Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) is threatening to take CNN and The Daily Beast to court after the outlets published a story saying a former Rudy Giuliani associate was willing to tell Congress that Nunes met with an ousted Ukrainian prosecutor.
The ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee told Maria Bartiromo on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures“ that he plans to take both news organizations to federal court “right after Thanksgiving” and that he hopes they will cooperate.
He criticized the outlets’ “fake news” reports that said an attorney for indicted Giuliani associate Lev Parnas said Parnas had knowledge about a meeting between Nunes and ousted Ukrainian Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin last year. The representative slammed the media for using “indicted criminals” as sources.
“It is not OK to work with someone who has been indicted on serious federal crimes to build a media narrative and dirty up a member of Congress,” Nunes said.
Bartiromo asked Nunes whether he met with Shokin, and the California representative replied that he wants “to answer all of these questions” but “can’t compete by trying to debate this out with the public media when 90 percent of the media are totally corrupt.”
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“I’m not going to sit here and try to compete against the media that I have no chance of winning this,” he said. “I will win in court, and they’ll have a chance to cooperate, and they’ll have to show how they work with somebody who has been indicted, which is likely conspiring to obstruct justice.”
A spokesperson from The Daily Beast declined to comment on threats of litigation Sunday but said they “stand by our reporting and are happy to defend it.”
CNN also declined to comment on Sunday.
The reports about Nunes’s meeting with the Ukrainian prosecutor indicate that the ranking member may have been involved with efforts to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden.
The House launched the impeachment inquiry into the president after a whistleblower reported that Trump asked the Ukrainian president to look into Biden days after withholding military aid. Testimony from other Trump officials has revealed a wider campaign to investigate Biden.
As the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, Nunes has been the GOP leader during the impeachment hearings and has defended the president’s actions.