House intelligence committee votes to make classified Democrat memo public

A Congressional committee has voted to release the Democrats’ rebuttal to a politically charged memo in which the Republicans accused the FBI and the Justice Department of abusing surveillance laws.

President Donald Trump has five days to decide whether to allow the memo’s release, extending a dispute that has crystallised partisan narratives about the federal government’s investigation of potential Russian election disruption efforts.

The document at question represents the Democrats’ response to another memo, prepared by House Republicans and released last week with Mr Trump’s blessing, that questioned the “legitimacy and legality” of federal authorities winning approval to eavesdrop on Carter Page, a former adviser to Mr Trump’s presidential campaign.

Looming in the background of the duelling memos is an ongoing probe, led by special counsel Robert Mueller, into potential linkages between Mr Trump’s presidential campaign and the Russian government’s effort to influence the 2016 election.

Republicans allege that their memo shows the federal government overreached its authority in seeking to gather evidence of Russian meddling. Democrats have blasted that narrative as political theatre, saying the Republican memo omitted facts in an effort to discredit Mr Mueller’s investigation.

“We think this will help inform the public of the many distortions and inaccuracies in the majority memo,” Rep Adam Schiff of California, the top Democrat on the intelligence committee, said after the vote.

The FBI itself echoed Democrats’ criticism of the Republican memo, saying in a rare statement before the document’s release that the law enforcement agency had “grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy”.

A central argument of the Republican memo alleges that when the Justice Department and the FBI were not forthright when they sought permission from a special court to monitor Mr Page. It says they did not disclose that a controversial dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele, which formed an “essential” part of their evidence, was funded in part by The Democratic National Committee and a law firm representing Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

Mr Schiff has disputed that account, telling reporters that the court was aware of the “likely political motivation” underlying the Steele dossier.

Mr Trump has sided firmly with Republicans who say their memo shows the government behaved inappropriately, arguing that it vindicates his longstanding criticisms of Mr Mueller’s investigation as illegitimate.

“Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead)”, Mr Trump said on Twitter. “This is an American disgrace”!

With the vote to release the Democrats’ counter-memo approaching, Mr Trump lashed out on Twitter against Mr Schiff, who has been a highly visible critic, saying he “Must be stopped!”

“Little Adam Schiff, who is desperate to run for higher office, is one of the biggest liars and leakers in Washington,” Mr Trump proclaimed.