Nearly two years to the day after Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) read into the Congressional record unverified and salacious allegations about Russian collusion from the now discredited “Trump Dossier,” senior Republicans are calling for his resignation.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) on Monday demanded an apology from Schiff and for the California Democrat to resign from his position as the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
“[Schiff] owes the American public an apology,” McCarthy said, according to Politico. “Schiff has met the standard that he has imposed on other members of Congress of when they should step back from their positions. He has exceeded that standard, and there is no question he should step down from the Intel chairmanship.”
Also on Monday, White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said Schiff “ought to resign today” over his continued insistence that President Donald Trump would “be impeached or indicted.”
“He ought to resign today,” Conway said. “He’s been on every TV show 50 times a day for practically the last two years, promising Americans that this president would either be impeached or indicted.”
“Adam Schiff should resign. He has no right as somebody who has been peddling a lie, day after day after day, unchallenged and not under oath,” she continued. “Somebody should have put him under oath and said ‘you have evidence, where is it?’”
Donald Trump Jr. had earlier asked if Schiff should “face any repercussions for the lies?”
“Its not trolling when you’re right. #fullofSchiff has been flagrantly lying to the American people & slandering POTUS & me for years for airtime. Should he not face any repercussions for the lies?” Trump tweeted, including an article about him “trolling” Schiff over Mueller’s report.
Schiff has, for more than two years, been claiming to have evidence that Trump conspired with Russians to steal the 2016 election.
1. On Sunday, Schiff told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that there was “significant evidence of collusion,” even though the special counsel determined there was “no evidence that the Trump campaign or anyone associated with it conspired with the Russians to influence the election, despite offers by the Russians to do so.”
2. In March 2018, Schiff wrote in his “Minority Views” response to the Republican-led House Intelligence investigation into Russian collusion (which also found no collusion) that the committee’s “findings are misleading and unsupported by the facts and the investigative record.”
3. In February 2018, Schiff claimed there was “ample evidence” that Trump colluded with Russia. He was speaking at a breakfasted hosted by the Christian Science Monitor when he said: “There is already, in my view, ample evidence in the public domain on the issue of collusion if you’re willing to see it.”
4. In March 2017, Schiff said on “Meet the Press” that there was “circumstantial evidence of collusion” and “direct evidence… of deception.”
5. Also in March 2017, and just a few days after simply saying there was “circumstantial evidence,” Schiff told MSNBC that there was “more than circumstantial evidence” – and he had seen it.
Schiff has, as Conway mentioned, made numerous appearances on TV over the past few years to claim that Trump colluded with the Russians. He has offered no evidence other than what was already known and apparently dismissed by the Mueller investigation to back up his claims.