Press Releases

Washington, DC – Today, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, released the following statement:

“At our urging, the Trump Administration has now declassified certain transcripts of conversations between Michael Flynn and the Russian Ambassador. It is clear why they did not release them before, when they were selectively declassifying other information.

“These transcripts clearly demonstrate that Lt. General Michael Flynn lied to the FBI and the Vice President when he denied discussing sanctions in a then-secret set of conversations with the Russian Ambassador. These calls took place shortly after the Russian government interfered in the 2016 election in an effort to help Trump win, and Flynn was engaged in trying to mute the Russian reaction to sanctions imposed by the Obama Administration over that very interference. Implied in his urging the Russians not to overreact to the sanctions over their election interference, was the idea that the Trump Administration would change course.  As Lt. Gen. Flynn plainly urged the Russian Ambassador, ‘Do not allow this administration to box us in right now!’

“The transcripts also reveal why Flynn was properly the subject of a counterintelligence investigation and how the DOJ’s effort to dismiss the case against him is so transparently political and destructive to the interests of justice.  As a result of lying to both the FBI and the Vice President, Flynn posed a severe counterintelligence risk because the Russians knew the real contents of Flynn’s communications and that he lied about them to the some of the most senior officials in the U.S. government.

“These transcripts fully affirm what we already knew from Flynn’s Statement of Offense, which he repeatedly confirmed during two guilty pleas under oath – that Flynn in fact lied about his interactions with the Russian Ambassador. It should be no surprise that the President and his allies wish to promote conspiracy theories to distract and re-write history, as the true facts and history are so damning.”

Click here to view the transcripts.

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