During a Wednesday House Judiciary Committee hearing about a police reform bill, the committee’s top Republican Jim Jordan decided that now was the time to rant and rave about the Russia investigation. Specifically, he used the context of a discussion about policing reforms to launch into a rant about how, supposedly, there was some kind of grave injustice in the fact that FBI interviews with Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn were not recorded. Republicans allege that Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his communications with a Russian Ambassador to the U.S., was mistreated.
It’s amazing how staggeringly irrelevant that Republicans have managed to make their core positions. In a conversation about police brutality, which is a problem that has affected the lives of many people around the country on a real basis, Republicans veered into a rant about securing protections for Donald Trump’s political allies.
Jordan ranted:
‘Cops wear body-cams, but the FBI agent interviewing a 3 star general doesn’t have to record that conversation? That makes no sense! Especially when you know the facts around that conversation that took place.’
Discussing an FBI interview of Flynn in mid-January, Jordan added:
‘There’s no recording of that interview. There’s the 302 notes. And guess what they do with the notes? They change ’em! Months later! And prosecute a general! Prosecute an American citizen based on that!’
Jordan seems to think that longstanding FBI policy around conducting interviews constitutes some kind of affront against the Trump team specifically. It’s not. Flynn admitted to lying to authorities when he claimed not to have discussed sanctions with the Russians, and transcripts of his original conversations with the Russians have since emerged that confirm that yes, he discussed sanctions with them. None of the facts of Flynn’s case have changed — but Jordan and other Republicans seem to want a free pass for Flynn anyway.
As Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) put it, addressing Republicans directly right before Jordan spoke:
‘Until you’re willing to get rid of the straw men, get rid of the confusion, get rid of all of the different tactics that you’re using to avoid the hard conversation about race in America, we are not going to get where we need to be, to have equality.’
Although Swalwell spoke before Jordan, Swalwell’s comments cover Jordan’s perspective as well. Watch below:
