Pete Souza/The White House/ZUMAPRESS
A couple of weeks ago, Senators Chuck Grassley and Lindsey Graham took yet another shot at Susan Rice, one of the Republican Party’s favorite punching bags. They got hold of a memo that Rice wrote during her final days in the White House, recounting a meeting with FBI director James Comey related to the Trump-Russia investigation. Rice’s letter was a summary of the meeting, in which she quoted President Obama telling Comey to continue doing everything “by the book.”
How suspicious! Grassley and Graham thought it “odd” that Rice would document the meeting, and suggested that Comey hadn’t proceeded “by the book.” Hmmm. Suspicious. They were also suspicious of Obama’s comment that he wasn’t providing Comey with any instructions from a “law enforcement perspective.” What about other perspectives? Hmmm. And what about the Steele dossier? And why the question to Comey about whether there was any reason not to fully share information about Russia with the incoming Trump team? Hmmm. Hmmm.
Today Rice answered. She didn’t quite call G&G grandstanding boneheads, but the tone of the letter is pretty acerbic:
How about that? Apparently President Obama was reluctant to share information with Michael Flynn in light of “concerning communications” held “before and after the election.” I wonder why G&G didn’t think of that?
As for why Rice memorialized the conversation, I’d say that’s pretty obvious. It’s because she knew full well that the Republican Party is full of people like Grassley and Graham. She may know that better than almost anybody, in fact.