Every Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee just demanded a criminal investigation of Jeff Sessions

The entire Senate Judiciary Committee wants to investigate Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

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published 2 March 2017

On Thursday, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee sent a letter to FBI Director James Comey and U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Channing Phillips requesting an "immediate criminal investigation" into statements made by Attorney General Jeff Sessions during his Senate confirmation hearing. The letter cited recent revelations Sessions met twice with Sergey Kislyak, Russian ambassador to the United States, during the presidential campaign, despite saying under oath during his hearing that he "did not have communications with the Russians."

Sessions has defended his response, saying he met with Kislyak in his capacity as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, not as a campaign representative; Sessions at times appeared as a surrogate for President Trump during the election. But the Democrats contended Sessions' statement was "disingenuous at best," noting the question did not specifically ask about campaign-related meetings. "His efforts to downplay the contacts as ordinary business for a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee also seem questionable given that other members of the committee have not indicated that they had similar meetings with the Russians," the Democrats wrote in the letter.