Republicans are split over how to respond to newly declassified intelligence files that revive allegations of a Clinton-led scheme to falsely link Donald Trump to Russia. While some GOP lawmakers want new investigations, others argue the matter is old news and better left to the Justice Department.
The material, released by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, includes a 2020 House Intelligence Committee report and a classified annex tied to Special Counsel John Durham’s findings.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe, who served under Trump, said the evidence shows a “Hillary Clinton plan” to smear Trump in 2016 by promoting false claims of Russian collusion.
“In the summer of 2016, U.S. intelligence intercepted Russian intelligence talking about a Hillary Clinton plan,” Ratcliffe said on Fox News. “A Hillary Clinton plan to falsely accuse Donald Trump of Russia collusion, to vilify him and smear him with what would become known, infamously, as the Steele dossier.”
Ratcliffe claimed that former CIA Director John Brennan, along with James Clapper and James Comey, pushed the Steele dossier into intelligence assessments. “They all pushed the known fake Steele dossier,” Ratcliffe said. He added that their actions ignored contradicting evidence and helped justify the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane probe.
He also said the intelligence was “so explosive” that Brennan briefed then-President Obama and his national security team. A 2023 report from Gabbard’s office accused the Obama administration of “manufacturing” intelligence assessments to justify what it called a “years-long coup against President Trump.”
But not all Republicans are eager to revisit the issue. Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) said the Justice Department is better suited to handle it. “It creates more and more drama here,” he told reporters. “Sunshine is a good thing… however that comes out, get the information out.”
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) echoed that view. “We’ve got other issues right now that are going to be more time-consuming, and more top of mind,” he said, though he didn’t rule out a future review by the Intelligence Committee.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rick Crawford (R-AR) took a sharper stance. He called Brennan “a documented liar, full stop,” and said, “We can hold them to account by removing them from the [intelligence community] and ending their career as deep-state operatives.”
Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL) said he would support hearings and fresh investigations. Others, like Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and John Cornyn (R-TX), are pushing Attorney General Pam Bondi to appoint a special counsel.
Democrats have dismissed the claims as partisan. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) said the newly declassified House report shouldn’t override earlier bipartisan conclusions. “The Senate Intelligence Committee did a — not just bipartisan — but a unanimous, bipartisan report on Russian collusion in the 2016 election,” he said. “I would caution anybody on either side to take something that’s one party.”
President Trump didn’t hold back. “Obama is guilty… this was treason,” he said Tuesday in the Oval Office.
A 2022 TIPP poll found that even many Democrats wanted Clinton investigated over her alleged role in the collusion claims. Ratcliffe also said Clinton’s 2022 testimony to Durham contradicted intelligence now being declassified. “What that reflects,” he said, “is a coordinated effort to amplify the lie and bury the truth.”