The Senate Intelligence Committee Is Reportedly Investigating Steve Bannon
Reuters reported earlier today that the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee is investigating Steve Bannon’s role in President Trump’s 2016 campaign. The information was attributed to “three sources familiar with the inquiry.”
From Reuters:
The committee is looking into what Bannon might know about any contacts during the campaign between Moscow and two advisers to the campaign, George Papadopoulos and Carter Page, they said.
William Burck, a lawyer for Bannon, told Reuters: “The Senate Intelligence Committee has expressed an interest in interviewing Mr. Bannon as a witness, just as they have many other people involved in the Trump Campaign. But the Committee has never suggested that he’s under investigation himself and to claim otherwise is recklessly false.”
Papadopoulos was sentenced to 14 days in prison in September for lying to the FBI about his contact with Russians. Page, a former Trump campaign advisor, became a central figure in the Russia probe after it was made public that the FBI was authorized to surveil his communications during the 2016 campaign. The FBI’s warrant application alleged that Page was “an agent of a foreign power.”
The Senate committee will also apparently look into Bannon’s dealings with Cambridge Analytica, the now-defunct firm that, along with Bannon, helped craft Trump’s message and target his voters by diving deep into Facebook’s user data.
Sources told Reuters that the committee is working with Bannon to find a date in late November for an interview with Senate investigators.
Bannon has already met twice with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. Bannon’s second meeting with Mueller took place last week, according to the Washington Post. That interview apparently focused on Trump supporter Roger Stone and his potential connections to WikiLeaks’ release of Democratic officials’ emails in 2016. Stone says he had no involvement with the email leaks.