Speaker Pelosi and Minority Leader McCarthy received a briefing from the FBI today on the recently revealed connection between Rep. Eric Swalwell and a Chinese spy who acted as a campaign bundler for him and helped install an intern in his office. After the meeting, Rep. McCarthy said he had one takeaway:
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, McCarthy said the briefing “only raised more questions. The one thing that was fundamentally answered: he should not be on Intel.”…
Top House leaders — Pelosi and McCarthy — decide which lawmakers get appointed to the intelligence committee.
Calling China “an adversary in many shapes and many forms,” McCarthy said “there are definitely 200 other Democrats that I know could fill that place long before this individual should be serving.” He did not elaborate beyond that…
Pelosi did not comment after Friday’s meeting.
Pelosi has previously said she didn’t have “any concern” about Swalwell but Republicans have been pushing to get him knocked off the intel committee. Trey Gowdy recently gave an interview in which he argued Swalwell should find another committee assignment.
“He berated Jared Kushner and Donald Trump Jr. for meeting with a Russian lawyer — not dating one, meeting with one,” he recounted. “And then he berates Devin Nunes for a phone call with Lev Parnas, and he calls the president an agent of Russia.
“Meanwhile, for four years, the guy is not smart enough to know he’s being played by a Chinese spy?” he asked again. “That’s the best Nancy Pelosi could do? At 230 members, the best you can come up with is a former city councilman in California who’s not smart enough to know when a woman is expressing interest in you, [whether] she’s a spy?”…
“And I don’t think Swalwell has denied having a relationship with her [suspected spy Fang Fang]. He said it was classified. I’ll be damned if I know what that means: All you’ve got to say is ‘I didn’t sleep with her’, Eric. That’s all you got to say.”
The original Axios story about Chinese spy Fang Fang indicated that the FBI had caught her sleeping with two midwestern mayors but did not say that she’d had a physical relationship with Rep. Swalwell. I guess Swalwell could deny it happened but, honestly, would you believe him if he did?
After the briefing today, Rep. McCarthy appeared on Martha MacCallum’s show. I’ve got this cued up to the start of the actual interview. McCarthy really can’t talk about what he learned today so, beyond saying that the briefing lasted “more than an hour,” he mostly relies on the information already made public in the Axios report. Asked directly if he learned about a sexual relationship between Fang Fang and Swalwell, McCarthy repeats that he can’t discuss what he learned.
