[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 98 (Wednesday, June 13, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3865-S3866]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE IG REPORT

  Mr. SCHUMER. Finally, there is the IG report. Tomorrow, the inspector 
general of the Justice Department will release a report about the 
Department's handling of an investigation of Secretary Clinton in 2016. 
We look forward to the report and learning what it has to say.

[[Page S3866]]

  Now, we hope our Republican colleagues don't take the cynical track 
of trying to spin the report's contents to somehow sully the completely 
separate and ongoing investigation into Putin's meddling in the 2016 
election. The DOJ IG report is likely to focus on the conduct of the 
Justice Department and the FBI in handling the Clinton email 
investigation in the runup to the 2016 election. Mueller was not 
appointed at that point. He wasn't a gleam in anyone's eye. So what he 
is doing is totally independent of what happened here.
  Furthermore, when the President says ``witch hunt'' and somehow 
blames Democrats for this, well, whatever Comey did hurt Hillary 
Clinton, and he didn't do the same thing to President Trump, which 
would have hurt him. He released the details of Hillary's 
investigation--many of us thought he did that wrongly--but didn't 
release any details of the investigation into possible collusion of the 
Trump campaign with the Russians.
  So this idea that somehow what Comey did and what Mueller is doing 
was designed to hurt President Trump and Republicans at Democrats' 
behest is like ``Alice in Wonderland''--it is the opposite of the 
facts. The investigation into Putin's meddling in our elections and any 
potential associations between Russian intelligence and the Trump 
campaign is an entirely separate investigation from what happened with 
Hillary Clinton.
  It would be erroneous to try to use the information in the IG report 
to discredit the special counsel, but we hear rumblings that some of 
these very partisan Republicans, led by Chairman Nunes, may try to go 
down that road. We hope they won't be so cynical or so willing to twist 
the facts inside out and turn truth on its head, all for political 
gain.
  It is crucial--critical--that Special Counsel Mueller's investigation 
get to the bottom of what happened and who was involved in Russia's 
efforts to influence the outcome of the 2016 election.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cotton). The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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