Sen. Mark Warner (Va.), the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, broke on Tuesday with committee Chairman Richard Burr’s (R-N.C.) assessment that the panel had not found evidence of collusion based on its findings thus far.
“Respectfully, I disagree,” Warner said, according to CNN. “I’m not going to get into any conclusions I’ve reached because my basis of this has been that I’m not going to reach any conclusion until we finish the investigation. And we still have a number of the key witnesses to come back.”
Burr told CBS News last week that “based on the evidence” the committee has seen so far, there is nothing to suggest that members of President Trump’s campaign and the Russian government colluded during the 2016 election.
The split in public comments between Burr and Warner marked a rare instance of a partisan divide between the two committee leaders, who have been conducting a bipartisan investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
NBC News reported Tuesday that the committee is nearing the end of its investigation having uncovered no direct evidence of collusion, but some senators on the panel were less committal.
Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), a member of the Intelligence Committee, told The Hill when asked about the NBC report that the panel “has not concluded anything.”
“Several of the individual members have made statements, but I certainly am not prepared to make a statement as to what was found or not found,” he said.
Warner told CNN that lawmakers are still hoping to speak with a few witnesses, including Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen. The longtime Trump associate was scheduled to testify Tuesday, but postponed his appearance, citing medical reasons after a recent shoulder surgery.
“What we do know, and it’s part of the public record, there’s never been a campaign in American history that during the campaign and its aftermath that the campaign folks affiliated with the campaign had as many ties with Russia as the Trump campaign did,” Warner said.
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Warner, Burr split on committee findings on Russia collusion https://t.co/QfDtkyIOdQ pic.twitter.com/ETwvkVILG8
— The Hill (@thehill) February 13, 2019
Burr: “If sharing polling data with your former partner in political races in the Ukraine is collusion, then I guess it is. I don't perceive it as collusion.”
NARRATOR: It was, in fact, collusion https://t.co/uAhfyieWTG— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) February 13, 2019
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