Whitaker says no interference in Russia probe
WASHINGTON — Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker told Congress on Friday that he had “not interfered in any way with the special counsel’s investigation” into Russia’s 2016 election-manipulation operation since President Donald Trump installed him atop the Justice Department.
During an often contentious oversight hearing before the House Judiciary Committee, Whitaker also testified he had provided no inside information about that inquiry, or related ones in the Southern District of New York, to Trump or his lawyers and White House aides.
“I do not believe that I have briefed third-party individuals outside of the Department of Justice,” Whitaker, 49, said. “I have received the briefings myself, and I’m usually the endpoint of that information.”
Whitaker provided those bottom-line claims up front, but he refused to discuss other things — such as his conversations with Trump, or why he recently said the special counsel inquiry would soon wrap up — as questions about the Russia investigation dominated the hearing. The committee chairman, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., told Whitaker he would seek to force him to submit to further questioning in a later deposition.
After taking control of the House in the midterm elections, Democrats made it an early priority to get Whitaker in front of the oversight committee before his expected replacement by William Barr, whom the Senate is likely to confirm next week as attorney general. Whitaker’s voluntary appearance followed a last-minute fight with Democrats on Thursday over whether they would commit to not serving him with a subpoena before or on Friday — a precursor to potentially citing him for contempt of Congress.
Whitaker testified under oath he had never used his position to provide inside information about the Russia inquiry to Trump or his proxies, nor had he taken any step to impede special counsel Robert Mueller’s work — both fears Democrats have repeatedly expressed since Trump installed him as acting head of the department. Whitaker pointedly declined at multiple points, though, to defend Mueller and his investigation from accusations by Trump or others that he was conducting a “witch hunt.”