Senate’s return to Russia probe foments hostility

Democrat says panel becoming ‘political errand boys’

WASHINGTON — Two Republican-led Senate committees have launched election-year investigations into the Justice Department’s Russia probe, resurrecting the issue at the urging of President Donald Trump, while reigniting the partisan hostility that comes along with it.

In two committee rooms Thursday, tensions roiled as lawmakers considered a raft of subpoenas for current and former Justice Department officials. With the country suffering through civil unrest over police brutality, mass unemployment and the coronavirus pandemic, Democrats and even some Republicans questioned whether looking back at the Russia investigations — now dating back more than three years — should be a top priority.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was defiant, angrily stating that there are people in the Justice Department “who are real good candidates for going to jail.” Rhode Island Democrat Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse countered that he was concerned that the panel was turning into “political errand boys” for Trump’s reelection.

As the senators bickered, Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., burst out that “it’s bullshit the way people grandstand for cameras in here” and “some of us have other work to do.”

Graham shot back: “If you’ve got to go somewhere else, go.” He later postponed the vote on more than 50 subpoenas, saying he would give people more time to talk.

In a Senate office building next door, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee approved its own slate of three dozen subpoenas related to the Russia probe over strong Democratic objections. The panel’s top Democrat, Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, dismissed it as an election-year defense of Trump.

But while all Republicans on the panel voted to authorize the subpoena authority, two urged the committee’s chairman, Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, to change course.