Washington — Senator Richard Burr (Richard Burr) is conducting an investigation of the Russian intervention in elections in 2016, the ongoing Senate intelligence Committee. At first, he reluctantly took the job, but now is hard. In his view, the new data caused the investigation to go beyond the originally established framework, however, the Senator hopes to complete it this year. This will allow the Congress to take measures that will prevent further attempts by Moscow to influence the vote in America.
“The investigation is delayed, because initially we did not know some names and was not aware of the existence of some documents, letters, reports, lists of calls. We never imagined that we will need to take the testimony of certain individuals or read their materials,” explains Mr. Barre, the Republican Senator from North Carolina, who heads the intelligence Committee.
According to Mr. Berra, he hopes “to come to final conclusions before the end of the year.” “However, I cannot exclude that there will be some new information that we don’t know yet, and do not extend the investigation for another month or two. I understand that we are talking about urgent investigation, but it should be carried out carefully and cut it, I will not”.
These terms Mr. Burr called in its first eight months of extensive interviews. He made it to The New Washington, podcast, The New York Times. At the moment, his words — the most certain information on this subject. The report of the Senate Committee may be the first significant report of the Congress about Russia’s attempts to secretly influence the outcome of last year’s elections.
Mr. Burr has long been a member in the intelligence Committee and traditionally prefers to have the issues associated with intelligence activities, the Congress said behind closed doors. But this time he considers it important that it is usually secretive, the Committee released the results of its investigation.
“The results of this investigation should be presented to the American people. He needs to see that we found and draw your own conclusions. This information is not for the cabal in Congress, he said. We must show the American people the facts”.
Mr. Burr said the new information prompted the investigation in new directions, and he will not hesitate to consider any business activities of persons associated with the electoral headquarters of the trump, if there is information about their complicity with the Russians or that they are compromised.
However, he immediately added: “While I have not seen any evidence to suggest that we need to do it.”
Initially the Democrats wanted to create a special Committee to investigate. Many of them seriously doubted that Mr. Barre, a staunch supporter of the President and his former adviser — would be diligent to investigate Russia’s attempts to support the campaign of Mr. trump. In January, when Mr. Burr stated that the Committee will not consider a possible connection between the electoral headquarters of the trump and Russian intelligence, their scepticism has become even stronger.
However, under the pressure of the Senator from Virginia Mark Warner (Mark Warner), Vice-Chairman of the Committee from the Democratic party, Mr. Burr quickly changed his position and promised a large-scale investigation into election-related activities in Russia. Mr. Warner works closely with Mr. Burr, and Democrats in General try to refrain from criticism of the Chairman of the intelligence Committee. On the contrary, they praise him for his public hearing that he is holding. In early June, at these hearings was the former Director of the FBI James Comey (James B. Comey).
According to Mr. Berra, his decision to actively advocate on the same side with Mr. Warner was due to the fact that they both understand that Congress must show the public that “the Russian intervention was a blatant and deployed,” and Congress may take in response to the punitive measures.
“It is now right?— asks Mr. Burr, speaking of Russia’s attempts to influence American domestic policy. — I hope not. And we need to do everything possible to change the architecture of our system and create early warning mechanisms”.
Mr. Burr admits that his confidence in the serious scale of the Russian effort implies differences with Mr. trump, who, despite the consensus of the intelligence community, has doubts about the involvement of Russia and that Moscow was trying to help him.
“Some people try to present things as if he actually won, but the election outcome was faked Russia, — says Mr. Burr. — In reality, however, Russian in any way, in any form and in any form did not affect the vote count. The President does not have to doubt it. All clear — he has got majority support, he took the oath, he is President, he won, he deserved it”.
“However, I would like to separate this question from the question about the threat posed by Russia and which we are not at liberty to ignore. We need to be tough so nothing like this happens again” — he said.
Many doubt that the Committee has staff able to carry out such a complex investigation. However, Mr. Burr is deeply confident in his subordinates. In his view, competence-related intelligence matters gives the intelligence Committee has an advantage over other agencies conducting similar investigations, including the apparatus of the Ministry of justice appointed a special Prosecutor Robert Mueller III (Robert S. Mueller III).
“We are investigating do extremely smart and competent people, — stressed Mr. Burr. — They never had to learn anything — they have long know how to read intelligence reports and understand what these materials mean. I am sure that Bob Mueller is now more difficult — in his office consist of lawyers who’ve never seen the intelligence reports, the people who still need to explain. We, meanwhile, managed to take the testimony of nearly a hundred witnesses.”
“I’m not sure anyone’s still the story was going the moment as far as ours,” he says.
During his last campaign for re-election to the Senate, Mr. Burr stated that this will be his last term, and he’s not going to run in 2022. Specified in The New York Times the question of whether it gives him more freedom in the conduct of the investigation, he replied evasively.
“Regardless of whether I run or not, I wouldn’t call this investigation a pleasant thing, he said. — However it was assigned to me. Our Committee exists for such work. Not to do it or do it carelessly would be to ignore vested in me the responsibility.”
