Hotly disputed Russia-probe memo released over FBI protest

The Republican-led House intelligence committee has released a memo based on classified information that alleges the FBI abused U.S. government surveillance powers in its investigation into Russian election interference.

President Donald Trump cleared the way for publication of the controversial memo, despite objections from the FBI. The four-page memo was drafted by Republicans on the committee chaired by Rep. Devin Nunes of California.

It says there was "a troubling breakdown of legal processes" in the FBI's Russia investigation.

Trump told reporters the document shows "a lot of people should be ashamed of themselves."

"I think it's terrible," Trump said. "What's going on in this country, I think it's a disgrace."

Trump has been telling friends that he believed the document would validate his concerns that the FBI and Justice Department conspired against him.

But the FBI says the four-page document is inaccurate and stripped of critical context. And Democrats say the memo, which makes public material that is ordinarily considered among the most tightly held national security information, cherry-picks Republican talking points in an effort to smear law enforcement.

Rep. Adam Schiff, the committee's top Democrat, said the Republican document "mischaracterizes highly sensitive classified information" and that "the selective release and politicization of classified information sets a terrible precedent and will do long-term damage to the intelligence community and our law enforcement agencies."

The memo had been classified since it deals with warrants obtained from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The White House declassified it on Friday.

The disclosure is likely to further escalate an intra-government conflict that has divided the president and his hand-picked law enforcement leaders.

But the memo does nothing to address obstruction questions that have led Mueller to express interest in interviewing Trump. It also reveals that the FBI investigation began months earlier, in the summer of 2016, based on information involving a separate Trump aide, George Papadopoulos, who has already pleaded guilty to federal charges.

Mueller inherited the probe in May 2017. Four people have so far been charged in his investigation, including two who have pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.

Trump, who lashed out anew at the FBI and Justice Department ahead of Friday's document's release, refused to express confidence in Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who appointed Mueller and is mentioned by name in the memo.

Asked if he still had confidence in Rosenstein, he retorted. "You figure that one out."

Earlier in the day, the president tweeted: "The top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favour of Democrats and against Republicans - something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago. Rank & File are great people."

Later, White House spokesman Raj Shah told CNN, "We fully expect Rod Rosenstein to continue on as the deputy attorney general."

The memo offered the first government confirmation that the FBI in October 2016 obtained a secret warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to monitor Page, on the basis that the FBI believed he might be an agent of a foreign power — Russia. That warrant was reauthorized multiple times, including by Rosenstein.

In a statement, Page, who served as a foreign policy adviser and came on the FBI radar in 2013 as part of a separate counterintelligence probe, said, "The brave and assiduous oversight by Congressional leaders in discovering this unprecedented abuse of process represents a giant, historic leap in the repair of America's democracy."

The memo asserts that opposition research conducted by a former British spy, Christopher Steele, for Fusion GPS "formed an essential part" of the initial application to receive the warrant. It's unclear how much or what information that Steele collected was included in the application. Steele's research was compiled into a dossier of salacious allegations involving Trump and Russia. 

Regardless, the FBI routinely relies on multiple sources of information when it obtains surveillance warrants, and that information oftentimes is not verified at the time agents make their applications.

Fusion GPS's opposition research effort was initially funded by the conservative Washington Free Beacon. It was later picked up by the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign through a Washington law firm.

The memo release, and Trump's tweet, escalates a clash with the man he picked to lead the FBI, Christopher Wray, after firing James Comey as agency director.

In a tweet of his own, Comey said the memo is "dishonest and misleading."

Trump's tweet also seemed at odds with House Speaker Paul Ryan, who said a day earlier "this memo is not an indictment of the FBI or the Department of Justice."

FBI officials, including Wray, had also made direct appeals to the White House, warning that the declassification and release of the memo could set a dangerous precedent.