Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Ah, the different things are different argument.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

President Biden is doing good where he can, and getting it done.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

We still have time to mess this up!

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

FFS people, this was a good thing. take the win.

I desperately hope that, yet again, I am wrong.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

Republicans can’t even be trusted with their own money.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

“Let’s not pretend [Trump] wants to engage in high-minded discourse.”

Good lord, these people are nuts.

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

The US Supreme Court is on the ballot in november.

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

You are here: Home / Nunes Steps Down – Temporarily

Nunes Steps Down – Temporarily

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Via CNN:

House intelligence chairman Devin Nunes announced Thursday he was temporarily stepping aside from leading the investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 elections.

Nunes cited a series of ethics complaints filed against him alleging that he violated terms of discussing classified material following his clandestine meeting at the White House just over two weeks ago.
“I believe it is in the best interests of the House Intelligence Committee and the Congress for me to have Representative Mike Conaway, with assistance from Representatives Trey Gowdy and Tom Rooney, temporarily take charge of the Committee’s Russia investigation while the House Ethics Committee looks into this matter,” Nunes, a California Republican, said in a statement.

Reader Interactions

90Comments

  2. 2.

    Jeffro

    Love it!

    Hey Nunes, how about if you turn the whole thing over to Adam Schiff – he seems to know what he’s doing

  4. 4.

    Nicole

    Slate (I think it was Slate) ran an interview with someone talking about how bad things are in Great Britain right now, as compared with what’s going on here, and I was somewhat comforted by the interviewee’s comments on the American political system’s ability to block things from going forward. I think Nunes being pressured to step aside is part of that system.

    So, uh, good on us for not being totally out of our racist, nationalist minds?

  6. 6.

    m0nty

    Surely the Senate was always going to be where the serious stuff happened. The House committee remains a side show.

  9. 9.

    mai naem mobile

    Aah be hearing me some dueling banjos with Trey Howdy being in charge. No doubt he’ll have Susan Rice up there testifying for 16 hrs straight.

  10. 10.

    Corner Stone

    IMO, this is the first step down a long ladder for Nunes. The louder the, “I have full faith and confidence in Rep Nunes.” declarations get, the faster he’s going to hit the next rung down.

  11. 11.

    Ryan

    @Corner Stone: Exactly! Have we learned nothing from Trump? Deny, lie, talk over, shout over, do anything, except admit you were wrong. Also, count on that bothsiderism to swoop in.

  13. 13.

    germy

    House Ethics Committee now investigating Devin Nunes over his White House stunt: report

    The House of Representatives’ Ethics Committee has launched an investigation into Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) over his late-night trip to the White House to get an exclusive intelligence briefing.

  14. 14.

    Corner Stone

    I don’t know if this like a Three Ring Circus or just some kind of Rotating Shitshow of Fail. Doesn’t Cohen-Watnick have to be watching his actual ass at this point? Bannon’s on the way out and can’t help C-W any longer, and I think J-Kush was just playing along until he could cleave Bannon out of power. Flynn is begging for mercy and will personally feed him to the alligator if it helps him.
    If I were C-W I’d be sleeping with one eye open from now on.

  15. 15.

    Big Ole Hound

    Hey, we all know Trey Gowdy will bring the house to a standstill with his “investigations”. That is a good thing.

  17. 17.

    amk

    Merkley on Nunes: "We shouldn't be considering a nominee to the Supreme Court" while probe into "treasonous activity" is ongoing.— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) April 6, 2017

  20. 20.

    cmorenc

    I so vastly more confident the House Intel Committee Investigation will now head in a productive direction now that Trey Gowdy is co-taking over the reigns. Gowdy will thoroughly probe any email trails between the Russians and the Trump campaign / administration, looking for any where Hillary was copied onto the distribution list.

  23. 23.

    Goku

    @cmorenc: What you said. I have very little confidence that Howdy Gowdy is going to run an impartial investigation after his witch hunt of an investigation of whether Killary personally murdered Corporal Ben Ghazi or not

  24. 24.

    Debbie1

    @donnah: The good news is that there is a House Ethics Committee. The bad news? It is being run by Republicans, using”alternative facts” and bizzaro rules. So, no enforcement at all.

  25. 25.

    dmsilev

    @Corner Stone: He’s a patsy. The interesting question is whether, once he’s been thrown to the wolves, he’ll be willing to rat out the bigger fish.

  26. 26.

    Gelfling 545

    @hueyplong: My first reaction was, yeah, that’s exactly what it means. I think Nunes may have sacrificed his political career for Trump. Unfortunately, in Trump’s estimation, loyalty only runs one way.

  28. 28.

    SenyorDave

    @amk: So, anyone knows anything about this conaway guy? The name itself is kinda suspect.

    According to his wife, he’s oe of the most outstanding humans on the face of the earth. He’s incredibly smart, the most honest, decent person you could ever imagine.

  29. 29.

    Corner Stone

    “Leaks! Who is doing the Leaking?! We need to stop the Leaks! The central questions we need to answer with this serious investigation are, ‘What did Hillary know? And when did she know it?’ and this committee will not rest until we have those answers to my satisfaction.”
    /Rep Gowdy

  30. 30.

    Feebog

    I googled up the committee members. Conaway appears to be the ranking member below Nunes assuming the members are listed in order of seniority. Gowdy is on the committee but in the middle of the pack in terms of seniority. If Nunes is simply recusing and not resigning from the committee that means he will not be replaced.

  32. 32.

    Corner Stone

    @Gelfling 545:

    I think Nunes may have sacrificed his political career for Trump.

    Nunes tossed his career away because he is dirty. He didn’t sacrifice himself for Trump. Nunes is toast.

  34. 34.

    gvg

    naming 3 people to take charge sounds like a recipe for more chaos. What committee did Gowdy chair that wasted all the time on the emails?
    I had never heard of Nunes before this mess but apparently he has been in Congress since 2003.

  35. 35.

    PPCLI

    @amk: Conway just equated Russia interfering in the election possibly in coordination with the Trump people, and the HRC campaign hiring “Mexican” entertainers for her rallies. (All but one of the people he could be referring to are, I believe, American citizens.)

    So I doubt that he will be much of an advance over Nunes, and may be a step backward.

  36. 36.

    randy khan

    I won’t say I’m excited by this, but it’s nice to see Nunes suffering some consequences for his actions. We can hope for more, of course, and it might even be coming.

  38. 38.

    The Moar You Know

    He’ll keep his seat: that district loves them some idiocy. But he’ll never chair a committee again, or even serve on one in any meaningful fashion. He’s too fucking stupid to keep a low profile.

  40. 40.

    germy

    @bemused: Mike Conaway, the guy with the MAGA hat.

    Rep. Mike Conaway (R-TX) this week tried to downplay alleged attempts by Russian actors to influence the 2016 presidential election by comparing the cyber attacks to a performance by a Mexican entertainer at a Hillary Clinton campaign event.

    “Harry Reid and the Democrats brought in Mexican soap opera stars, singers and entertainers who had immense influence in those communities into Las Vegas, to entertain, get out the vote and so forth,” he told The Dallas Morning News in an interview published Thursday. “Those are foreign actors, foreign people, influencing the vote in Nevada. You don’t hear the Democrats screaming and saying one word about that.”

  41. 41.

    satby

    So the right wing is ginning up some controversy about Liz Warren paying her female staffers less than the male staffers. I can’t find any reporting on it to rebut with that’s not straight from the fever swamp. Anyone else hearing this from the RWNJs of their acquaintances?

  42. 42.

    Humboldtblue

    @Corner Stone: He’s absurdly popular in his district so it will have to something tied to the Russians or criminal/ethical actvity that brings him down, he aint about to lose an election.

  46. 46.

    Yarrow

    @Corner Stone: Mexican telenovela stars appearing at campaign events and Russia hacking the DNC and influencing the election via stolen Facebook data, voter rolls hacking, targeted propaganda and disinformation are the exact same kind of foreign influence on the 2016 election. The. Exact. Same.

  47. 47.

    Humboldtblue

    @Corner Stone: Does he do business with Russia? He comes from a well known dairy family in Tulare (lives in a gated community now because that’s how you bootstrap it in red, rural, California) but I haven’t looked into any details.

  48. 48.

    germy

    Top White House political strategist Steve Bannon may no longer be on the National Security Council, but he’s not backing down from his fights with his rivals in the Trump administration.

    Axios’ Jonathan Swan reports that Bannon has been telling associates that he loves “a gun fight” and that he will continue fighting what he sees as the “globalist” wing of the White House, which includes Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner.

    According to Swan’s sources, the Kushner faction believes that Bannon and his allies are “clinically nuts,” while Bannon’s team believes Kushner is trying to transform Trump into a moderate Republican “squish.”

    Most interestingly, one of Bannon’s allies hints that Kushner will be the target of upcoming leaks that will damage his public reputation.

    “Steve has developed strong and important relationships with some of the most powerful right leaning business leaders,” the Bannon ally told Swan. “I see some bad press in [Jared’s] future.”

  49. 49.

    clay

    There’s no possible way he can keep his chairmanship, is there? How could Paul Ryan say with a straight face that Nunes could still do this job?

  51. 51.

    Mike in NC

    So merely a coincidence that the most brain-dead of the House Republicans all landed seats on the Intelligence Committee.

  54. 54.

    clay

    @Mike in NC:

    So merely a coincidence that the most brain-dead of the House Republicans all landed seats on the Intelligence Committee.

    Consistent with their MO. Appoint an enemy of the environment to the Environmental Committee. Appoint an enemy of labor to the Labor Committee. So the Intelligence Committee must contain…

  56. 56.

    germy

    @Goku: Remember the calico cat and the gingham dog? They engage in an epic battle:

    Next morning, where the two had sat
    They found no trace of dog or cat;
    And some folks think unto this day
    That burglars stole that pair away!
    But the truth about the cat and pup
    Is this: they ate each other up!
    Now what do you really think of that!

  57. 57.

    Corner Stone

    @Mike in NC:

    So merely a coincidence that the most brain-dead of the House Republicans all landed seats on the Intelligence Committee.

    To be fair, you’d have to be a dart World Champion to hit a name on their roster that’s not dumb as a stump. And if you were able to do that, it’s almost guaranteed they’d be so evil that Satan pays them rent.

  58. 58.

    Yarrow

    @Humboldtblue: @Gin & Tonic: Nunes is the part owner of a winery that has as one of its distributors the largest wine distributor in Russia. At this point, no company in Russia achieves that kind of status without Putin having some kind of connection. So there’s a possible relationship, but not obvious.

  59. 59.

    Corner Stone

    @germy:

    Axios’ Jonathan Swan reports that Bannon has been telling reporters that he loves “a gun fight” and that he will continue fighting what he sees as the “globalist” wing of the White House, which includes Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner.
    …
    while Bannon believes Kushner is trying to transform Trump into a moderate Republican “squish.”

    Most interestingly, one of Bannon hints that Kushner will be the target of upcoming leaks that will damage his public reputation.

    “I have developed strong and important relationships with some of the most powerful right leaning business leaders,” Bannon told Swan. “I see some bad press in [Jared’s] future.”

    Here, I have fixed that for that nice Mr. Swan fella.

  64. 64.

    David Spikes

    @Big Ole Hound: The tell-Nunes called the WH to inform them before he made the public announcement. He really does think he works for the president and that his number one job is protecting Trump.

  65. 65.

    different-church-lady

    @germy: I remember working for a company lead by two partners, one nice, the other a dick. They were growing until the dick kept alienating good people and eventually word got out and nobody wanted to work for them anymore, so they contracted until it was just the two of them doing consulting. Then one day the dick must have realized the only person left to alienate was his partner. So he did. They ended up suing each other.

    Sounds familiar, no?

  67. 67.

    Yarrow

    @Gin & Tonic: @Goku: People also thought Trump, Sr. would never win. I’d feel safer if we could eliminate the possibility of any of them running for anything at all.

  69. 69.

    Goku

    @different-church-lady: New York State is not the same as the whole country. NYC has millions of residents who have known these people for decades and hate them. Right now Trump is at 35% approval. That likely isn’t going to get better. That’ll stick to him as well

  70. 70.

    Goku

    @Yarrow: There are only two methods by which that will happen: they end up in prison or they die.

    Or I guess they figure that the brand would suffer as a result

  71. 71.

    TriassicSands

    @Jeffro:

    Hey Nunes, how about if you turn the whole thing over to Adam Schiff – he seems to know what he’s doing

    Sadly, knowing what one is doing is a disqualifying qualification in the GOP. I guess we should be grateful Nunes didn’t turn his responsibilities over to Louie Gomert (though Trey Gowdy is a good approximation).

  72. 72.

    different-church-lady

    @Goku: SANE PEOPLE: “There is no way another Trump can defy reality again.”

    VOTERS: “Hold my beer…”

  73. 73.

    Bill Arnold

    @germy:

    Most interestingly, one of Bannon’s allies hints that Kushner will be the target of upcoming leaks that will damage his public reputation.

    Mmm, yes. China included, one expects.

  74. 74.

    germy

    @Bill Arnold:

    Mmm, yes. Fortunately there’s plenty of obvious ammunition (and shivs and etc) just lying around to be picked up, for all factions in these palace intrigues.

    In three hundred years people will be watching this reenacted as part of the Shakespeare In The Park series.

    (Assuming there’s anyone left alive in three hundred years)

  75. 75.

    Goku

    @different-church-lady: Bottom line, New York is NOT that far gone. He shares the full name of the guy. 2016 was a perfect storm. The spell is wearing off (fingers crossed) and people are beginning to wake up not just to Trump’s B.S. but the Repubs as well

  76. 76.

    NorthLeft12

    @germy: Surprised he did not mention the insidious Canadian influence on Hillary’s campaign. Creeping northern socialism, eh?

  78. 78.

    germy

    Breitbartt, the pro-Trump propaganda outlet previously run by White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon, is now being deployed against President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and top White House staffer Jared Kushner as part of an internal power struggle.

    Over the past week — as Kushner and Bannon have reportedly feuded — the website has published articles highlighting Kushner’s meetings with the Russian ambassador, questioning the ethics of his business dealings, criticizing his “thin resume in diplomacy,” and speculating about whether he is leaking negative stories about Bannon.

    Those attacks represent a U-turn in the website’s coverage of the president’s family. Following Trump’s election and in the early days of his administration, Breitbart provided Kushner and his wife, Ivanka, with soft-focus celebrity coverage. The website chronicled their search for a home and synagogue in Washington, D.C., and lashed out at their critics.

    https://mediamatters.org/blog/2017/04/06/defend-bannon-breitbart-has-opened-fire-presidents-son-law/215938

  80. 80.

    Gelfling 545

    @amk: I’m not excited about his recusal because of who will replace him. I’m excited because he was forced into recusing (and hopefully later resigning, as the investigations move along) essentially by the weight of public opinion and protest.

  81. 81.

    Brachiator

    @hueyplong:

    Kind of hoping “temporarily” means “until he resigns in disgrace.”

    That really would be the best of all possible worlds.

    ETA: Weird. The quote, link, bold options disappeared briefly.

  82. 82.

    bemused

    @germy:

    Gotta watch out for those foreign terrorist soap opera actors! I really want see a list of House Republicans that graduated high school with grades above C or D level.

  83. 83.

    Goku

    @different-church-lady: Hey if you want to be all soon and gloom for no reason don’t do that here. Why even bother, we’ll just lose anyway. In fact, we might as well just kill ourselves now since we might die tomorrow. Why bother?

  86. 86.

    Spanky

    Well, if Nunes resigns, I’m sure there’s room in the White House for a bright guy like him. Maybe the NSC….

  88. 88.

    Miss Bianca

    @Yarrow: Well, if anything could magically improve Andrew Cuomo’s reputation overnight, it would be the thought of a Gov. Donald Trump Jr.

  89. 89.

    artem1s

    So Bannon and Nunes? neutralizing a couple of Twittler’s insiders in exchange for nuking the filibuster? So Donnie has demonstrated he will screw his contractors staff once again rather than be outed as the loser who couldn’t close the deal on his SCOTUS nominee. ZEGS probably got the Freedum Caucus and moderates to come to some common ground on starving grannies too. tRump is rube.

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