enate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley is willing to have executives from the firm behind the disputed Trump-Russia dossier testify publicly, his spokesman said Wednesday, adding that the Iowa Republican hasn't sought the release of a transcript of his panel's earlier interview with them for investigative reasons.
The leaders of Fusion GPS, the firm that commissioned a former British spy to compile a dossier that describes an elaborate web of Trump ties to the Kremlin, said in a
New York Times opinion piece Tuesday that Republicans had bottled up their closed-door testimony while leaking selective details to undermine their credibility.
"Senator Grassley has always been and remains for transparency," Grassley spokesman Taylor Foy said Wednesday. "There are, however, investigative factors that he must consider to temporarily protect certain information in the midst of an ongoing inquiry such as this one, like tainting the memory of other witnesses."
Foy said F
usion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson rebuffed the committee's request six months earlier to testify publicly and invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination "to negotiate for a closed-door interview."
"Despite his public statements, Mr. Simpson and his attorney demanded during the interview that the transcript be kept confidential," Foy said. "Mr. Simpson has refused to answer dozens of questions voluntarily, and has failed to provide the Committee with documents and responses to follow-up questions after the interview."
"The Committee’s invitation for Mr. Simpson to testify at a public hearing remains on the table," he added.
Simpson was not immediately available to comment on the response from Grassley's office.
But he and fellow Fusion founder Peter Fritsch escalated their clash with congressional Republicans on Tuesday in the op-ed, accusing the GOP of sitting on 21 hours worth of their testimony while spinning a sinister public narrative about the firm's work.
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/03/chuck-grassley-fusion-gps-322076
