Dems badger Sessions into testifying before Senate in ‘public’ hearing; here’s what they’ll get

Dems badger Sessions into testifying before Senate in ‘public’ hearing; here’s what they’ll get

Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced this morning that he will testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee Tuesday. The testimony, moreover, will be delivered in a public, as opposed to closed-door, hearing.

According to NBC News, Justice Department spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores issued a statement that read in part:

The Attorney General has requested the hearing be public. He believes it is important for the American people to hear the truth directly from him and looks forward to answering the committee’s questions tomorrow.

The decision to make the testimony public is a concession to Democrats, who have been hounding the AG to speak up on the Russian hacking that they are sure was a nail in the coffin of Hillary Clinton’s presidential ambitions.

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On Sunday, Sen. [score]Ron Wyden[/score], D.-Oregon, sent a letter to the chairman and ranking members of the Intelligence Committee, asking that Sessions testify in public.

“I urge that the Committee hold a hearing with the Attorney General in the open so that the American people can hear for themselves what he has to say with regard to connections to the Russians and the President’s abuse of power,” Wyden wrote.

Another Democrat, Sen. [score]Patrick Leahy[/score] of Vermont and ranking Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee published a series of nasty tweets over the weekend that he hoped would bully Sessions into testifying, and in a public setting:

The urgency for Sessions’s appearing before a Senate committee was amped up by James Comey’s testimony last week, in which he stated that the FBI had discovered something about Sessions “that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic.” However, he added, he could not elaborate on it publicly.

So when all is said and done, what we can look forward to tomorrow and in the days following? As for Sessions’s testimony, he is the attorney general of the United States. There is very little if any information that he could divulge to Congress in a closed-door hearing, let alone a public forum.

As for what happens afterwards, expect to see headlines all across the mainstream media reading, “AG Refuses to Answer Questions in Order to Cover for President” or something along those lines.

Howard Portnoy

Howard Portnoy

Howard Portnoy has written for The Blaze, HotAir, NewsBusters, Weasel Zippers, Conservative Firing Line, RedCounty, and New York’s Daily News. He has one published novel, Hot Rain, (G. P. Putnam’s Sons), and has been a guest on Radio Vice Online with Jim Vicevich, The Alana Burke Show, Smart Life with Dr. Gina, and The George Espenlaub Show.

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