There is limited desire among Republicans on Capitol Hill to haul Obama-era CIA Director John Brennan back in front of lawmakers, despite accusations that he may have lied to Congress about statements related to 2016 Russian election meddling.
A years-old House Intelligence Committee report now available to the public appears to contradict statements made to Congress by Brennan in 2017, a document that was recently declassified by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard as part of a broader document dump she claims is evidence of a “treasonous conspiracy” by Obama officials to undermine Trump in 2016.
However, Republicans on Congress’s Intelligence Committees suggest they have more pressing matters than nearly a decade-old testimony outside the statute of limitations for lying to lawmakers and that the Department of Justice is better equipped to investigate such allegations.
“I would let the federal agencies be able to walk back through it. It creates more and more drama here,” Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) said. “Sunshine is a good thing. It’s wherever that comes out, however that comes out, get the information out.”
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) was unfamiliar with the House report but saw “other issues out there right now that are a lot more pressing.” He did not offer specific examples.
“As a committee that has oversight, we most certainly can take it up in regular order and look at it,” Rounds said. “But I think we’ve got other right issues right now that are going to be more time-consuming, and more top of mind than that right now.”
Sen. James Risch (R-ID), who also chairs the Foreign Relations Committee, declined to comment beyond expressing a desire for the Trump administration’s ongoing investigations to play out.
“That thing’s under investigation. Let them do their work,” Risch said.

The declassified information, coupled with other reports released by CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Special Counsel John Durham, suggests Brennan may have violated intelligence community standards, relied on information from the Steele dossier, and excluded contradicting evidence on Russian efforts to intervene for Trump’s benefit. Brennan denied doing such things in statements to Congress.
Ratcliffe has suggested Brennan won’t have statute of limitations protections because he believes there remains an ongoing conspiracy. Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey are reportedly the subjects of a criminal investigation by the bureau.
Brennan has rejected accusations of treason and manufacturing fake intelligence to hurt Trump’s election chances as “baseless.” Gabbard referred Barack Obama last week to the DOJ for prosecution, despite current and former presidents having legal immunity from official acts taken in office.
Democrats have come to the defense of prior intelligence assessments and Obama officials, pointing to past inquiries, including a bipartisan Senate Intel panel report involving now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who at the time led the committee. They’ve accused the Trump administration of trying to distract from conservative blowback over releasing the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) criticized the House’s declassified report as “partisan” and disqualifying. Gabbard has not directly rebutted the findings by the Senate or other government entities that agreed Russia launched a sweeping interference operation, but has suggested they were based on fake Obama-era intelligence.
“I would caution anybody on either side to take something that’s one party,” Kelly said. “The Senate Intelligence Committee did a — not just bipartisan — but a unanimous, bipartisan report on Russian collusion in the 2016 election. I think people should go to that.”
Some House Intelligence Committee Republicans expressed more willingness to reopen the matter, given that it was their panel’s report.
Its chairman, Rep. Rick Crawford (R-AR), referred to Brennan as “a documented liar, full stop.” But he added that “accountability isn’t always about prosecuting individuals,” a likely reference to Brennan’s testimony being outside the five-year statute of limitations for prosecution.
“In some cases, prosecuting may not be possible, but we can hold them to account by removing them from the [intelligence community] and ending their career as deep-state operatives,” Crawford said. “This should be the end goal for some of these middle-level employees who willfully participated or just went along with this, lacking the intestinal fortitude to stand up and refuse to go along with this conspiracy.”
Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL) said he would support congressional hearings and investigations.
Republicans on other panels of potential jurisdiction, such as Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and John Cornyn (R-TX) of the Judiciary, want Attorney General Pam Bondi to appoint a special counsel.