[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 14]
[House]
[Pages 19658-19663]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




           ATTACK ON RULE OF LAW AND DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Arrington). Under the Speaker's 
announced policy of January 3, 2017, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. 
Gaetz) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority 
leader.
  Mr. GAETZ. Mr. Speaker, I take the floor tonight, along with many of 
my colleagues, to fight back against an attack on the rule of law and 
our democratic institutions.
  Right now, the investigations into Donald Trump and the prior 
investigation into Hillary Clinton have been infected with the virus of 
severe bias.
  Hillary Clinton went under investigation for the mishandling of 
classified information and her dealings through the Clinton Foundation, 
which was essentially investigated by her own fan club. Meanwhile, 
Robert Mueller obtained his team by fishing in the never-Trump 
aquarium.
  Only through the antidote of transparency can we end this erosion of 
the rule of law and restore the American people's confidence in the 
institutions that we must trust to live in a civilized society.
  The people in this country have a right to know what has happened 
within the FBI, the Department of Justice, and within Robert Mueller's 
team as he probes the President and his transition. But there is so 
much in hearing after hearing that members of the Judiciary Committee, 
the Intelligence Committee, and the Oversight Committee have been told 
we don't have a right to know as the Representatives of the people.
  Let's begin with the tarmac meeting between Loretta Lynch and former 
President Bill Clinton.
  We as the American people apparently don't have a right to know what 
was truly discussed. In information and reports that have been 
submitted to the Congress, there is extensive redacted information. So 
we don't get to see the substance of those communications between 
Loretta Lynch and former President Bill Clinton. It is deeply 
troubling.
  We also don't get to know what the informant would tell us who had 
information about Russia's attempts to impair the United States' 
uranium assets through the now infamous Uranium One deal.
  We know that there was an informant. We now know that informant 
wanted to come forward and give information about bribery and kickbacks 
that undermine America's interests.
  Unfortunately, people at the Justice Department who still remain in 
substantial positions of power went and sought a gag order so that the 
Congress wouldn't learn what was happening and so the American people 
wouldn't learn what was happening.
  Then we learn that an inspector general who wanted to raise the flag 
of concern regarding the deeply troubling conduct of Hillary Clinton 
was essentially shut down.
  Mr. McCullough has now given interviews upon his departure from the 
intelligence community indicating that he went to James Clapper. He 
said that these mishaps, these potential violations of law, were 
serious and that they put America's national security in jeopardy. What 
he heard back from Mr. Clapper was that these revelations would create 
heartburn for the Clinton campaign.
  It is ludicrous, when we have got potential bribes and kickbacks, and 
we have got the Clinton Foundation functioning essentially as a 
passthrough money laundering operation, that we wouldn't have all of 
the information that an inspector general would bring forward.
  Mr. McCullough gave interviews where now he said that his family, his 
job, his agency, his mission was threatened by people in the deep 
state. That is not the America we need to live in. Transparency is the 
antidote to this type of corruption and this type of truly intolerable 
conduct.
  Here is what we do know. We do know that the Democratic National 
Committee was off paying for a salacious and false dossier from the 
Fusion GPS company about the current President, Donald Trump. We don't 
know whether or not the FBI contributed funds toward that cause.
  Think about that for a moment. When we asked the Attorney General and 
the FBI Director, were taxpayer funds used to go and obtain a dossier 
to discredit the President both before and after his election, we were 
told that we don't have a right to know and that the taxpayers don't 
have a right to know if their money was used in this way. It is 
troubling.
  We also know that Nellie Ohr, the wife of a top Department of Justice 
official, Bruce Ohr, was actually getting paid by Fusion GPS, the 
company that ultimately produced this false dossier.
  If that is not a conflict of interest, if that doesn't impair the 
credibility of this investigation, I don't know what does.
  We also don't know who is in charge. We asked questions to the 
Attorney General regarding the nature of his recusal. Can the Attorney 
General appoint a second special counsel to evaluate the Clinton 
Foundation?
  We got contradictory answers.
  So as we prepare for the Deputy Attorney General Mr. Rosenstein's 
testimony before the Judiciary Committee tomorrow, we don't know if it 
is Mr. Rosenstein who can appoint a special counsel. We don't know if 
it is the Attorney General who has the power to do that.
  We do know that the American people want it. Harvard University 
released a poll that said over 60 percent of the American people 
believe there should be a second special counsel to investigate Clinton 
and the Clinton Foundation, largely as a consequence of this 
intractable bias that we continue to see in the intelligence community.
  So let's look at that bias as it is applied to Mr. Mueller and his 
team.
  We have no idea how Bob Mueller picked the members of his team. I 
asked FBI Director Christopher Ray: Did people get on the Mueller team 
because they hate President Trump? Was there any vetting? Was there any 
review? Did we look at political contributions, political activity or 
activism from these folks?
  The FBI Director would not answer my question.
  So here we are, unclear as to whether or not the standard to 
investigate the

[[Page 19659]]

President was a preexisting bias against him.
  Mr. Speaker, I don't believe that it is a coincidence that the 
Mueller team is populated by people who bring that bias with them and 
who seemingly have acted upon it.
  Mr. Weissmann, who is Mueller's number two, attended Hillary 
Clinton's election night party. Are you really telling me we couldn't 
find a number two in the Mueller investigation who wasn't at Hillary 
Clinton's election night party? For goodness sake.
  We also know that Mr. Weissmann sent emails to Sally Yates, praising 
her for directly defying an order from the President. That should have 
disqualified Mr. Weissmann, but we don't know if that was, in fact, the 
qualifying factor that led him to be on this team.
  Aaron Zebley is also a member of the Mueller team. He represented 
Justin Cooper, who set up the Hillary Clinton email server. Could we 
not have found people for the Mueller team who were not involved in 
setting up an email server for Hillary Clinton?
  He also used a hammer to smash BlackBerrys, destroying evidence. Mr. 
Zebley may be a witness, yet he is on the Mueller team.
  Jeannie Rhee. She defended the Clinton Foundation against FOIA 
requests and now is involved in persecuting the President. In fact, 
over half of the members of the Mueller team have financially 
contributed to the campaigns of Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, or 
both, and none of them contributed to Donald Trump.
  I don't think it is a coincidence. I think it is ridiculous that the 
Congress doesn't have any information about how these people were 
selected, how they were vetted, how they were approved.
  But it is not just the Mueller team. It is also the Department of 
Justice. Bruce Ohr, the head of counter intelligence, meets with 
Christopher Steele, who is the author of the dossier during the 
campaign. Then after the campaign, he meets with Glenn Simpson.
  All the while, Bruce Ohr, working at the Department of Justice, has a 
spouse getting paid by the very people developing these lies about the 
President to discredit him. It is smoking-gun evidence of bias and 
conflict of interest.
  But it is not just the Mueller team and the Department of Justice. It 
is also the FBI. Andrew McCabe is the current Deputy Director of the 
FBI. When he was the assistant agent in charge of the Washington field 
office, he was sending out emails just weeks before the 2016 election 
saying that the Hillary Clinton investigation would be given special 
status, that it would be handled by a small team at headquarters.
  What that means is that Hillary Clinton got different treatment than 
any other American who would have been charged with the mishandling of 
classified information in the Washington, D.C., area.
  Absolutely outrageous. That special treatment didn't lead to a more 
rigorous review. We know now that James Comey was drafting the 
exoneration statement before even interviewing key witnesses, including 
Hillary Clinton herself.

                              {time}  1730

  Then you have Peter Strzok, also at the FBI. Mr. Strzok has now been 
discredited and demoted because he was sending 10,000 text messages 
back and forth with his mistress about how much he loved Hillary 
Clinton and hated President Trump. I don't think it is a coincidence 
that Mr. Strzok is the person who went in and changed the term 
``grossly negligent,'' which is a crime, to ``extremely careless,'' in 
the exoneration statement about Hillary Clinton.
  The Attorney General needs to do his job. He needs to appoint a 
special counsel to investigate Hillary Clinton because she was never 
investigated in earnest in the first place. He needs to tell Robert 
Mueller to put up or shut up.
  If there is evidence of collusion, let us see it. We are almost a 
year into this investigation, and the only thing I see is a bias that 
continues to erode our institutions and our rule of law, and this 
Congress should stand for it no more.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry).
  Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, the gentleman from 
Florida (Mr. Gaetz), for bringing this issue to the floor.
  Mr. Speaker, this can all be cleared up, pretty quickly, with a 
little bit of transparency and with a little bit of sunlight. It comes 
down to the issue of: Do we have impartial justice in this country or 
don't we?
  We are all familiar with Lady Justice. She has a blindfold over her 
eyes, she is holding the scale, and the scale is straight across. It is 
not leaning one way or the other. But, in this case, it seems--and I am 
going to say that kind of tongue-in-cheek--it seems like it is, like 
the scale is not right across, Mr. Speaker. It is heavily on one side, 
and the other side is way up in the air.
  And let me just make a couple of points:
  Deputy Director McCabe refers to the Clinton email investigation as 
``special.''
  Why is it special?
  Where is it on that scale?
  Is it up high or is it down low?
  Why is it called special?
  Why did Secretary Clinton have a team from headquarters investigate 
her, as opposed to the Washington field office?
  Think about this:
  If the FBI called you, it wouldn't be for a meeting or an interview. 
It would be called your deposition. You would sit there with your 
lawyer, and you would answer questions. And it wouldn't be when it was 
convenient for you. It would be when it was convenient for the FBI.
  Secretary Clinton gets to have a meeting with the FBI for an 
interview on a Saturday morning of a holiday weekend. Now, contrast 
that on the scales of justice with Paul Manafort. Paul Manafort gets 
his home broken into in the middle of the night and dragged out of bed 
while he and his wife are sleeping. Something doesn't seem right to me.
  You talk about the meeting on the tarmac. The FBI, in their emails, 
it was revealed that they wanted to get the agent that divulged the 
fact that that meeting occurred out on the tarmac. They weren't 
interested in what the meeting was about just days before Secretary 
Clinton was going to be deposed before this House of Representatives 
and be questioned and interviewed about her role in Benghazi.
  Why does that happen?
  It seems like the scales of justice, once again, are tipped.
  Peter Strzok. He interviewed Heather Samuelson, Cheryl Mills, Bryan 
Pagliano, and Paul Combetta, and they all got immunity. They all got 
immunity.
  Who gives somebody immunity without anything in return?
  Okay, they got immunity. We get it. We want to know what was on the 
other side of that equation. I mean, this is not to apologize for, or 
to stick up for, Mike Flynn or for Paul Manafort. If they have 
committed crimes, that needs to be dealt with appropriately. Lying, 
period, is never appropriate.
  But they didn't get this deal. These folks did get the deal. And, at 
the same time while they got the deal, we know via their email and 
interviews that they actually did lie to the FBI. Some of these folks 
lied to the FBI, yet Michael Flynn pleads guilty, and these guys and 
gals get immunity.
  Do the scales of justice, Mr. Speaker, seem like they are a little 
bit askew?
  Mr. Combetta--if that is how you pronounce his name--we know that he 
was out there searching for ways on the internet about how to scrub a 
computer. Nothing to see here, right? That seems a little odd, doesn't 
it?
  Cheryl Mills, she got immunity, allegedly, to give up her laptop. So 
she got immunity; we got that. She can't be prosecuted. We got the 
laptop. Shouldn't the American people know what was on the laptop? Why 
is that information not available? Why is it that this Congress, this 
jurisdiction of oversight, as applied in the Constitution, has to beg 
and cajole the FBI and

[[Page 19660]]

the Department of Justice to provide documents so that we can see what 
happened, so that we can know, so that the American people and their 
representatives can know how this dossier--if you want to call it 
that--was constructed and how it was used? Why must we beg for that 
information, and why can't we get it?
  Mr. Speaker, this can all be cleared up; just provide the 
information. There doesn't have to be another special prosecutor. Mr. 
Mueller can continue with his investigation and find the truth because 
we all want the truth. We want the truth that is impartial, not 
something that is fabricated because we now have an FBI that is 
pursuing individuals, as opposed to crimes.
  The American people need to know that this isn't a tinhorn 
dictatorship and that we don't have government officials using the 
power of the Federal Government to work against their political rivals. 
They need to know that they can trust their FBI, and right now it 
doesn't seem like they can have confidence in that.
  It seems like if you are on the wrong side of the scale, Mr. Speaker, 
it is a bad day for you. But if you are connected and you have people 
working for you like--oh, I don't know--Peter Strzok, Bruce Ohr, and 
his wife now, Andrew Weissmann, or Jeannie Rhee, I mean, as the days go 
on, we just keep on finding out more and more and more. And we don't 
find it out because they are offering it. We find it out because we 
have to pull it from them and just beg them and require them to come in 
here and force the information out of them. That is not how this is 
supposed to work.
  We need to have confidence in our FBI, and we need to have confidence 
in our Department of Justice. American citizens need to have confidence 
in their judicial system to know that the blindfold is still on Lady 
Justice, that the scales are even, that we are all going to be treated 
evenly, and that crimes are going to be investigated, not individuals. 
And that there is not going to be some kind of a witch hunt or a lynch 
mob mentality at the Federal Government level against people with whom 
the political ruling class disagrees.
  If it requires another special counsel, so be it. If not, it would be 
great if we could just clear all of this up by providing the 
information that this House of Representatives and the American people 
demand. There is no reason to keep it. It is not classified; it is not 
sensitive. It is information that all of us need to know so we know how 
our Federal Government is operating and who is being truthful with us. 
And then we can have confidence in the fidelity of our FBI and our 
Department of Justice.
  Mr. GAETZ. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. 
Jody B. Hice).
  Mr. JODY B. HICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from 
Florida (Mr. Gaetz) for yielding.
  I am greatly honored to be here to participate in this important 
discussion. We all want transparency, and for that to be in our 
government is critical to all of us. I am honored to be on the 
Oversight and Government Reform Committee where this is part of the 
responsibilities entrusted to us.
  But after repeated scandals and misconduct, it is patently obvious to 
me that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton plays by her own 
rules, and simply does so because of her own status, her own positions 
of power and influence in the government, and has been in those roles 
for decades. She has been getting a free pass to follow or ignore the 
law as she chooses, whereas it seems, on the other hand, as has already 
been discussed this evening, President Trump and his administration 
seems to get a special counsel just for sneezing. It is insane what is 
going on, and we, as Americans, must prioritize equal justice under the 
law.
  Lady Justice must remain blind, and her scales must remain balanced. 
This is a fundamental principle for all of us as Americans--something 
we cherish and something we hold on to--and we are watching it change 
right before our eyes. It seems as though Lady Justice is peeking 
underneath that blindfold, and that is simply unacceptable.
  Mr. Speaker, I am honored that we are coming to draw attention to 
this horror and this change that is taking place. The principle of 
blind justice is one of the most basic fundamental principles that we 
have in this country, and without it we are watching individuals like 
Mrs. Clinton and her allies act above the law and get away with things 
they simply ought not be getting away with. And the truth is, a breach 
of justice for one is a breach of justice for all of us.
  Let me give you a quick example. Back in August of 2016, The New York 
Times reported on generous foreign donations to the Clinton Foundation, 
and this was done while Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State. That, 
in itself, ought to raise some red flags, shouldn't it? Foreign 
countries. And then we find out that many of these foreign countries 
had already tremendous human rights violations: Kuwait, for example, 
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and several others, just to name a few, yet they 
are giving tons of money to the Clinton Foundation, while she is 
Secretary of State.
  And then the Clintons say: Well, we were open; we disclosed all of 
the information about who was giving what. They tried to convince us 
that they went above and beyond to disclose their donors, but they did 
not do so.
  For example, we found they failed to disclose $2.35 million in 
donations from a family foundation that was linked to the mining 
company, Uranium One, which we happen to be talking about tonight.
  Well, who is Uranium One?
  Of course, we know by now that this is a company that was taken over 
by Russia's state-owned nuclear energy firm, Rosatom, another decision 
that was signed off by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
  The dots are pretty easy to start connecting. We, at least, have some 
red flags here.
  Furthermore, there was a whopping $145 million given to the Clinton 
Foundation by Uranium One's owners. I don't know about everyone else 
here, but I would certainly know it if I received over $100 million 
from Russian donors. Talk about Russian collusion. Shall we talk about 
it? Let's have this discussion. That is the whole point of what we are 
talking about here this evening. I would also be very concerned that 
someone receiving this kind of money was free of bias or coercion when 
they are getting this type of money.
  But let me land the plane here. There is a full-fledged investigation 
going on here into President Trump's interactions with Russia, but 
where is the investigation on Hillary Clinton's activities with the 
Russians?
  The Obama administration attempted to sweep this situation under the 
rug. They let her off the hook. That is a disgrace. It is in complete 
disregard for our Nation's laws. And, perhaps, that in itself ought to 
be something else that is looked into: the Obama administration's role 
in all of this.
  I am grateful that Attorney General Sessions is taking these 
allegations seriously. I am hopeful that we can get to the bottom of 
this and ensure that justice is served.
  The FBI must investigate this thoroughly. We must have transparency 
to make sure that Hillary Clinton is held accountable and reaffirm that 
no one is above the law.
  Enough is enough. We have got to go into this further.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the good gentleman from Florida (Mr. Gaetz) for 
his leadership on this.
  Mr. GAETZ. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. 
Jordan).
  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, did the Comey FBI and the Obama Justice Department 
coordinate with the Democratic Party to go after the Republican Party? 
Did the FBI and the Justice Department work hand in glove with the 
Clinton campaign to go after the Trump campaign? That is the 
fundamental question. That is the fundamental question.
  And think about what we have learned in the last several weeks:
  First, we learned that the DNC and the Clinton campaign paid for the 
dossier. The DNC and the Clinton campaign, which we now know are one 
and

[[Page 19661]]

the same, paid for the dossier. They first paid their law firm, who 
then paid Fusion GPS, who then paid Christopher Steele, who then paid 
Russians. This is a great irony.
  We have Special Counsel Mueller investigating possible coordination 
between the Trump campaign and Russia to influence the 2016 
Presidential election, yet we know, just as sure as I am standing on 
the House floor tonight, the Clinton campaign paid Russians to do what? 
Influence the 2016 Presidential election.
  They paid for the dossier. It has been reported--and I think it 
happened--but it has been reported the dossier became the basis to 
secure warrants at the FISA court. In other words, they took this 
dossier, this disproven dossier, fake news, National Enquirer, garbage 
dossier, they dressed it all up, they spruced it all up, they took it 
to the FISA court and then got a judge to say: Okay, that is enough to 
spy on Americans.
  That is what has been reported. And all of the evidence points to 
that actually taking place.
  So they used this dossier, this disproven dossier, to spy on 
Americans.
  And then what have we learned in just the past 5 days?

                              {time}  1745

  Bruce Ohr, the Associate Deputy Attorney General; Bruce Ohr, four 
doors down from Mr. Rosenstein; Bruce Ohr, the top guy at the Justice 
Department, in 2016, during the campaign, is meeting with the guy who 
wrote the dossier, meeting with Christopher Steele.
  Bruce Ohr, the top guy at the Justice Department, the Associate 
Deputy Attorney General, and four doors down from Mr. Rosenstein is 
also meeting with Glenn Simpson, the guy who founded Fusion GPS, the 
people who paid for the dossier.
  So you have got Bruce Ohr, the top official at the Justice 
Department, hanging out with the guy who wrote and the guy who paid for 
the dossier during the campaign.
  Here is the kicker. I mean, you can't make this stuff up. Here is the 
kicker. At the same time that Bruce Ohr is meeting with him, we learn 
that Bruce Ohr's wife is being paid by Fusion GPS, working for the 
people who paid Christopher Steele to write the dossier that we believe 
was taken to the FISA court to secure warrants to spy on Americans 
associated with the Trump campaign.
  We know all that happened. That is all public. We know that is the 
truth. Now, what Mr. Gaetz is saying--and this is why I appreciate the 
work that Mr. Gaetz and my colleagues are doing on this--and what we 
are saying: Look, give us the documents. Answer our questions, for 
crying out loud. And if you won't, then appoint a special counsel--a 
second special counsel so the American people can get the truth.
  Because if this, in fact, happened--and I think it did--where you had 
the Justice Department, the FBI working with one campaign to go after 
the other campaign, working with the Clinton campaign to go after 
President Trump's campaign, then that is as wrong as it gets. That is 
something that should never take place in the United States of America.
  That is why this is so important. That is why the work that 
Congressman Gaetz and other colleagues are doing is so important.
  Again, if you are not going to do the job, Justice Department, at 
least appoint a second special counsel so we can get answers and we can 
hold people accountable who did this in this great country.
  Mr. GAETZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Jordan) 
for joining us on the floor this evening. I particularly thank him for 
his work in the Judiciary Committee and the Oversight Committee. The 
gentleman is correct. We just want our questions answered. We just want 
to know: Did these things occur that would seem to evidence collusion 
on the part of the Democratic Party and the Clinton campaign with 
Russians to influence the outcome of the election?
  But our own Justice Department and our own FBI won't answer those 
questions. Tomorrow we have Mr. Rosenstein before the Judiciary 
Committee. I hope he does give us answers.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman 
from Florida (Mr. Biggs), a fellow member of the Judiciary Committee.
  Mr. BIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. 
Gaetz) for leading this Special Order tonight, and I am grateful for 
his work on this very important issue.
  Mr. Speaker, I will tell you that I am very appreciative of my 
colleagues who also continue to work on this very important task, 
because this reminds me of playing a basketball game where you get 
there and there is a five-on-five game, except for it is not really 
five-on-five because the other team has got the referees on their side, 
they have got the scorekeeper on their side, they have got the 
statistics on their side, they have got the person that runs the clock 
on their side.
  That is really what has happened here. We know that is what has 
happened here because of the conflict of interest and bias that has 
taken over and controls the Robert Mueller special investigations team. 
That is a team that is biased. He has got conflict of interest. Nobody 
is going to get a fair shake from that team.
  Why is that?
  Well, let's just think about this. A couple of weeks ago, we had the 
FBI--excuse me--Attorney General Jeff Sessions come in. He is a great 
guy. I asked him specifically: Do you have any procedure to vet 
conflict of interest or bias on Mueller's special team or in the 
Department of Justice?
  He said: No, we don't. We don't have that.
  He doesn't have a question there. He doesn't have a process. He says: 
It is up to each individual to determine if they have got that conflict 
of interest or bias.
  Well, we had Director Wray in last week. I asked him the same 
question. He said basically the same thing: No, we don't have a 
process.
  Mueller doesn't have a process. In fact, it is as if the process is 
you need to have a conflict or bias in order to get on Mueller's 
special counsel team. That is what this is stacked up to be.
  Well, that is where we are today. And tomorrow, when Deputy 
Rosenstein comes in, I am looking forward to asking him the same 
questions because there is conflict and there is bias. My colleagues 
have all iterated that tonight. It just happens over and over and over 
again. To get on that team, you have to have a conflict or bias.
  Well, so what else is important? What else has come out of these 
hearings?
  Well, I tell you what else has come out. I said to Director Wray: 
Look, we know there is a problem here. Attorney General Sessions told 
us that the responsibility of the person involved is to make sure they 
don't have a conflict. We know that there is a huge cloud that sits 
right there.
  Well, this is outrageous. No firm in the private sector would ever 
allow that to go on. But here we have this--it is like a drip, drip, 
drip from a faucet. Every day or two, here is another conflict of 
interest that comes out. Maybe Mr. Strzok, maybe Mr. Ohr, maybe Mr. 
Ohr's wife, maybe Mr. Weissmann, maybe Mr. Zebley, maybe Mr. Cooper, 
maybe Jeannie Rhee. It just goes on and on.
  You know what? This is ridiculous. So I asked Director Wray: Look, 
you have got the inspector general looking at the Hillary Clinton 
investigation right now and all these other investigations. What will 
you do if he says there was irregularities in the Hillary Clinton 
investigation?
  He said: I would try to ``unring the bell.''
  Think about that. He says he is willing to unring the bell. I asked 
him what he meant. So he talked about personnel decisions. Maybe 
someone needs to be let go, disciplined, retrained, whatever. Maybe 
they will come up with a process to vet conflicts of interest and bias 
investigations.
  But I pressed him a little bit harder. I asked him: When you get to 
unring the bell, if you have irregularities in the Hillary Clinton 
investigation, will you commit to reopen the investigation?
  Now, he didn't commit, but he indicated very strongly he would reopen 
that Hillary Clinton investigation.

[[Page 19662]]

  That is what needs to happen now. We know that there were 
irregularities. We know that that is what the inspector general is 
going to find. And I tell you this: We have got to stop making this 
administration play a stacked team when the other team has nothing but 
biased and conflicted investigators who control the clock, who control 
the score, who control the statistics, who control the referees. That 
is what you have going on here, and it must stop, and it must stop now.
  With that in mind, if Attorney General Sessions, if Director Wray, 
and if Mr. Rosenstein do not provide the information Congress has 
asked, they should be held in contempt.
  Mr. GAETZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. 
Biggs) for his leadership on the Judiciary Committee. He is absolutely 
right. We have to get answers to these questions. And if we don't, then 
Congress can never have confidence in the outcome of any investigation. 
And if we can't have confidence, then our constituents, the American 
people, certainly can't either.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman 
from Texas (Mr. Gohmert), another member of the Judiciary Committee.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I do appreciate the concerns of my friends 
here in Congress because this is just incredible.
  You know, many of us have read, understood what happened during 
Watergate, and we thought surely there have been enough things put in 
as checks to prevent an administration from totally co-oping the 
Department of Justice. No one President should be able to have an 
administration that is powerful enough that it could be a self-
sustaining party where all of the powers, whether it is the IRS that 
has people in key places that prevent people from guilt giving, for 
example, proper tax status to opponents of an administration so that 
they stand a better chance of being defeated in running for a second 
election.
  It happened in the Obama administration. And to the great 
embarrassment or what should be embarrassment of the Obama 
administration, of the IRS, and of the United States Congress, nothing 
was done. It appears crimes were committed. Nothing was done.
  We are just aghast.
  How could this happen?
  Surely the DOJ would jump into the IRS and correct this and stop this 
so that the IRS could not be weaponized as a political tool. I mean, 
Nixon may have dreamed of that at some point, but we are not aware of 
it.
  I mean, it is just hard to believe that anybody would anticipate 
using the powers of government in such a flagrant form as we are 
finding out almost every day now. New allegations, not just--not 
allegations; new facts show that corruption and political animus and 
anything but justice was being conducted for a number of years in the 
Department of Justice.
  You know, as an assistant district attorney in east Texas, as a judge 
getting to know and hearing so many different Federal agents testify, 
most people felt like, gosh, if the FBI comes in, these are the guys in 
the white hats. But much of America has seen what can only be styled as 
real corruption that has turned those white hats into a stinking brown 
for some of the top people.
  We heard Christopher Wray, the FBI Director, saying: You know, I 
think of the FBI and I think about these thousands of great Federal 
agents across the country who care about their country and protecting 
people's lives and protecting the law.
  Well, yeah, I think about that, too, until my mind comes back here to 
Washington, and not just a swamp, but areas that have become a 
cesspool. It is unbelievable to think--I mean, I saw ``All the 
President's Men'' the other night about Watergate and Deep Throat. And 
as I watched, oh, my gosh, you mean somebody in the White House may 
have had contact with somebody that may have had funds that could be 
used?
  I mean, you look at what is coming out in the news every day and it 
makes that look like Keystone Cops--nothing compared to the extent that 
this administration used the Justice Department.
  And going back to the IRS, what did Rosenstein or all these other 
great Justice Department officials do for us in cleaning up the mess at 
the IRS?
  Nothing, nothing, nothing.
  What did Eric Holder and Loretta Lynch do to clean things up?
  Well, they just kept dumping more and more dirt in that washing 
machine.
  Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, then you find that a 
reporter sees the husband of someone being investigated in a 
clandestine meeting, in an area they thought nobody would notice.
  And what do they want to do at the Justice Department?
  We find out they want to go after that reporter. They want to go 
after that reporter because this reporter actually was reporting some 
things that might help get some things cleaned up.
  They say: We don't want things cleaned up. We want to keep our little 
cesspool tight and friendly, where we know all the players and all the 
swamp rats.
  We have got to have a massive clean out of what has been happening, 
but it is not happening.

                              {time}  1800

  Then we find out, gee, there was this investigation regarding Russia 
trying to violate the law, pay bribes, pay payoffs, anything they could 
do to corner the market on uranium and get United States uranium in 
their own control. And, gee, who ends up having their fingerprints on 
that? A guy named Rosenstein.
  In fact, then you see one of the people involved in the investigation 
of corruption and uranium and payoffs, well, there is Rod Rosenstein's 
name. Now, he has an assistant sign for him asking the judge to seal 
the records so we can't know exactly what all was done by the FBI.
  It is kind of like we find out there is someone, the undercover agent 
that the FBI was using, that the Justice Department was using, and they 
get an agreement, a nondisclosure agreement. I mean, the only reason I 
can think of they would want a nondisclosure agreement at the FBI is so 
that the informant wouldn't turn around and talk about how dirty they 
have been. I mean, why would they get a nondisclosure agreement?
  I might expect the guy who was the informant demanding a 
nondisclosure agreement from the FBI and from the Justice Department: 
You can't talk about what all I did; you can't talk about the things I 
did because the people I was working undercover for you on, they might 
try to kill me, so I demand a nondisclosure agreement from the Justice 
Department, from the FBI, so you won't disclose things that will get me 
killed.
  But, no, that is not what happened. Under the Obama administration, 
Loretta Lynch ``Injustice Department,'' we have a nondisclosure 
agreement that the person who risked his life couldn't disclose what 
was going on. Sounds like somebody, to me, at the FBI and the Justice 
Department had a pretty dirty conscience and they didn't want to be 
outed. And at every turn: Oh, well, that was sealed. Oh, well, that is 
a nondisclosure agreement. Oh, you can't have access to that.
  The FBI and the Justice Department and people that we have been 
questioning have really kind of gotten themselves in a position where 
they are above the law. They are above Congress. And in this country, 
the branch that the Founders thought would have the least control 
ever--that was the judiciary; they are small; they don't really have 
any power--they are legislating and running the executive branch from 
under their robes.
  At the same time, you have got the executive branch and the 
Department of Justice that has become a new playground for people who 
want to write like Kafka, ginning up charges, knocking down doors in 
the wee hours of the morning: Oh, were they a threat?
  Well, no, not really, but we just need to intimidate them. It is what 
we do in the Justice Department nowadays. We are the Department of 
intimidation.
  I am telling you, Mr. Speaker, there has got to be a material change. 
There

[[Page 19663]]

has got to be. There are too many people currently in the Justice 
Department and the top of the FBI--not these fine young agents across 
the country who have given everything they had, even though Mueller 
removed their ability to have wise counsel because he got rid of the 
long-toothed people that had the experience and the wisdom to know how 
to bring these agents along. He purged the training materials so FBI 
agents could not know how to discern if somebody had been radicalized.
  There is just so much, that almost needs to start from scratch; and 
we are having to deal with the players like Rosenstein who have been in 
that system as they were part of the process while it was corroding 
and, really, infecting.
  I thank my friends for caring enough about what is going on to stand 
up and raise cain. But, like I said, you know, just when you think, 
well, that has got to be the final shoe dropping, then we have this 
story that the wife of the demoted DOJ official actually worked for the 
firm that put together, was behind, the anti-Trump dossier that we 
believe may very likely have been used in order to surveil the Trump 
campaign, in order to use the DOJ, working in collusion with not only 
Russia, but also the Hillary Clinton campaign, in order to elect a 
candidate who had no chance otherwise.
  Well, a funny thing happened on the way to using the DOJ and Fusion 
GPS and the Russians in order to get Hillary Clinton elected--she 
didn't get elected. But that certainly doesn't owe anything to Nellie 
Ohr or Bruce Ohr or these people who have been occupying the Department 
of Justice as it tainted and turned from, what Christopher Wray says, 
an F that stood for ``fidelity'' to, now, an I that stands for 
``infidelity.''
  Let's get back to fidelity in the Justice Department. Let's get back 
to an incorruptible Justice Department. I am hoping and praying we are 
heading that direction, but I am just not seeing it yet.
  Mr. GAETZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas. His 
perspective as a former prosecutor and former judge certainly sheds a 
tremendous amount of light on the stark days that we found ourselves in 
with this biased effort against the President of the United States.
  I would also like to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Jordan), the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry), the gentleman from Georgia 
(Mr. Jody B. Hice), and the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Biggs) for 
their contributions not only to this Special Order, but to this 
critical discussion we are having in the country.
  I will conclude with this, Mr. Speaker. Tomorrow, the Deputy Attorney 
General will raise his right hand and swear to be truthful before the 
Judiciary Committee, and we will ask these tough questions about 
coordination with Democrats and the DNC and, potentially, the FBI to 
gin up this false information about the President.
  We will ask why a senior official at the Department of Justice had a 
spouse who was working for the company that was trying to discredit our 
President both before and after the election. And I hope he doesn't 
give the same answers that we heard from the Director of the FBI, Mr. 
Wray.
  Mr. Wray said in response to almost all these questions: Well, we 
have got an inspector general. Inspector generals sniff around all 
these things, and if there is something wrong, we will make reforms 
after we hear back.
  The time is now. The danger to our country is clear and present if we 
allow our duly-elected President to be undermined by these unfair and 
biased tactics. So I am hopeful that we will move past the jargon and 
just give straight answers to the American people to these very 
legitimate questions that so many of our constituents are asking.
  We should also remember that the inspector general process is far 
from perfect. We heard from an inspector general, Mr. McCullough, who 
said that, when he brought forward claims, he was threatened, his 
family was threatened, his job was threatened, his agency was 
threatened, and that he did not have an opportunity to tell the 
American people the truth.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people deserve the truth. The truth is that 
there was no collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. If there 
was any collusion, it was the Democrats, it was the DNC, and it was 
this nexus between Mr. Ohr and his spouse working for the very people 
who were engaged in these devious tactics.
  We deserve better, and we are going to be demanding better tomorrow 
in the Judiciary Committee.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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