by Casey Harper
After two years of waiting for a federal report on allegations of Democratic spying on the Trump campaign, Republicans are demanding answers.
More than 40 Republican U.S. senators sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland Thursday requesting the release of the Durham report, the long-awaited results of an investigation into the controversial origins of the FBI investigation into Russian collusion.
“Attorney General Merrick Garland must pledge to publicly release the full report and allow Special Counsel Durham to continue his investigation uninhibited past September 2021,” said Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., who signed the letter. “We are over two years into the investigation of how the Obama-Biden FBI spied on an incoming president, and we still do not have answers. America’s national security apparatus was weaponized to take down President [Donald] Trump, and the American people deserve to know how this occurred.”
Former President Trump appointed Special Counsel John Durham in 2019 to investigate the impetus behind the FBI’s Russia investigation, which began in 2016. Many anticipated the report may have come during the last election cycle, but it still has not been released.
The FBI investigation came under serious scrutiny after news broke that the FBI conducted ongoing surveillance of a Trump campaign advisor during the Obama administration and may have relied on intelligence from shaky sources. Special Counsel Robert Mueller did not find the evidence to prove such collusion.
Durham has been investigating the FBI’s surveillance, the sources behind it, and whether any wrongdoing occurred. Earlier this year, Trump lamented the report’s delay.
“Where’s Durham?” Trump said in a statement in March. “Is he a living, breathing human being? Will there ever be a Durham report?”
The senators’ letter requests an update be made publicly available and has the support of the vast majority of Senate Republicans.
“Two years ago, your predecessor appointed United States Attorney John Durham to conduct a review of the origins of the FBI’s investigation into Russian collusion in the 2016 United States presidential election,” the letter says. “The Special Counsel’s ongoing work is important to many Americans who were disturbed that government agents subverted lawful process to conduct inappropriate surveillance for political purposes. The truth pursued by this investigation is necessary to ensure transparency in our intelligence agencies and restore faith in our civil liberties. Thus, it is essential that the Special Counsel’s ongoing review should be allowed to continue unimpeded and without undue limitations. To that end, we ask that you provide an update on the status of Special Counsel Durham’s inquiry and that the investigation’s report be made available to the public upon completion.”
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Casey Harper is a Senior Reporter for the Washington, D.C. Bureau for The Center Square. He previously worked for The Daily Caller, The Hill, and Sinclair Broadcast Group. A graduate of Hillsdale College, Casey’s work has also appeared in Fox News, Fox Business, and USA Today.
Photo “Merrick Garland” by Senate Democrats (CC BY 2.0),
