Republican senators are calling on the Department of Justice (DOJ) to explain its agents’ alleged surveillance of staff members of the House of Representatives and the Senate during the course of its investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Senators from both the House of Representatives and the Senate, including Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, Mississippi Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, recently wrote a joint letter to the DOJ asking a series of questions related to the alleged surveilling of congressional staff members. Other points of inquiry included what type of information was collected and how it was used in the investigation. Furthermore, senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee called for an “immediate briefing” by the DOJ. The senators noted that the alleged surveillance of Congress “raises serious and numerous questions of impropriety and possibly unlawful actions” and that the public “must know any connections” between the two.
