Special counsel John Durham defended himself against a barrage of attacks from House Democrats Wednesday, saying the only views of his reputation he values are those from the people he respects, his family, and God.
Durham was appointed by former Attorney General William Barr to investigate the flawed origins and troubling conduct of the FBI investigation into the Trump-Russia collusion claims, and he testified about his inquiry publicly for the first time before the House Judiciary Committee.
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The special counsel’s lengthy report concluded the FBI had no proper basis for launching its controversial 2016 election inquiry into former President Donald Trump and unfounded collusion claims, which soon transformed into special counsel Robert Mueller’s sprawling investigation.
Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) attacked Durham’s investigation and Durham personally.
“You got nothing. It was all set up to hurt the Mueller report … to hurt the Bidens, and to help Trump — and you were part of it,” Cohen said. “You have a good reputation — you had a good reputation. … But the longer you hold on to Mr. Barr and this report that Mr. Barr gave you as special counsel, your reputation will be damaged, as everybody’s reputation who gets involved with Donald Trump is damaged.”
Durham replied, “My concern about my reputation is with the people who I respect, my family, and my Lord, and I’m perfectly comfortable with my reputation with them, sir.”
As Republicans in the chamber applauded, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), the committee chairman, added, “Well said. God bless you.”
Durham’s report in May revealed Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act wrongdoing related to the FBI's reliance on British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s discredited and Democratic-funded dossier to obtain flawed FISA surveillance against Trump campaign associate Carter Page during and after the 2016 election.
The Durham report also concluded that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s campaign played an outsize role in pushing such collusion claims to the media and the FBI.
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) repeatedly criticized Durham’s decision to weigh in publicly about an element of his investigation back when he was still a federal prosecutor.
While DOJ inspector general Michael Horowitz argued in December 2019 that Crossfire Hurricane was “opened for an authorized investigative purpose and with sufficient factual predication,” Durham and Barr disputed the notion that the opening of the investigation was justified.
“Based on the evidence collected to date, and while our investigation is ongoing, last month we advised the inspector general that we do not agree with some of the report’s conclusions as to predication and how the FBI case was opened," Durham said at the time.
“You sought to get the inspector general to change his conclusion, did you not, when he was concluding that the investigation was properly predicated? Did you privately seek to intervene to change the conclusion?” Schiff asked.
“This is outside the scope of the report, but if you want to go there, we asked the inspector general to take a look at the intelligence that is included in the classified appendix that you looked at, and said that that ought to affect portions of his report,” Durham replied.
“You thought it was appropriate for you to intervene with an independent investigation by the inspector general because he was reaching a conclusion you disagreed with?” Schiff asked.
“The premise isn’t right,” Durham retorted. “The inspector general circulated a draft memo to a number of agencies and persons — our group was one of them. We were asked to review that draft and bring to his attention any concerns that we might have or any disagreements.”
Durham’s report concluded that the launch of the Trump-Russia investigation was deeply flawed and that an “objective and honest assessment” of the actual evidence “should have caused the FBI to question not only the predication for Crossfire Hurricane but also to reflect on whether the FBI was being manipulated for political or other purposes,” but “unfortunately, it did not.”
Rep. Ted Lieu (D-CA) attempted to argue that Mueller’s investigation was successful but that Durham’s had failed.
“Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort was convicted, correct?” Lieu asked.
“That’s correct — not in connection with these matters," Durham said.
“Trump’s former deputy campaign manager Rick Gates was convicted, correct?” Lieu followed up.
Durham replied, “Not in connection with the Russia matter.”
“Mr. Durham, you can hold yourself out as an objective Department of Justice official, or as a partisan hack — and the more that you try to spin the facts and not answer my questions, you sound like the latter,” Lieu contended.
Mueller’s 2019 report said that Russians interfered in the 2016 election in a “sweeping and systematic fashion,” but the special counsel's team “did not establish" any criminal collusion between the Russians and anyone in Trump's circle. No Americans were charged with collusion.
Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) pressed Durham on his trip to Italy with Barr back in 2019.
“Italian officials gave you evidence that they said had linked Donald Trump to certain financial crimes,” Lofgren said. “Did the attorney general ask you to investigate that matter that the Italians referred to you, and if so, did you take any investigative steps?”
Durham said that “the question is outside the scope of what I think I’m authorized to talk about. It’s not part of the report” but that “I can tell you this — that investigative steps were taken, grand jury subpoenas were issued, and it came to nothing.”
Durham later said he went to Italy to attempt to gather information about a “mysterious professor” named Joseph Mifsud.
Schiff also pushed Durham on the now-infamous June 2016 Trump Tower meeting.
“Are you really trying to diminish the significance of what happened here?” Schiff asked.
Durham said that “I’m not trying to diminish it at all, but I think the more complete story is that they met, and it was a ruse, and they didn’t talk about Mrs. Clinton.”
Durham called the meeting “ill-advised,” which Schiff called “the understatement of the century.”
“It was not illegal. It was stupid, foolish, ill-advised,” Durham added.
While Durham's yearslong investigation provided substantial evidence that many of the biggest Trump-Russia collusion claims could be traced back to the Clinton campaign and Democratic operatives, his new report also repeatedly raised the possibility that the dossier at the heart of the collusion claims contained Russian disinformation.
Steele was working for Vladimir Putin-linked oligarch Oleg Deripaska before, during, and after his time targeting then-candidate Donald Trump, and the former MI6 agent was hired to put the dossier together by an opposition research firm, Fusion GPS, which was simultaneously working for Kremlin-linked lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya of the Trump Tower meeting. Hillary Clinton’s campaign, through Marc Elias, hired Fusion in 2016.
A Senate Intelligence Committee report said the information Veselnitskaya offered during the Trump Tower meeting "was focused on U.S. sanctions against Russia under the Magnitsky Act" and "was part of a broader influence operation targeting the United States that was coordinated, at least in part, with elements of the Russian government."
The Senate report assessed Veselnitskaya and Rinat Akhmetshin, who accompanied her, both “have significant connections to the Russian government, including the Russian intelligence services."
Fusion co-founder Glenn Simpson denied any foreknowledge of the Trump Tower meeting despite seeing Veselnitskaya the day before, the day of, and the day after.
Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) contended that “the Durham report is, by itself, a deeply flawed vessel," while Nadler and Lofgren both attempted to revive the debunked Alfa Bank saga.
Nadler wrongly claimed that the FBI never looked into “questionable computer contacts between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, one of the largest banks in Russia.”
Lofgren asked, “Did you take a look at how the FBI evaluated the alleged ties to Alfa Bank? Did you hire cyber experts to actually take a look at those potential or alleged ties?”
“I didn’t hire them, but they were FBI experts. … It is an entire section on Alfa Bank,” Durham said.
The Durham report referred to the “unfounded Alfa bank claims.”
Mueller, the FBI, the CIA, a bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee investigation, and John Durham’s team all cast doubt on or rejected the Alfa-Bank claims touted by the Clinton campaign.
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) claimed Wednesday that “my MAGA colleagues want you to be someone you’re not, and they want you to say something you won’t — they want you to join the law firm of Insurrection LLC.” Swalwell added that “You’re wise not to do that.”
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Durham pushed back on any claims that he was a partisan during his opening statement.
“I want to emphasize in the strongest terms possible that my colleagues and I carried out our work in good faith, with integrity, and in the spirit of following the facts wherever they lead without fear or favor,” Durham testified. “At no time and in no sense did we act with a purpose to further partisan political ends — to the extent that somebody suggests otherwise, that’s simply untrue and offensive.”