Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said Monday that Democrats want the full, unredacted report from special counsel Robert Mueller so they can leak it to the press.
Although the House Intelligence Committee ranking member also wants to see the report, he warned Democrats would weaponize the 300-plus-page report to fuel the narrative there was collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.
"The Democrats on the left here — they just want to get their hands on the report so — it’ll probably be classified, there will be a lot of classified information in there — so that they can leak it," Nunes said on Fox News. "So they can leak it to all their buddies in the media, so that they can continue on going down rabbit holes and pretending that there is some kind of Russian collusion."
Last week Nunes and all eight of his fellow Republicans on the intelligence panel signed a letter calling on Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., to resign, saying they had "no faith" in his leadership given his repeated assertion there was "more than circumstantial evidence" that Trump colluded with Russia, even after special counsel Robert Mueller concluded there was no conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin, according to a summary from Attorney General William Barr.
Barr said last week he expects a redacted version of Mueller’s report to be released in mid-April, "if not sooner." The attorney general also volunteered to testify publicly after Mueller’s report is released to the public and said he is available to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 1 and the House Judiciary Committee on May 2.
President Trump and his allies claim Barr's summary provided him exoneration, but Democrats who are unsatisfied with the four-page letter are demanding to see the full report immediately by this week. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., is setting up a fierce subpoena battle with the Justice Department.
Nunes doubts Democrats will prevail.
"I highly doubt it if there's grand jury testimony in there," he said when asked by Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner.
Nunes said he wants the Mueller "dossier" released because he claimed it was "written by partisans." He also said he'd like to view the underlying information, including "interviews they did. I want to see who they subpoenaed, I want to see if they had any wiretaps."