#John Ratcliffe says he’s working on Russia ‘collusion’ probe

Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe revealed he has been coordinating with US Attorney John Durham in his probe into the origins of the “Russian collusion” investigation and plans to declassify more documents soon.

Speaking to Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” the DNI told host Maria Bartiromo that the two men were working together and that he would not “prejudice” Durham’s investigatory work.

“I pledged to a bipartisan group of senators that I would look at all of the underlying intelligence surrounding the intelligence community’s assessment of Russia’s interference and this idea of Trump-Russia collusion.

“But I’m not going to prejudice John Durham’s work in connection with that, so we’ve had to coordinate with his office about the timing of that. But I’m optimistic that I’ll be declassifying additional documents soon,” Ratcliffe told the Fox News host.

Ratcliffe went on to say that the two had been in contact for months due to the similarities in their respective investigations.

“We’ve actually, for several months, been coordinating with his team of folks to make sure that he has access to all of the intelligence community documents that he needs. He’s looking at the same, some of the same documents that I am, and so our work is running on parallel paths. Now, his is a criminal investigation, and he’s not sharing his findings or the work that he’s doing, but I’m coordinating with him to make sure that he has the intelligence documents that he needs to do his work,” the former Texas Congressman explained.

Their work together, Ratcliffe warned, is far from over.

“What I don’t want to do is declassify something that might prejudice his work, so we’re going to have to coordinate as we go forward the completion of his work with my ability to declassify documents, and so we’ve communicated along those lines,” he said.

Durham was tapped early last year by Attorney General William Barr to look into the origins of the probe into possible collusion between Russians interfering in the 2016 election and members of the Trump campaign.

Earlier this month, it was revealed that former CIA director John Brennan had been interviewed for eight hours on “a wide range” of topics as a part of the probe.

Nick Shapiro, Brennan’s former deputy chief of staff, said in a statement that the former CIA director was happy to take part in Durham’s probe.

Shapiro said that Brennan was “not a subject or a target” of any criminal investigation and that he was only questioned as a “witness to events that are under review.”

“Brennan welcomed the opportunity to answer Mr. Durham’s questions related to a wide range of intelligence-related activities undertaken by CIA before the November 2016 presidential election as well as the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) published in early January 2017,” Shapiro said.

The grilling came days after former FBI attorney Kevin Clinesmith pleaded guilty to falsifying emails which he later used to request a surveillance warrant on Trump foreign policy advisor Carter Page.