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House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff said the acting spy chief of President Trump had invoked "superior authority" for refusing to join the Democrat leader's demand for access. to the complaint of a whistleblower.
Although Schiff does not know exactly who told Interim National Intelligence Director Joseph Maguire to hold out, Schiff said it could go as far as Trump.
"That implied a superior authority, a person superior to the DNI," said Sunday the California Democrat at CBS News. Facing the nation.
"I can not get into the content, but I can tell you that at least, according to the director of national intelligence, this involves privileged communications," he added. "It now means that the target group is quite small and their communications are privileged, so I think it's fair to assume that this involves the president, his entourage, or both."
On Friday, Schiff summoned Maguire to compel him to hand over the complaint, which came from the intelligence community.
The law, says Schiff, requires Maguire to submit the complaint to congressional intelligence committees. A letter to Maguire, accompanying the subpoena, indicated that the House Intelligence Committee would compel him to testify at a public hearing on Thursday, if he did not comply with it. not Tuesday.
Margaret Brennan, moderator, asked her if, until now, Maguire had ignored the subpoena. Schiff replied, "Well, at this point, yes."
"Ignore the subpoena, ignore our request. No DNI – no director of national intelligence has ever refused to respond to a whistleblower complaint," Schiff said. . "And here, Margaret, the important thing is that the Inspector General found this complaint urgent, she found it credible, that is to say that she made a preliminary inquiry, that the whistleblower was credible, which suggests corroboration, flagrant misdeeds ".
Schiff also warned of the repercussions of ignoring the protection of whistleblowers by the acting director of national intelligence.
"This means that people will end up doing justice and go straight to the press instead of the mechanism put in place by Congress to protect classified information," he said. "And this seriously threatens our national security as well as a system that encourages people to report wrongdoing."
Schiff said his panel was investigating possible "wrongdoing". He also noted that, although the whistleblower "is not allowed to forward us the complaint," this individual "can address directly to Congress, which the director also prohibits at this stage" .
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