GOP Releases Nunes Memo After Donald Trump Brushes Off FBI Objections

The controversial “Nunes Memo” has been released by House Republicans with the approval and at the urging of President Donald Trump. The memo, which Democrats and the FBI say the document is misleading in its allegations of FBI surveillance abuse, claims that the FBI and Department of Justice officials were aware that the author of the so-called Steele dossier, used to secure a FISA warrant to surveil Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, had a strong anti-Trump bias.

Trump told reporters this morning, “I think it’s a disgrace what’s happening in our country. A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves”

The release of the memo drew swift condemnation from Democrats. Minority leader Nancy Pelosi said that Trump “has surrendered his constitutional responsibility as Commander-in-Chief by releasing Nunes’ unredacted, classified memo. His decision undermines our national security and is a bouquet to his friend Putin.”

Senator Mark Warner, the Virginia Democrat and vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said, “Unlike almost every House member who voted in favor of this memo’s release, I have actually read the underlying documents on which the memo was based. They simply do not support its conclusions.”

Just prior to the release of the memo, Republican Senator John McCain tweeted, “The latest attacks on the FBI and Department of Justice serve no American interests – no party’s, no president’s, only Putin’s.”

Here is the first page of the memo: