House Republicans say no evidence of collusion as they end Russia probe

Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee announced Monday they found no evidence that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia and that they are shutting down their yearlong investigation.

The committee's Republicans are also disagreeing with the intelligence community's assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to help the Trump campaign over Hillary Clinton, a notion that aligns with President Donald Trump's viewpoint on election meddling.

The conclusions will be met with sharp disagreement from Democrats and are bound to inflame partisan tensions on a committee that's been beleaguered by partisanship throughout the course of its Russia probe.
Rep. Mike Conaway, the Texas Republican leading the Russia investigation, said Monday that the committee had concluded its interviews for the Russia investigation, and the Republican staff had prepared a 150-page draft report that they would give to Democrats to review on Tuesday morning.

"We found no evidence of collusion, and so we found perhaps some bad judgment, inappropriate meetings," Conaway said. "We found no evidence of any collusion of anything people were actually doing, other than taking a meeting they shouldn't have taken or just inadvertently being in the same building."

Democrats say there are still scores of witnesses the committee should call, and argue that Republicans have failed to use subpoenas to obtain documents and require witnesses to answer questions that are central to the investigation.

Conaway told reporters that he feels the committee has investigated all avenues it needed to probe, and he argued that the panel would not have been able to obtain the information Democrats were seeking had they gone the route of subpoenaing witnesses or trying to hold them in contempt.

Conaway, for instance, said the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting between senior campaign officials and a Russian lawyer where dirt on Clinton was promised was "ill advised." But he said that the committee did not turn up any evidence of collusion, arguing the promoter who organized the meeting had exaggerated what the Russians would provide.

The committee's report will conclude that they agree with 98% of the intelligence community's January 2017 assessment that Russia meddled in the 2016 election, according to a committee aide.

But the panel's Republicans take issue with the key finding that Putin was trying get Trump elected. Conaway said it was clear the Russians were trying to sow discord in the 2016 US election, but Republicans did not establish the same conclusions as the CIA that they specifically were trying to help Trump.

The committee's Russia investigation included interviews with 73 witnesses and a review of roughly 300,000 pages of documents, Conaway said. They included key figures like Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Steve Bannon, but Democrats have argued that those witnesses failed to fully provide documents or answer important questions.

Conaway said he hopes that Democrats can work with Republicans on the draft report, and he wants to take their feedback as they shape the final report. He declined to put a timeline on when the report would be made public, as the committee intends to submit it to the intelligence community for declassification beforehand.