suspected Crimes and Other Wrongdoing" in Mueller's report.
"We have learned so much from the same redacted version of the report from special advocate Robert Mueller," Nadler said in a statement. "Russia attacked our elections to help President Trump win. Trump and his campaign have welcomed this help. The president then tried to obstruct the investigation of the attack. Mueller confirmed these revelations and has now left Congress to resume his activities where he had stopped. "
The scheduled hearings come after Mueller made a rare public appearance last week to mark the conclusion of his investigation and the closure of his office. He claimed that there was "no sufficient evidence to accuse of conspiracy" regarding the coordination of members of the Trump campaign with the Russian government in the 2016 presidential election .
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But Mueller left open the question of whether the president was obstructing justice.
"If we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so," Mueller said. "We did not determine if the president had committed a crime."
Mueller explained the Justice Department's long-standing policy, according to which a sitting president can not be charged with a crime, and so stated: "Accusing the President was not an option we could consider ".
Mueller added that "it would be unfair to accuse anyone of a crime when there could be no judicial resolution of the prosecution". Mueller said that, even though the opinion of the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) is blocking an indictment president during his tenure, "the Constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse the president of wrongdoing ".
Many congressional Democrats have taken Mueller's comment as a green light to begin talks on the impeachment procedure against the president – despite the reluctance of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
But while Pelosi continued to push back the deputies who demanded removal, she sparked a new controversy this week by declaring at a closed meeting that she wanted to see Trump in "prison" once that was over. He would leave office.
Politico reported that Pelosi told the presidents of the Democratic Committees: "I do not want to see him deposed, I want to see him in prison."
Several Democratic sources in the House told Fox News that Pelosi had said the same thing about Trump at previous caucus meetings, such as "we should go down there and stop the man." According to the source, Pelosi would try to delay any action after the election, saying the Democrats should defeat Trump in 2020 – and then sue after his resignation from office.
Since then, Trump has called Pelosi "nasty, vindictive and horrible" and called his remarks "disgusting".
"Nervous Nancy is a shame for herself and for her family to have made such a disgusting statement, especially since I was with foreign leaders abroad. There is no evidence that such a thing has been said, "tweeted Trump on Friday.
At the same time, the House is preparing to vote on whether Attorney General Bill Barr and former White House lawyer Don McGahn are in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with recent summonses to appear before the House. Congress asking for information and testimonials relating to Mueller's investigation.
Nadler's committee voted last month to condemn Barr in defiance of his refusal to subpoena a non-redacted version of the Mueller report and its underlying evidence.
As for McGahn, the White House has repeatedly asked him not to testify, claiming that he was legally immune from the obligation to testify about privileged discussions as part of of his official duties. The Democrats responded that McGahn had waived this privilege by agreeing to talk to Mueller.
A contempt vote would be historic, but not unprecedented. In 2012, the GOP-controlled House voted against Attorney General Eric Holder in defiance of the "Fast and Furious" investigation into the "Fast and Furious" case. Holder became the first Cabinet member to be held in contempt of Congress in this manner.
Samuel Chamberlain and Gregg Re from Fox News contributed to this report.
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