GOP rep calls on House to end Russia probe

Rep. Tom Rooney (R-Fla.) is calling for the House Intelligence Committee to end its investigation of alleged ties between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 presidential campaign. 

“Tonight I’ve asked our chairman [Rep. Mike] Conaway [R-Texas] that we need to end this investigation,” Rooney, who sits on the committee, told CNN’s Erin Burnett. 

Rooney cited reports that outgoing White House communications director Hope Hicks told the committee she told “white lies” on behalf of President Trump during her marathon nine-hour testimony before the committee on Tuesday.  

{mosads}Hicks reportedly told the panel, after speaking with her lawyers, that she hasn’t lied about anything related to the Russia probe. 

“We’ve interviewed scores of witnesses and now we’ve gotten to the point now where we are literally bringing people in for nine hours just so the Democrats can leak to the press something as ridiculous as white lies, not having anything to do with the Russia investigation, but that drives the whole story for the whole next day,” Rooney continued. 

“I’ve never gone on TV Erin, by the way, to talk about the Russia investigation because I don’t think it’s appropriate. But I’m coming on today because it needs to end,” he said. 

Hicks revealed on Wednesday that she would be departing her White House post in the coming weeks just one day after her testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. 

The New York Times’s Maggie Haberman, who broke the news of Hicks’s resignation, said sources told her Hicks’s departure does not have to do with her Tuesday testimony.  

Hope Hicks departure is NOT about yesterday’s hearing, per multiple sources. She had planned it before, had been thinking about it for months. She had informed a very small number of people prior to Hill hearing that she planned to leave.

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) February 28, 2018