Aaron P. Bernstein/Reuters
The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday expressed “grave concerns” about the committee chairman Devin Nunes’s behavior in claiming President Trump was “incidentally” surveilled without providing the information he received to his committee. “Chairman [Nunes] will need to decide whether he is the chairman of an independent investigation into conduct—which includes allegations of potential coordination between the Trump campaign and the Rusians—or he is going to act as a surrogate of the White House, because he cannot do both,” ranking member Adam Schiff (D-CA) said during a fiery press conference. “Unfortunately I think the actions of today throw great doubt into the ability of both the chairman and the committee to conduct the investigation the way it ought to be conducted,” he continued. “If the incident today is an indication that, after making the baseless claim the president then aggravated the damage by implicating the British in a potential plot to have the British surveil him on behalf of President Obama, and now is attempting to interfere in the congressional investigation—again, with the effort of trying to provide some substance to a claim without substance—then the damage the wrecking ball of this allegation has just claimed another victim—that being our own committee,” Schiff said. At several points during the presser, Schiff suggested the formation of an independent committe might be in order.