Former U.S. Congressman Trey Gowdy (R-SC), sent shock waves through the country a few days ago during an interview with Fox News. The former Representative, who was the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee before deciding not to run for re-election last year, divulged that unreleased transcripts between an FBI informant and a former campaign aide of President Donald J. Trump, George Papadopoulos, exist.
Gowdy maintained these transcripts have the “potential to be a game-changer.”
With the unreasonably long Mueller investigation finally complete, Attorney General William Barr has vowed to investigate whether government officials “put their thumb on the scale” during the Russia probe. He’s especially interested in the possibility that the early stages of the investigation were impacted.
According to TheBlaze, Gowdy implied that wrongdoing may have occurred because government officials failed to disclose the transcripts “when applying for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrants against Trump campaign aide Carter Page.” The former Representative categorized these documents as exculpatory evidence.
During the sit-down with Fox News, Gowdy contended, “If the bureau is going to send an informant in, the informant is going to be wired. And if the bureau is monitoring telephone calls, there’s going to be a transcript of that.”
Continuing, he said, “And some of us have been fortunate enough to know whether or not those transcripts exist, but they haven’t been made public,” he continued. “And I think one in particular is going — it has the potential to actually persuade people.”
Illustrating his clear understanding of the divisive state of American politics, Gowdy went on to state, “Very little on this Russia probe, I’m afraid, is going to persuade people who hate Trump or who love Trump. But there is some information in these transcripts that I think has the potential to be a game-changer if it’s ever made public.”
During the sit-down, the former Congressman echoed Representative John Ratcliffe’s (R-TX) demands to publicly release the information. Gowdy remarked, “You know, Johnny Ratcliffe is rightfully exercised over the obligations that the government has to tell the whole truth to a court when you are seeking permission to spy or do surveillance on an American.”
He went on to add, “And part of that includes the responsibility of providing exculpatory information or information that tends to show the person didn’t do something wrong. If you have exculpatory information, and you don’t share it with the court, that ain’t good. I have seen it. Johnny has seen it. I would love for your viewers to see it.”
Last fall, Ratcliffe suggested that the Justice Department and the FBI concealed information that conflicted with evidence it presented to the FISA courts to get a wire tap on Trump campaign employee George Papadopoulos.
During an interview with Fox News, Ratcliffe stated, “Hypothetically, if the Department of Justice and the FBI have another piece of evidence that directly refutes that, that directly contradicts that, what you would expect is for the Department of Justice to present both sides of the coin to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to evaluate the weight and sufficiency of that evidence.”
The Texas Representative went on to say, “Instead, what happened here was Department of Justice and FBI officials in the Obama administration in October of 2016 only presented to the court the evidence that made the government’s case to get a warrant to spy on a Trump campaign associate.”
At the time, The Daily Caller revealed, “Other Republican lawmakers have hinted that intelligence exists which exonerates Papadopoulos, who has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about contacts he had with a Maltese professor named Joseph Mifsud.”
Ratcliffe maintained that the declassification of a series of Justice Department and FBI documents “would corroborate” his assertions regarding the Papadopoulos intelligence.
Ratcliffe insisted, “My opinion is that declassifying them would not expose any national security information, would not expose any sources and methods. It would expose certain folks at the Obama Justice Department and FBI and their actions taken to conceal material facts from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.”
With Democrats seemingly only worried about how fast they can impeach Trump, prominent Republicans, like Gowdy, need to sound the alarms on any potential egregious misconduct the FBI and Justice Department may be hiding.
During an interview with Fox News’ Bill Hemmer last week, Attorney General Barr commented, “People have to find out what the government was doing during that period. If we’re worried about foreign influence, for the very same reason we should be worried about whether government officials abuse their power and put their thumb on the scale.”
