House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said on Friday he would offer a resolution next week to remove California Democrat Eric Swalwell from the permanently elected committee on intelligence, an attempt a senior Democratic assistant called a “waste of time” going nowhere. .
“Pelosi has just re-appointed Eric Swalwell to the Intelligence Committee. Based on the briefing she and I received together, Swalwell should not be on the panel overseeing the preservation of our country’s secrets,” McCarthy said. . in a tweet.
His tweet refers to a briefing by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and McCarthy, received by the FBI on December 18, 2020, about Swalwell’s contacts with a suspected Chinese intelligence agent, according to a McCarthy assistant.
According to a 2020 story by Axios, the operator, named Christine Fang or Fang Fang, contacted several Bay politicians between 2011 and 2015 as part of an intelligence operation run by China’s civilian spy agency. She helped raise funds for Swalwell’s re-election campaign in 2014, helped place at least one intern in his office, and interacted with the congressman on several occasions.
Axios also reported that a current senior U.S. intelligence official does not believe Fang passed or received any classified information, and federal investigators notified Swalwell of her activities in 2015, at which point he severed all ties.
At the time of the story, Swalwell’s office admitted that he had met Fang more than eight years ago and that he had given information about her to the FBI when he was informed of her identity. He had not seen her for six years.
Following McCarthy’s tweet on Friday, Swalwell said: “I am eager to continue the important work of protecting Americans and supporting the hardworking heroes of our intelligence community, and I thank Speaker Pelosi and Chairman Schiff for their support and trust. . “
A senior Democratic aide said McCarthy’s resolution would be ‘tabled’ or rejected by the House, calling it a “waste of time”. The assistant said Swalwell acted appropriately and was not accused of doing anything wrong.
“Republicans need to be very careful about starting something like this,” the assistant warned. “Their conference is full of exposure.”
GOP lawmakers pointed to the story of trying to discredit Swalwell when he served as one of the accusers during the Senate trial of former President Trump last month and to warn that it would be grounds to deprive him of his committee mandates if the Republicans would take power again. the House – just as Democrats deprived Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene of her committee duties earlier this year. Greene’s removal comes in response to comments she made before her congressional campaign expressing support for QAnon conspiracy theories and other racist and anti-Semitic remarks.