Top Republican senators said Thursday that their Democratic counterparts sicced the FBI on them in 2020 in an attempt to shut down their probe into how the Justice Department bungled the Trump-Russia investigation.
Sen. Charles E. Grassley said senior Democrats falsely told the FBI he was being manipulated by Russian disinformation, and when the FBI did a secret briefing for Mr. Grassley and fellow Sen. Ron Johnson, it was leaked to the press to try to discredit the work the senators were doing.
“It was pure nonsense that the irresponsible media portrayed as the truth,” said Mr. Grassley, Iowa Republican.
He was one of the star witnesses as House Republicans’ new Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government kicked off its work with its first public hearing.
The panel has been tasked with exposing attempts to use the power of the government to silence vital debates and investigations.
Led by Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, the panel gives Republicans a premier forum for exploring their sense that the FBI, the Justice Department and other organs of the federal government have become biased against conservatives. That includes the belief that investigators pursued incessant — and largely fruitless — probes of Donald Trump, while largely ignoring allegations about President Biden and his family.
SEE ALSO: White House blasts GOP hearing on weaponization of FBI as ‘un-American’
Thursday’s hearing included Mr. Grassley and Mr. Johnson, Wisconsin Republican, as well as former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, who served as a Democrat but is now an independent. Rep. Jamie Raskin, Maryland Democrat, served as his party’s invited witness.
Mr. Grassley said his fight with the weaponized government began in 2019 when, as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, he asked the Treasury Department for details of a “questionable” financial transaction that involved the Biden family.
Democrats told the FBI that Mr. Grassley and Mr. Johnson, who was chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, were being manipulated by disinformation. Parts of that letter were leaked to the press.
Then, at the Democrats’ request, the FBI did a briefing for Mr. Grassley and Mr. Johnson and details of that also leaked. Mr. Grassley said it was all a set-up meant to tarnish the two Republicans’ work.
“That leak outrageously and inaccurately connected that FBI briefing to our investigation in another effort to falsely label our good government oversight work as Russian disinformation,” Mr. Grassley said.
Mr. Johnson, in his testimony, said the leaks were a “key ingredient in the most destructive, political dirty trick in US history.”
He pointed to Democrats’ first impeachment effort against Mr. Trump, which relied on a whistleblower whom Republicans suspect was manipulated by congressional Democrats.
“The cooperation between the House intelligence committee and the impeachment whistleblower remains murky,” Mr. Johnson said.
Mr. Raskin, the Democrats’ witness, criticized the weaponization subcommittee’s existence and said the GOP is trying to use the panel to defend Mr. Trump. That means it is Republicans who are actually weaponizing government, he said.
“The odd name of the weaponization subcommittee constitutes a case of pure psychological projection,” he said. “When former President Donald Trump and his followers accuse you of doing something, they’re usually telling you exactly what their own plans are.”
Mr. Raskin said Mr. Trump weaponized government when he sought to encourage Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, to rethink his state’s vote count in favor of President Biden in the 2020 election.
Mr. Raskin also said Mr. Trump targeted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Black Lives Matter.
Republicans countered that when the FBI went after Republicans, it was trying to shut down investigations that were producing substantive results.
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.