The release of the Nunes memo — a highly controversial classified document that alleges the FBI abused its power during the Russia probe — prompted anger among politicians and advocates Friday.
U.S. President Donald Trump signed off on the four-page document’s release, despite fierce opposition from politicians, the FBI and the Justice Department.
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The FBI has said the memo is inaccurate and missing critical context. Trump, however, has supported the memo’s release, which could undermine the probe being led by special counsel Robert Mueller.
Anger over its possible release boiled over Friday after the document was made public.
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A statement from the FBI Agents Association released directly after the memo defended its members.
“The American people should know that they continue to be well-served by the world’s most preeminent law enforcement agency,” the statement read. “FBI Special Agents have not, and will not, allow partisan politics to distract us from our solemn commitment to our mission.”
Former FBI director James Comey, who was fired by Trump in 2017, tweeted that debate over the memo “destroyed trust.”
But the White House stood by its decision to release the classified memo.
Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders sent out a statement saying, “The memorandum raises serious concerns about the integrity of decisions made at the highest levels of the Department of Justice and the FBI to use the Government’s most intrusive surveillance tools against American citizens.”
The move was also denounced by top House Democrat Nancy Pelosi in a statement in which she called the document a “misleading partisan spin memo.”
“President Trump has surrendered his constitutional responsibility as Commander-in-Chief by releasing highly classified and distorted intelligence,” she wrote. “By not protecting intelligence sources and methods, he just sent his friend Putin a bouquet.”
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Pelosi’s sentiment was echoed across the political spectrum by Republican Sen. John McCain.
“The American people deserve to know all the facts surrounding Russia’s ongoing efforts to subvert our democracy, which is why Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation must proceed unimpeded,” McCain wrote in a statement shortly after the memo’s release.
“Our nation’s elected officials, including the president, must stop looking at this investigation through the lens of politics and manufacturing political sideshows. If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing Putin’s job for him.”
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Former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry also spoke out against its release in a tweet Friday afternoon, saying the memo is “dangerous, ugly, and an assault on the integrity of the institutions of our country.”
While some politicians spoke out fiercely against the memo, founder of WikiLeaks Julian Assange had a different take on its release.
“The claims about how the ‘Nunes’ memo would destroy ‘national security’ were lies,” Assange tweeted. “Classification stickers are used by bureaucrats trying to obtain ‘political security’ for their cronies.”
— With files from The Associated Press