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While I haven’t been writing about the Devin Nunes situation that much, I’ve been following it with interest. Since I don’t want to do 20 million links, here’s my summary: Representative Nunes, the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, forced himself into the spotlight several weeks ago. He was called to the White House by mysterious figures and given classified material which he claimed “proved” that Emperor Bigly was telling the truth when Bigly claimed (on Twitter) that Pres. Obama “wiretapped” him. When Nunes was called out by members of his own committee, he spent weeks trying to explain himself. He also got caught in some weird lies, and he claimed that he would never reveal his sources for the classified material.

The whole situation absolutely looked like this: Bigly called up Nunes and Bigly’s people cherrypicked some classified information which Nunes then willfully misrepresented as a way to justify Trump’s tweets. From this Nunes debacle, we’re also now talking about poor Susan Rice, who was Obama’s NSA and might have authorized some completely legal “demasking” involving Trump and his team. Throughout it all, Nunes is the one who seems to be hiding sh-t – along with Bigly – and he seems to be the one furtively engaged in illegal and unethical activities.

Well, funny story. The House Ethics Committee is now investigating Devin Nunes for disclosing classified material. And Rep. Nunes has just stepped down from the Intelligence Committee.

House intelligence chairman Devin Nunes announced Thursday he was temporarily stepping aside from leading the investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 elections. Nunes cited a series of ethics complaints filed against him alleging that he violated terms of discussing classified material following his clandestine meeting at the White House just over two weeks ago.

“I believe it is in the best interests of the House Intelligence Committee and the Congress for me to have Representative Mike Conaway, with assistance from Representatives Trey Gowdy and Tom Rooney, temporarily take charge of the Committee’s Russia investigation while the House Ethics Committee looks into this matter,” Nunes, a California Republican, said in a statement. He added, “I will continue to fulfill all my other responsibilities as Committee Chairman, and I am requesting to speak to the Ethics Committee at the earliest possible opportunity in order to expedite the dismissal of these false claims.”

[From CNN]

Again, I’m wary of arriving early to the #TrumpImpeachmentParty but I do think this is a good sign. This is a sign that House Democrats are applying pressure where and how they need to. I also think this is the last gasp of Republicans trying to look like they are impartially investigating Emperor Bigly. The next step – even with Nunes’ recusal – is for an independent commission to be paneled.

lets recap, Flynn fired, Bannon removed from NSC, Nunes steps away from Intel role on Russia Probe, Sessions forced to recuse from same.

— Chris Sampson (@TAPSTRIMEDIA) April 6, 2017

Nunes should be a cautionary tale for Republicans: you do Trump’s dirty work on Russia at your own peril.

— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) April 6, 2017

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