House minority leader Kevin McCarthy said on Friday that he will offer a resolution next week to remove California Democrat Eric Swalwell from the House’s Standing Intelligence Committee, an effort that a senior Democratic aide called “loss of time “that won’t get you anywhere.
“Pelosi has just renamed Eric Swalwell to the Intelligence Committee. Based on the information she and I received together, Swalwell should not be on the panel charged with keeping our nation’s secrets,” said McCarthy in a tweet.
His tweet refers to a briefing by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and McCarthy, received from the FBI on December 18, 2020, about Swalwell’s contacts with a suspected Chinese intelligence agent, according to a McCarthy advisor.
According to a 2020 story by Axios, the operative, called Christine Fang or Fang Fang, made contact with several Bay Area politicians between 2011 and 2015 as part of an intelligence operation run by China’s civilian spy agency. She helped raise funds for Swalwell’s 2014 reelection campaign, helped put at least one intern in her office, and interacted with the congressman at various events.
Axios also reported that a current senior U.S. intelligence officer does not believe that Fang passed on or received any confidential information, and federal investigators alerted Swalwell about his activities in 2015, at which point he severed all ties.
At the time of the story, Swalwell’s office acknowledged that he had known Fang more than eight years ago and that he provided the FBI with information about her when informed of his identity. He hadn’t seen her in six years.
After McCarthy’s tweet on Friday, Swalwell said, “I look forward to continuing the important work of protecting Americans and supporting the hardworking heroes of our Intelligence Community, and I thank President Pelosi and President Schiff for their support and trust. . “
A senior Democratic aide said McCarthy’s resolution would be “postponed” or rejected by the House instantly, calling it a “waste of time”. Swalwell, the aide said, acted appropriately and was not accused of doing anything wrong.
“Republicans must be very cautious when starting something like this,” he warned. “Their conference is full of exposure.”
Republican Party lawmakers pointed the story to try to discredit Swalwell when he served as one of the impeachment managers during ex-President Trump’s Senate trial last month and to warn that it would be a reason to remove him from his case committee assignments. Republicans regained power in the House – as soon as Democrats set out to remove Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene from Georgia from her committee duties earlier this year. Greene’s removal came following comments she made before her campaign for Congress, in which she expressed support for QAnon’s conspiracy theories and other racist and anti-Semitic remarks.