Attorney General Pam Bondi on Monday directed the Justice Department to move forward with a probe into the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation.
The recent release of documents aimed at undermining the legitimacy of the inquiry that established that Moscow interfered on President Donald Trump’s behalf in the 2016 U.S. presidential election prompted the probe.
Grand jury investigation
What we know:
Bondi has directed a prosecutor to present evidence to a grand jury after referrals from the Trump administration's top intelligence official, a person familiar with the matter said Monday.
That person was not authorized to discuss it by name and spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press. Fox News first reported the development.
What we don't know:
It was not clear which former officials might be the target of any grand jury activity, where the grand jury that might ultimately hear evidence will be located or which prosecutors — whether career employees or political appointees — might be involved in pursuing the investigation.
It was also not clear what precise claims of misconduct Trump administration officials believe could form the basis of criminal charges, which a grand jury would have to sign off on for an indictment to be issued.
‘Russiagate’
The backstory:
The FBI's Russia investigation was opened on July 31, 2016, following a tip that a Trump campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, had told a Russian diplomat that Russia was in possession of dirt on Clinton.
The investigation resulted in the appointment of a special counsel, Robert Mueller, who secured multiple convictions against Trump aides and allies but did not establish proof of a criminal conspiracy between Moscow and the Trump campaign.
The inquiry shadowed much of Trump's first term and he has long focused his ire on senior officials from the intelligence and law enforcement community, including former FBI Director James Comey, whom he fired in May 2017, and former CIA Director John Brennan.
The Justice Department appeared to confirm an investigation into both men in an unusual statement last month but offered no details.
Multiple special counsels, congressional committees and the Justice Department's own inspector general have studied and documented a multi-pronged effort by Russia to interfere in the 2016 presidential election on Trump's behalf, including through a hack-and-leak dump of Democratic emails and a covert social media operation aimed at sowing discord and swaying public opinion.
But that conclusion has been aggressively challenged in recent weeks as Trump's director of national intelligence and other allies have released previously classified records that they hope will cast doubt on the extent of Russian interference and establish an Obama administration effort to falsely link Trump to Russia.
The Source: Information for this article was taken from The Associated Press and FOX News.