California Democrat Adam Schiff certainly knows a thing or two about collusion. He obviously does not have any evidence of collusion between President Trump’s 2016 election campaign team and Russian officials, as he has always claimed to have, but he has worked behind the scenes to find ways to damage the president. The great irony of this is that he is actually working in Russia’s interest since destabilization of the American political structure is always Russia’s aim, regardless of which party is in power.
Most recently, a report emerged from The Hill that Schiff met last year with the man who runs Fusion GPS, the research firm employed by Hillary Clinton’s campaign to solicit compromising material on Trump from – surprise, surprise – the Russians.
The meeting between Schiff and Glenn Simpson, which took place while the two men attended a security conference in Aspen, Colorado, in July 2018, throws up more red flags than a Chinese military parade.
Schiff and Simpson’s Shady Meeting
Schiff was, at that time, the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee and although there is, technically, nothing illegal or in contravention of committee rules about the meeting, it was highly inappropriate considering that Simpson was one of the committee’s key witnesses in its investigation into FBI abuse of power. Further, it appears that Schiff did not inform the committee about the meeting which, in itself, casts a veil of suspicion over the supposed brief encounter.
Simpson is now also known to have lied to Congress – something that is only a crime for Trump associates, apparently. The Fusion founder made false claims about his contact with DOJ official Bruce Ohr – the latter’s own testimony contradicted what Simpson told Congress about the timing of their first meeting.
After Democrats won control of the House of Representatives in November 2018, Schiff became chairman of the Intelligence Committee and had shut down its investigations into the fraudulent application for a FISA warrant by the FBI, which was based upon uncorroborated opposition research provided by Simpson’s firm.
Schiff claims that his Aspen meeting with Simpson was entirely coincidental, lasting only a brief moment and that the two did not discuss anything pertaining to congressional investigations. Some patterns of behavior become suspicious, however, when members of one political party repeat them too often. The Schiff-Simpson encounter echoes the infamous tarmac meeting between Bill Clinton and then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch while the DOJ was investigating Clinton's wife for mishandling classified information.
Clinton and Lynch attempted to keep the obviously pre-planned meeting secret. When it became publicly known, the two said it was merely a chance encounter and that they had no discussion related to the Clinton investigation.
Schiff’s Attempt to Collude With Russia
Other than Hillary Clinton, the only U.S. politician known to have willingly colluded with Russians in an attempt to affect political change in America is none other than Adam Schiff himself. In 2017, Schiff received a phone call from a man identifying himself as Speaker of the Ukrainian Parliament, Andriy Parubiy and claiming that he could provide the congressman with compromising photographs of President Trump, that were in the possession of the Russian government.
In a recording of the call, first released by British newspaper The Daily Mail, Schiff eagerly agreed to follow up on the matter and wanted to obtain copies of the photographs. “I think it probably would be best to provide these materials both to our committee and to the FBI,” Schiff told the caller.
As it turned out, the call was a prank, perpetrated by a pair of Russian radio hosts known for such tricks. The congressman’s staff later claimed that Schiff had known it was a hoax all along but was unable to explain why Schiff discussed the Intelligence Committee's investigation with the caller for eight minutes and why his staff followed up on the call with emails requesting a meeting at the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, D.C. to pick up the photographs.
Had those photographs existed and had Schiff obtained copies of them, there can be little doubt that the images would have found their way to The Washington Post and The New York Times within a matter of hours.
Time to Limit Congressional Abuse of Power
Schiff has just launched an investigation into President Trump’s financial affairs even though it is not clear how the House Intelligence Committee has the authority to look into the personal or business finances of a private American citizen – even if that citizen later becomes president.
Adam Schiff
Like most of his party colleagues, Schiff considers the scope of the federal government’s authority to be limitless – or, at least, it is when that authority lies in the hands of Democrats. It should disturb all Americans that those who control Congress can arbitrarily decide to investigate anything they wish, based on nothing more than political differences.
The federal government is supposed to be made up of three co-equal branches of government. Currently, the only branch that is subject to any oversight is the executive branch. The Supreme Court answers to no-one and both chambers of Congress get to write their own rules. Senators and representatives may be obliged to pursue legislation consistent with their campaigns for office but, once elected they can abuse the power of the committees to further their own interests and persecute their opponents.
Perhaps it is time to fully implement the never-realized promise of checks and balances by creating a joint committee – made up of representatives of all three branches of government – to define the boundaries of congressional power.
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