That's What He Said

News  |  Nov 30, 2018

Members of the Senate Intelligence and Judiciary Committees have started going back over witness testimony and looking for falsehoods and inconsistencies in the wake of Thursday's revelation Michael Cohen lied to Congress. 

NBC News:

The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, said Thursday that the committee had made multiple criminal referrals to Mueller, but added "we're not going to talk about any individuals."

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said the intelligence committee "made referrals where appropriate. I am very glad the special counsel is pursuing those who mislead members of congress."

The committee's chairman, Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., had a stern warning Thursday for witnesses appearing before Congress.

"This is a reason people shouldn't lie when they're in front of a congressional investigation," Burr said.

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Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said it was "possible" that other witnesses had lied. "I think there probably will be some efforts to reinterview some people as a result of what happened today."

Some Democrats on the Senate intelligence and judiciary committees, including Chris Coons of Delaware and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, have said publicly that they suspect that some witnesses, including the oldest president's son, may have given misleading or false statements in testimony.

"My impression from watching Donald Trump Jr. in that meeting is that he evaded and contradicted himself in many of his answers," Blumenthal said on the day the transcript was released. "I have no confidence that he has told the whole truth."

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At least one witness, longtime Trump associate Roger Stone, has amended his original testimony.

More than 200 witnesses have appeared before the Senate Intelligence Committee alone as it seeks to learn about Russian interference in the 2016 election.

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The special counsel does have access to a select number of transcripts from witness interviews conducted by the Senate Intelligence Committee, though Warner would not specify which ones or how many.

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Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee blocked a Democratic effort in September to make all of its interview materials available to the special counsel. But most of those interview transcripts will be released publicly in a redacted state as early as December.

Democrats on the committee tell NBC News that one of the committee's first acts in the new Congress will be to send the special counsel all unredacted transcripts of interviews the panel conducted in 2017 and 2018.

Senate committees scouring testimony for misleading statements in Russia probe (NBC News)