This is your Republican Party

More than a year after Republican leaders promised to investigate Russian interference in the presidential election, two influential Republicans on Friday made the first known congressional criminal referral in connection with the meddling — against one of the people who sought to expose it.

Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a senior committee member, told the Justice Department they had reason to believe that a former British spy, Christopher Steele, lied to federal authorities about his contacts with reporters regarding information in the dossier, and they urged the department to investigate.

  NYT

I would suggest an investigation of Charles Grassley and Lindsey Graham. What are they hiding by directing the focus on other people?

The decision by Mr. Grassley and Mr. Graham to single out the former intelligence officer behind the dossier — and not anyone who may have taken part in the Russian interference — was certain to infuriate Democrats and raise the stakes in the growing partisan battle over the investigations into Mr. Trump, his campaign team and Russia.

More than a year ago, Republican leaders in Congress agreed that committees in the House and Senate would investigate Russia’s efforts to influence the outcome of the 2016 election.

And I guess they never expected it to start encompassing a chunk of the Republican Party.

Republicans have deflected attention from the central issue and sought to cast doubt on Mr. Steele’s dossier and the political research firm that helped produce it, Fusion GPS, whose work was partly funded by Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

[...]

The firm was first hired by The Washington Free Beacon, a conservative website, in May 2016, and its work was later funded by the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign.

[...]

[T]he dossier has emerged as Exhibit A in Republicans’ insistence that Obama-era political bias could have affected the F.B.I.’s decision to open a counterintelligence investigation in July 2016 into whether Mr. Trump’s associates aided the Russia election interference.

Republicans, including the two senators, have argued that the dossier is tantamount to political opposition research, and claimed that it might have been used by the F.B.I. to open its investigation.

A claim that has been soundly debunked by Fusion GPS' testimony, which the GOP won't release, forcing Fusion to make a public statement about its testimony.

Anyone can make a criminal referral to the Justice Department, which is not obligated to take up the matter. But a recommendation from a senior senator who runs the committee that has oversight of the department comes with added weight.

[...]

“Publicizing a criminal referral based on classified information raises serious questions about whether this letter is nothing more than another attempt to discredit government sources, in the midst of an ongoing criminal investigation,” said Joshua A. Levy, the lawyer for Fusion. “We should all be skeptical in the extreme.”

Indeed, this is yet another attempt by the GOP to muddy the waters and deflect attention from Mueller's investigation. The party has no credibility left.

The senator is not the only prominent Republican lawmaker pressing the Justice Department and Fusion GPS for answers on the dossier. Representative Devin Nunes of California, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, has been locked in a standoff with the department over access to documents and witnesses he views as crucial to unraveling what the F.B.I. did with the dossier. And he has aggressively pursued Fusion GPS, subpoenaing the company’s bank records and sending two committee staff members to London last summer to try to meet with Mr. Steele unannounced.

Nunes and Grassley are two of the most rabid Republicans intent on shutting down the Mueller investigation. You have to wonder what they've done that they're afraid will come out. I don't know what Lindsey Graham's problem is. Until recently, he was a critic of Trump. Then suddenly, he became a best friend and golfing buddy.

Orange jumpsuits all 'round, please.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

This is Natasha Bertrand, Business Insider reporter:

It's necessary because they need to come up with everything they can to distract from what's happening with the Mueller investigation into Trumpland.

UPDATE 1/6/18: