Senate Republicans on Monday defended President Donald Trump over his removal of the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, whose office was investigating the president’s associates before his abrupt firing over the weekend.

Though some lawmakers took issue with the Justice Department’s chaotic handling of U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman’s termination, GOP senators returned to a familiar refrain — deferring to Trump’s judgment as he continues to remove officials involved in the myriad probes that have ensnared him and people close to him for years.

“The president’s been under investigation since before he was elected,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) lamented, calling the episode a “sideshow” amid the Senate’s efforts to pass a police reform bill this week.

Eager to avoid controversy in an election year, Republicans mostly defended Berman’s removal from his post with the Southern District of New York, arguing that Trump — and every president — has the sole power to hire and fire political appointees. Republicans have routinely referenced that authority as Trump has fired several officials over the past few months who are perceived to be disloyal to him, including some who were integral in the efforts to impeach him.

And they quickly dismissed Democrats’ suggestions about a corrupt motive in removing Berman — specifically, potential interference with ongoing investigations involving the president.

“These people all serve at the pleasure of the president,” Senate Majority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) said. He has exercised his prerogatives to fire people at various times.”

Cornyn added: “Everything the president does generates controversy. Everything the attorney general does generates controversy. It doesn’t mean it’s warranted. Clearly, the attorney general and the president were within their rights.”

The Justice Department was in turmoil over the weekend after Attorney General William Barr announced late on Friday night that Berman was stepping down from his position atop the powerful federal prosecutors’ office. Berman said he had “no intention of resigning,” adding that he only learned of his firing from Barr’s public announcement. He vowed to stay put until the Senate confirms a permanent replacement.

The standoff ensued until Saturday, when Barr told Berman that Trump had agreed to fire him, and Berman vacated the post after Barr said he would allow Berman’s top deputy to take over the office.

Trump later said he was “not involved” in the firing, and White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said the president merely signed off on the termination while Barr “was taking the lead on this matter.” McEnany on Monday denied that Berman’s removal was tied to his investigations and prosecutions of several Trump associates.

Still, the episode has raised questions about possible interference with SDNY’s ongoing, high-profile investigations involving Trump.

Some Republicans took issue with the initial handling and the immediate fallout of the decision, which triggered renewed allegations from Trump’s opponents that Barr was seeking to shield the president and his associates from accountability.

“It could have been done more smoothly. But it’s a situation where the U.S. attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president,” Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) said. “That’s how our constitutional system works.”

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), who chairs the Senate’s chief oversight body, added: “It is his prerogative to do that. I thought the whole situation was rather strange.”

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), said the Justice Department’s handling of the matter was “a bit inartful,” though he dismissed allegations of a corrupt motive.

“I just want to know, is there anything he did that would impede [ongoing] investigations — and I don’t think so,” Graham said, referring to promises by top administration officials, including Barr.

“You show me fishy, then I’ll be the first one to tell Horowitz to go look,” he added, referring to the Justice Department’s inspector general, Michael Horowitz.

Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, the lone Republican senator to vote to convict Trump in his impeachment trial, said the firing “looks pretty swampy.”

“I certainly hope that any investigations that were being pursued — particularly those that would relate to the president, or donors, or friends — would continue to be pursued,” Romney said.

Berman donated to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, and has contributed to various other GOP political campaigns in recent years. But over the past few years, his office has investigated and charged high-profile Trump associates.

“My assumption is that any investigations that were underway will be continuing,” Thune said of the probes.

Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani of New York, Trump’s personal attorney, is currently under investigation by the prosecutor’s office; the Trump Organization has also been under a microscope over potential violations of campaign-finance law; and federal prosecutors there have already indicted two Giuliani associates, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman. Berman’s office also successfully prosecuted Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney and fixer, for campaign-finance violations related to a hush-money payment to a woman who alleged she had an affair with Trump.

Berman was never confirmed by the Senate to his role as U.S. attorney. He was appointed to the post on an acting basis, but the White House was slow to submit a nominee to the Senate, prompting the SDNY judges to appoint him to the role.

Barr has vowed that there will not be any interference with ongoing investigations at SDNY — a promise Republicans emphasized as they defended the move.

“[If] they’re worried about interference with the investigations, Barr said there wouldn’t be any interference,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), a former Judiciary Committee chairman, said Monday.

“And I don’t understand why the Democrats are complaining about Berman if the person that’s going to take his place, Berman himself said that that person is competent,” Grassley added. “So I don’t know what the big deal is, really.”

But Grassley himself raised alarms in 2007 when the attorney at the time, Alberto Gonzales, presided over the removal of multiple U.S. attorneys amid questions about political motivations.

“It is improper for a president to fire a U.S. attorney for retaliatory reasons or to impede or obstruct a particular prosecution for unjust political or partisan gain,” Grassley said at the time. “We don’t want to see the independence, integrity of our attorneys compromised to the point where they aren’t serving their districts in the interests of justice.”

Though Grassley acknowledged that presidents have the power to hire and fire their own U.S. attorneys, he said the handling of the matter — particularly inconsistent statements made by the attorney general — were problematic.

“We shouldn’t be getting conflicting statements from the attorney general and/or his staff,” Grassley said at the time. “We shouldn’t be getting conflicting statements at all. The story must be consistent, complete and of course it must be the truth. We and the American people expect nothing less from our top law enforcement official.”

Democrats have been intensely critical of Berman’s removal, saying it amounted to an effort to interfere with the prosecutor’s investigations involving the president and his associates.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called on the Justice Department’s inspector general and Office of Professional Responsibility to conduct a joint investigation into Berman’s termination. The White House had initially sought to install Craig Carpentino, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, atop the SDNY. Schumer on Monday lauded Berman’s “courage,” saying that his initial refusal to step down allowed for his top deputy, Audrey Strauss, to instead take over the office.

Schumer has also called on Jay Clayton, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, to step aside as Trump’s nominee to replace Berman on a permanent basis, adding that Clayton shouldn’t be “an accomplice to this scheme.” Schumer has said he would not return a “blue slip” for Clayton’s nomination. (Senators who withhold blue slips can block nominees to positions in their home states.)

Graham indicated over the weekend that Clayton’s nomination was unlikely to proceed because he intends to continue honoring the “blue slip” policy.

On the House side, the Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing on Wednesday centering on allegations of politicization of the Justice Department under Trump. Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), the chairman of that panel, said he expected Berman to testify at some point, though it is unclear whether he or anyone involved in the firing will appear before the committee this week.

Kyle Cheney and Marianne LeVine contributed to this report.

Sen. Ron Johnson wouldn’t appear to be one of President Donald Trump’s closest allies at first glance.

The Wisconsin Republican doesn’t flood the airwaves to defend the president. He isn’t a fixture in the conservative media world, and he hasn’t seen his political stock boosted by a barrage of tweets and retweets from the president. In 2018, he even criticized Trump’s mix of tariffs and bailouts as a “Soviet-style economy.”

But Johnson, the chairman of the Senate’s chief oversight body, is playing a major role in advancing a key theme of the president’s reelection bid — that he and his associates were targeted unfairly by the outgoing Obama administration.

He is also investigating corruption allegations involving Hunter Biden, the son of the Democratic presidential nominee, stemming from the younger Biden’s role on the board of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma. Trump and congressional Republicans have claimed the former vice president sought to shield his son from a Ukrainian-led investigation into Burisma — though Biden denies the allegation.

In both instances, Democrats have accused Johnson of abusing his power, misusing the Senate’s oversight resources to boost Trump’s political prospects, and even operating a Russian disinformation front that jeopardizes U.S. election security — all serious allegations, even in today’s hyperpartisan Senate. But Johnson insists it’s just the opposite.

“I’m a very nonpartisan guy. I just am,” Johnson said in an interview. “I like using the word nonpartisan.”

Privately, Senate Republicans are worried that the efforts to relitigate the Russia investigation and the events of 2016 could backfire, according to a GOP senator who was granted anonymity to candidly address the situation. Republicans are especially concerned about the perception that their priorities are not in order as the country is reeling from the coronavirus pandemic, staggeringly high unemployment and unrest over recent police killings of unarmed African Americans.

Despite the partisan tensions and the intensifying harshness of the disputes, Johnson is unfazed by the criticism — even as he increasingly finds himself on defense.

“I’m not doing anybody’s bidding,” said Johnson, who has chaired the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee since 2015. “I am doing this because I’m concerned about this democracy, and I’m concerned about what happened starting before the election, during the transition, and what continued certainly through the impeachment trial.”

According to Johnson, the Homeland Security panel’s probe has uncovered information that shows the incoming Trump administration was “sabotaged” by the outgoing Obama team. Johnson portrays his investigation as an honest effort to find the truth and reform the presidential transition process to ensure a peaceful transition of power.

“I’m just a straight shooter. I call them as I see them,” he said.

Democrats contend that’s far from the truth. They note that Johnson intends to release reports in the summer and the fall on his twin investigations, which would thrust the issues back into the spotlight as Election Day nears. They also point to his comments earlier this year in which he said former Vice President Joe Biden “has not adequately answered” for his son’s role on the board of a Ukrainian energy company, adding: “If I were a Democrat primary voter, I’d want these questions satisfactorily answered before I cast my final vote.”

And after Johnson released a declassified list of former Obama administration officials who potentially “unmasked” former national security adviser Michael Flynn’s name in intelligence reports, the Trump campaign seized on the fact that Joe Biden’s name was on the list — even as Biden’s precise involvement was not clear.

“We’re in the middle of a pandemic and a peaceful uprising against police brutality, and [Johnson is] running errands for the Republican National Committee,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) said in a brief interview. “And it’s a misuse of his position.”

Minutes later, Schatz ran into Johnson outside the Senate chamber and told him: “Hey Ron, somebody asked me about your investigations and I wasn’t that nice.” Johnson laughed and replied, “That’s OK.”

Johnson later dismissed the interaction as being representative of the “collegial” nature of the Senate. But it also underscored the reality of how investigations into Trump’s political enemies that began after the Senate’s impeachment trial have been gripping the body ever since.

As he defended himself, Johnson contended that Democrats are simply “afraid of the truth.”

“Anybody that could take a look at what we already know and say, well we should just close our eyes and ears to this, let’s stop looking at this — I would say doesn’t really care about the fact that the transition was corrupted,” Johnson said.

“I’m just tenacious. I’m dedicated to getting the information,” he added. “And the question I have for my Democratic colleagues — what are you afraid of? What part of the truth that I hope we can reveal are you worried about?”

Johnson’s allies say his concerns are legitimate and require appropriate congressional oversight — an area in which Johnson has distinguished himself among conservatives, in particular during the saga over Hillary Clinton’s email server and the attack on a U.S. diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya. Both of those probes were led by Republicans.

“I think he’s genuinely upset about what happened,” said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who is conducting a similar investigation into the origins of the Russia investigation and the appointment of Robert Mueller as special counsel. “Now, how could you have Hunter Biden milking the most corrupt company in the Ukraine for millions of dollars while you’re trying to have, you know, Joe Biden there to reform corruption?”

“So I think [Johnson] is just sort of a good-government guy, and that’s driving his passion,” Graham added.

Graham also pushed back against the allegation that he and Johnson are simply doing Trump’s bidding, citing recent revelations that call into question the genesis of the counterintelligence investigation into alleged ties between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.

“Nobody said that about me when I supported the Mueller investigation. I was a great guy,” Graham said. “Now that I want to know how it got so off the rails and got so corrupt, I’m shilling for Trump. Not gonna work.”

Trump has mentioned Johnson by name on Twitter just twice — both coming in the past two months, when the senator’s investigations intensified and gained new momentum. In one tweet, Trump wrote: “America is proud of Ron Johnson. He never gives up!”

Still, that’s a stark contrast to the number of times Trump regularly boosts his top House defenders on Twitter, including Reps. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).

But unlike Nunes and Jordan, Johnson has a committee gavel — and he’s using it in a way that is, wittingly or unwittingly, advancing the president’s political interests.

His role has also strained his relationship with Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, the Homeland Security Committee’s top Democrat. Peters, one of the most bipartisan senators, rarely engages in the types of spats that have overtaken the committee in recent weeks, but he has been forced into that role given his seniority on the panel. As a result, he has treaded carefully so as to not further inflame his relationship with Johnson.

“Certainly, I would say it is more difficult. But I’ve tried not to let that get in the way,” said Peters, who is up for reelection this year. “It makes no sense to me. We’re in the middle of a pandemic, dealing with a whole host of threats to our national security. That’s where we should be focused. Not on what basically looks like a political witch hunt.”

Even some of Johnson’s fellow Republican senators have put the Wisconsin Republican in an awkward spot by warning him — directly and indirectly — that the investigation itself could be a front for Russian disinformation.

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), who chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee until stepping aside last month amid a federal probe into his stock trades, privately warned Johnson in December that going after Hunter Biden could aid Russian efforts to sow chaos and distrust in the U.S. political system. Burr’s temporary replacement as chairman, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), has expressed similar concerns about Russian disinformation, though he has declined to specifically call out Johnson.

And the Intelligence Committee is notably in the dark about the investigations. “I just hope that, when all the facts come out, the committee’s not being unwittingly used by Russia,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, said in a brief interview.

Those tensions boiled over during a classified election security briefing in March, during which several Democratic senators confronted Johnson over his Biden investigation, POLITICO previously reported.

Johnson was accused of playing politics with national security and enabling a repeat of Russian interference in the presidential election, especially as he was initially relying on disputed pro-Russia Ukrainian sources of information. One of those sources, former Ukrainian diplomat Andrii Telizhenko, had leveled unsubstantiated allegations about coordination between the Ukrainian government and the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 campaign. Concerns over Telizhenko’s credibility prompted Johnson to scrap a scheduled subpoena vote for him in March.

And at least one committee member, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), said it’s “apparent on its face” that the Hunter Biden probe is politically motivated, given that the elder Biden is the Democratic presidential nominee. Romney chose his words carefully, declining to explain why he has voted for Johnson’s subpoena authorizations targeting former Obama officials despite his criticisms. When asked if Johnson is doing a good job, he declined to answer.

In recent days, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has dubbed the GOP the “conspiracy caucus” over its election year investigations, arguing that Republicans are more consumed with helping Trump get reelected than working to solve the country’s problems.

Rank-and-file Democrats have largely echoed that message, though some Democrats are privately frustrated that the party has not responded to the investigations more substantively. But Schatz suggested that it might not be breaking through the partisan jabs, which have become increasingly vitriolic.

“Let me just be as crystal clear as I can — nobody cares. I don’t think the public is paying any attention to this,” an animated Schatz said. “This is a fool’s errand for them, and my response is: ‘Meh.’”

Burgess Everett contributed to this report.

Senate Republicans are ramping up their investigations into President Donald Trump’s foes.

In a party-line vote Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee authorized Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) to issue a broad range of subpoenas to a slew of former Obama administration officials who opened or were involved in the counterintelligence investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.

It’s part of a GOP-led investigation into the genesis of the Russia probe and former special counsel Robert Mueller’s appointment — a probe that that President Donald Trump has long sought, particularly as he seeks retribution after his acquittal in the Senate’s impeachment trial.

The subpoenas target former FBI Director James Comey, former CIA Director John Brennan, and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, among others. Graham has said he plans to seek testimony from Mueller himself, “or an appropriate designee.”

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) is also conducting a similar investigation that ensnares former Obama administration officials, with a focus on the presidential transition period in late 2016 and early 2017 and the “unmasking” of the name of incoming national security adviser Michael Flynn from intelligence intercepts. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which Johnson chairs, approved a similar subpoena authorization last week. The committee has also launched a probe targeting Hunter Biden, the son of presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Democrats have charged that the investigations are baseless and intended to boost Trump’s re-election prospects. Republicans reject that charge, alleging that the president and his associates were unfairly targeted by the outgoing Obama administration.

Graham’s investigation is also expected to focus on alleged abuses of the Foreign Surveillance Intelligence Act, which were documented in a scathing Justice Department inspector general report that examined the surveillance warrants for former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. That report also found that there was a proper foundation for the Russia investigation and that political bias did not play a role.

The list of subpoena targets also includes officials who were involved in the initial investigation of former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. The Justice Department recently moved to drop the criminal case against Flynn, though the judge overseeing the case is seeking further judicial guidance.

“We need to look long and hard at how the Mueller investigation got off the rails,” Graham said, hammering the FBI over its reliance on an unverified dossier of claims about Trump that was compiled by a former British intelligence officer. “We’re going to get to why everybody ran stop signs all the time.”

Graham has resisted Trump’s calls to seek the testimony of his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, as part of the investigation. Trump has accused Obama of trying to illegally sabotage him, though there is little evidence to support the claim and the president has not clearly stated what he is accusing Obama of doing.

“This is really unprecedented, at least in my 26 years,” said California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the Judiciary Committee’s top Democrat, arguing that the committee should vote on each subpoena rather than one broad authorization. “This ties the hands of the minority in any serious investigation.”

Democrats tried to amend the subpoena authorization on Thursday, including efforts to add Flynn, Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, former Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the president’s former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen to the list of subpoena targets. All of the Democratic amendments were rejected on party lines.

“I don’t understand how we can do an investigation if you’re not going to be able to get all the evidence,” Feinstein said as the amendments were rejected one-by-one.

Graham, once a Trump foe himself, has embraced the president’s calls for an investigation after initially supporting the appointment of Mueller and even crafting legislation to shield the special counsel from potential termination by the president.

But Graham has soured on the investigation after learning new details about the genesis of the Mueller probe, saying the process was “corrupted” by forces within the government who wanted to take down Trump. He is also facing his own re-election fight in November and, like most Senate Republicans, is eager to stick close to the president.

The committee held its first major hearing as part of the investigation last week when former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein took questions from senators.

Rosenstein defended his decision to appoint Mueller as special counsel and largely blamed the FBI for the inaccuracies and omissions in the surveillance applications, including one that Rosenstein himself approved.

Sen. Mitt Romney announced plans on Monday to introduce a bipartisan police reform bill in the wake of the killing of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers, slamming congressional Democrats for their sweeping legislation that has yet to draw Republican support.

The Utah Republican, who marched with Black Lives Matter protesters in Washington on Sunday, is working with a handful of GOP senators on a bill aimed at garnering broad support from members of both parties and both chambers.

“The fact that it has no Republican sponsors, the fact that there was no effort to contact any of us to have us weigh in on the legislation, suggests it’s designed to be a message piece, as opposed to a real piece of legislation,” Romney said of the Democrats’ proposal.

Romney — who won praise from Democratic and Republican lawmakers alike on Monday for joining the nationwide demonstrations — said he had talked with Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only African American Republican senator, among other GOP lawmakers.

The plan is in its early stages and has yet to be written into legislative text, but Romney said he’s aiming to create “supervisory” boards to determine whether unnecessary force or racial profiling was employed by a police officer, in addition to new training programs aimed at combating racial bias.

The Democratic proposal includes creating a “National Police Misconduct Registry,” developing a national standard on the use of force, and limiting the transfer of surplus military equipment to local police departments.

“We’ll try and fashion something that has broader bipartisan appeal,” Romney said. “If there’s injustice, we want to correct that. If there is prejudice, we want to change that. If there’s bias, we hope to give people a different perspective and that we can provide a sense of equality among our people.”

Romney also spoke emotionally about his decision to march with a group of Christian church leaders through the streets of Washington on Sunday, adding that one of his sons and some of his grandchildren also participated in protests. He also said he looked to his father, the late George Romney, whose tenure as governor of Michigan in the 1960s included marching with African Americans who were demanding racial equality.

“One of the fundamental principles of Christianity is that we’re all sons and daughters of the same God,” Romney said. “And a fundamental principle of this country is that we’re entitled to equal rights under the law and that we’re all esteemed as brothers and sisters. I stated the obvious, which is black lives matter.”

“Our whole family is very animated about the bias and the prejudice that too often still exists in a country, which is the land of the free and which was founded upon the principle that all men are created in the image of God, and are equal under the law,” he added.

Romney declined to respond to President Donald Trump’s recent Twitter jabs, which were aimed at mocking Romney for joining the protests. Romney has long criticized Trump, and he was the only Republican who voted to remove the president from office in the impeachment trial earlier this year. Trump has largely alienated Romney as a result, and continues to go after him on Twitter.

“Tremendous sincerity, what a guy,” Trump tweeted in response to a video of Romney speaking with a reporter at the protests. “Hard to believe, with this kind of political talent, his numbers would ‘tank’ so badly in Utah!”

Despite Trump’s assertions, Romney’s approval rating has spiked in his home state in recent months. He said he hoped his efforts could bring more African American voters into the Republican Party.

“My party obviously has an embarrassingly small share of African American votes,” Romney said. “I certainly did in my election and we have since. And I’d like to see that change. But that isn’t what motivated me to stand up and speak. I saw a heinous murder carried out by a person with a badge. And I know that’s an outlier. ... But when there’s a bad apple, it’s got to be pointed out and addressed.”

Romney did not vote for Trump in 2016, instead writing in his wife Ann. On Monday, he said he planned to “stay quiet” on his 2020 vote.

“I’m not going to be describing who I’ll be voting for, I don’t imagine,” he said. “My plan is to stay quiet on that.”

White House Counsel Pat Cipollone told a top Republican senator on Tuesday that President Donald Trump acted appropriately when he fired two independent government watchdogs.

The long-awaited response, which Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) demanded after Trump fired the inspectors general for the intelligence community and the State Department, comes after lawmakers on both sides of the aisle expressed concern with the president’s actions and asserted that he did not comply with a statute requiring a detailed explanation for those firings.

In a subsequent statement, Grassley said Cipollone’s response “failed to address” that requirement, which was codified in a 2008 law that Grassley co-authored.

“I don’t dispute the president’s authority under the Constitution, but without sufficient explanation, it’s fair to question the president’s rationale for removing an inspector general,” Grassley said. “If the president has a good reason to remove an inspector general, just tell Congress what it is. Otherwise, the American people will be left speculating whether political or self interests are to blame.”

Cipollone, however, focused his response on the president’s sole power to hire and fire officials within the executive branch, and said Trump “acted within his constitutional and statutory authority” when he fired Michael Atkinson, the intelligence community’s inspector general, and Steve Linick, the State Department’s inspector general.

“When the president loses confidence in an inspector general, he will exercise his constitutional right and duty to remove that officer — as did President Reagan when he removed inspectors general upon taking office and as did President Obama when he was in office,” Cipollone wrote.

Cipollone also defended the president’s decision to place Atkinson and Linick on administrative leave for 30 days. Grassley and other senators had said the move could have been an effort by the president to skirt the 30-day congressional notification requirement.

In his official notifications to Congress, Trump said only that he had lost confidence in both Atkinson and Linick — a response Grassley said was insufficient. But Cipollone argued that current law requiring such a notification “raises serious constitutional concerns.”

Cipollone also defended Trump’s replacements for each watchdog post, both of whom are serving in their roles in an acting capacity. Grassley raised concerns about this rationale in his statement, and said political appointees should not be serving in a leadership role in an inspector general’s office.

“The White House Counsel’s letter does not address this glaring conflict of interest,” Grassley said. “Congress established inspectors general to serve the American people — to be independent and objective watchdogs, not agency lapdogs.”

Grassley is crafting legislation to prevent political appointees within executive branch departments and agencies from being tapped to serve as acting inspectors general, “in order to preserve the independence required of the office.”

In the days after Trump fired Linick, it was revealed that Linick was looking into allegations that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo directed political appointees to run personal errands. Linick was also looking into the Trump administration’s sale of $8 billion in weapons to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates last year in a way that circumvented Congress’ authority to override those sales.

Pompeo later said he made the recommendation to Trump that Linick be terminated.

Atkinson, meanwhile, had drawn the president’s ire months ago when he transferred a whistleblower complaint to the House Intelligence Committee that later became the basis for the House’s impeachment inquiry.

Democrats have raised concerns about what they view as a campaign by the president to seek revenge against those who sought to hold him accountable.

The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday threatened to subpoena Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for documents the State Department provided to two Senate committees investigating former Vice President Joe Biden’s son Hunter.

In a letter to Pompeo obtained by POLITICO, Chairman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) demanded the department turn over all documents that it already sent to the Senate Homeland Security and Finance committees as part of Senate Republicans’ investigation, which targets the Obama-era State Department in addition to the Democratic presidential candidate’s son. Engel said he was prepared to issue subpoenas if he does not receive the information by June 1.

“I am deeply concerned by what appears to be a partisan misuse of Department of State resources to assist Senate Republicans in a political smear of Democratic presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden,” Engel wrote, noting that the department sent documents to the Senate committees just days after President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial wrapped up.

Engel’s letter comes a day after the Senate Homeland Security Committee, chaired by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), voted on party lines to authorize a subpoena to Blue Star Strategies, a Democratic public relations firm. Johnson’s panel is probing allegations that the firm sought to leverage Hunter Biden’s position on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, to influence the Obama State Department.

Echoing other Democrats, Engel said the allegations are “baseless” and “blatantly political,” and he slammed Pompeo for complying with the GOP senators’ probe after having ignored other House subpoenas, including during the impeachment inquiry last year.

“As the coronavirus spread from overseas and began to ravage American cities, scarce State Department resources were expended on producing documents to advance conspiracy theories damaging to a candidate for president of the United States,” Engel wrote.

Johnson and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), chairman of the Finance Committee, have asserted that their investigations are legitimate exercises of congressional oversight. Democrats have argued that the probes are a misuse of the Senate’s resources and are intended to boost Trump’s reelection chances. They also have said the overall effort advances Russian disinformation, citing Kremlin-aligned sources that are pushing similar claims against the Bidens.

Pompeo has been under intense scrutiny in recent days after he urged the president to fire the State Department’s inspector general, Steve Linick, who was investigating several claims of alleged misconduct by the secretary.

A Senate committee will vote next week on a subpoena related to a Republican-led investigation targeting Joe Biden’s son Hunter.

According to a memo obtained by POLITICO, the Senate Homeland Security Committee plans to vote next Wednesday on Chairman Ron Johnson’s request to issue a subpoena to Blue Star Strategies, a Democratic public-relations firm, as part of the panel’s probe of corruption allegations against Hunter Biden and the Obama-era State Department.

The vote comes as the Republican-led Senate aims to resume its normal business amid the coronavirus pandemic, including confirming judicial nominees and reauthorizing federal surveillance powers. But Democrats have slammed the GOP’s agenda since the chamber returned to Washington last week, arguing that senators should prioritize mitigating the economic and public health impacts of the coronavirus crisis over partisan priorities.

“We’re in the middle of a public health and economic crisis, but instead of holding oversight hearings about testing, PPE, or bringing in the FEMA administrator, Senate Republicans are choosing to pursue diversionary, partisan conspiracy theories to prop up President Trump,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said of the decision to schedule a subpoena vote during the pandemic.

Committee rules require a vote on a subpoena if the minority party objects. The committee’s top Democrat, Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, has vigorously opposed the Biden investigation, and he has demanded defense briefings in advance of any subpoena vote.

“The American people deserve to know the extent to which the U.S.-based, Democrat-led consulting company leveraged its connections within the Obama administration to try to gain access and potentially influence U.S. government agencies on behalf of its corrupt client, Burisma,” said Austin Altenburg, a spokesman for the committee.

Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican, initially planned to subpoena Andrii Telizhenko, a former consultant for Blue Star Strategies, but ultimately withdrew those plans amid concerns about Telizhenko’s credibility given his unsubstantiated claims of coordination between the Ukrainian government and the Democratic National Committee in 2016.

Telizhenko’s involvement in the investigation prompted angry exchanges at a classified all-senators briefing in March centering on election security. Sources described the briefing as “combative” and “personal” as Democratic senators challenged Johnson and argued that his investigation undermines U.S. national security by aiding Russian efforts to sow disinformation in the U.S. political system.

Blue Star Strategies did work for Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company whose board Hunter Biden served on. The investigation centers on allegations that Blue Star Strategies, which has withheld certain documents from Johnson, sought to leverage Biden’s role on the board to influence policy matters at the State Department. Biden and his father reject the claims, which have been pushed by President Donald Trump and his allies, in particular his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani.

Johnson has said he plans to release an interim report over the summer on the status of the investigation.

On the other side of the Capitol, the Democratic-led House Foreign Affairs Committee is looking into the State Department’s communications with the senators as part of their investigation.

“[The] State Department appears to be a willing partner in this naked political exercise after completely stonewalling the impeachment inquiry,” a committee aide said. “Chairman [Eliot] Engel has requested that State produce to the Foreign Affairs Committee all the information sent to Senators Johnson and Graham no later than this Friday. We’re not going to allow the State Department to be turned into an arm of the Trump campaign.”

Senate Republicans are beginning to sour on Christopher Wray.

They’re not ready to push for the FBI director’s firing as some of President Donald Trump’s most fervent allies have demanded, but they’re looking for speedier action on Trump’s desires to “clean up” the Justice Department.

“I’m not calling on [Trump] to make a change, but I think the FBI needs to show more energy in terms of solving some of these internal problems,” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in a brief interview. “They need to up their game.”

Graham, a close Trump ally, made his comments before DOJ’s stunning reversal Thursday to drop the criminal case against former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who twice pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russia’s then-ambassador to the U.S.

And Flynn’s newfound freedom from legal jeopardy could deliver Wray some breathing room.

The harshest attacks have come from conservative media figures close to Trump, who accused Wray of covering up evidence that would exonerate Flynn. In recent days, the Justice Department released documents including a handwritten note that Flynn’s allies suggested was proof that the government was trying to trick him into lying. Another showed that the FBI initially intended to drop its investigation into Flynn well before the January 2017 interview.

In court documents explaining its decision to drop the case, the Justice Department cited “a considered review of all the facts and circumstances of this case, including newly discovered and disclosed information.”

But even apart from the Flynn saga, a series of interviews with GOP senators underscored the frustration with the FBI’s broader handling of the Russia investigation and the agency’s responsiveness to their oversight requests.

Still, they also want Wray to stay put for now — with many of them privately saying they want no part of a tough confirmation fight to replace him in an election year. Most importantly, they say, many of the alleged abuses in the Russia investigation occurred well before Wray’s tenure.

“I wouldn’t ask for him to go right now,” said Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who has feuded with Justice Department leaders in recent years over access to documents. “I want him to take some action. He’s responsible for it. He’s responsible for getting things changed. [But] I don’t want to say he’s responsible for a lot of the stuff that happened before he was there.”

Grassley suggested that Wray’s job status will depend on whether he takes punitive measures against FBI officials who allegedly behaved improperly.

“I expect very dramatic action that proves that they know something was badly wrong over the last five or six years,” Grassley said. “And around this town, the only thing that you send a signal is one of two things: either somebody gets fired or they get prosecuted.”

Flynn’s case has been a rallying cry for conservatives and allies of the president who believe that the Justice Department was weaponized against Trump and has consistently sought to undermine him and his associates.

And in the days leading up to the decision to drop the case against Flynn, several of Trump’s most vocal boosters in the conservative media world were unrelenting in their criticisms of Wray, arguing that the Flynn revelations reflect a pattern of abuse that the current FBI leadership has failed to address. They also whacked Wray for not turning over the Flynn documents sooner.

Allies of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell praised Wray, in a sign he still has some strong backing on the Hill. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Wray is “the right man to clean up what was broken at the FBI.” And Senate Majority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) called Wray “very capable.”

But other Republicans said they aren’t satisfied with Wray’s progress so far.

“I’m highly concerned about his lack of, really, reform within the FBI and certainly not turning over the type of documents I think he should’ve turned over to Congress a long time ago,” Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) said. “So I’m very disappointed in his performance.”

“There are a lot of questions that have to be asked on exactly where in the hierarchy of the FBI the buck stops,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), a member of the Judiciary Committee, warned. “So I’ve not formed a formal opinion, but I think there are some questions, based on the answers, that could lead me in that direction.”

Republican senators supported the initial Russia investigations, including special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe, but have since soured on the predicates for those investigations, including the surveillance of former Trump adviser Carter Page whose Russia ties drew scrutiny from the intelligence community.

Some of the president’s closest allies want Wray to hold accountable officials whom they believe treated Trump and his presidential campaign unfairly in 2016.

“I’ll reserve judgment on whether he ought to be fired, but I think he needs to do more to get rid of the people who perpetrated this on the president,” said Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

The Senate overwhelmingly confirmed Wray to lead the agency by a vote of 92 to 5, with all Republicans voting in favor. But many of those same Republicans have grown concerned that Wray is not being transparent with Congress, specifically on how the FBI is implementing reforms in the aftermath of a blistering inspector general report that found widespread abuses of the surveillance courts.

“I think he’s been a little derelict in not being more accommodating to help get to the bottom of what many of us are concerned with,” Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) said. “I think he needs to be more energetic and more responsive. And I think if he’s not, there’s going to be increasing pressure for him to maybe move on down the road. I wouldn’t be calling for it myself. But I think he puts himself in a spot where he’s vulnerable.”

Trump himself is growing increasingly frustrated with Wray, but he has said privately that he does not want to be accused of having a constitutional crisis on his hands, and is letting Attorney General William Barr take the lead on handling Wray, according to a person close to the White House.

Trump has “never liked Wray,” the person said, adding that “keeping his job isn’t in the cards for him.”

In an interview last Friday with conservative commentator Dan Bongino, the president said that what Flynn faced was “a disgrace,” adding: “one way or the other he’s innocent.” Trump did not answer questions about the fate of the FBI director and whether he should be trusted to enact reforms.

Instead, the president praised Barr and said he is looking into the matter.

“I’ll tell you what, you’re going to see what a good job he’s doing,” Trump said. “I don’t get involved, I say Bill, you have to do what’s right. I can get involved in theory — I am the chief law enforcement, but I think it’s better if I don’t.”

The president has rarely voiced his concerns with Wray publicly. But last year, he lashed out at Wray after the FBI director backed up the Justice Department inspector general’s conclusion that the FBI’s Russia probe was appropriately launched. At the time, Senate Republicans raced to defend Wray from the president’s attacks.

Wray’s penchant to sometimes buck the president has rubbed Trump’s allies the wrong way, in particular when it comes to election interference and the origins of the Russia investigation.

“I think his attitude, his very dismissive attitude, when he’s been up before the Judiciary Committee addressing that situation is of deep concern to me,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), a member of that panel. “So I would just say that I have a lot of concerns.”

The FBI seemed to acknowledge the pressure Wray is under earlier this week when an agency spokesman released a rare statement seeking to distance Wray from the Flynn controversy, placing the blame on “prior FBI leadership.”

“Director Wray remains firmly committed to addressing the failures under prior FBI leadership while maintaining the foundational principles of rigor, objectivity, accountability, and ownership in fulfilling the Bureau’s mission to protect the American people and defend the Constitution,” the spokesman said.

House Republicans have gone even further than their counterparts in the Senate. Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to Wray earlier this week in which he suggested that the FBI director was shielding the agency’s alleged misconduct in the Flynn case.

“Even more concerning, we continue to learn these new details from litigation and investigations — not from you,” Jordan wrote. “It is well past time that you show the leadership necessary to bring the FBI past the abuses of the Obama-Biden era.”

Meridith McGraw contributed to this report.

The Senate Intelligence Committee is preparing to hold a confirmation hearing as early as next week for President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the nation’s 17 intelligence agencies, two sources familiar with the matter told POLITICO.

Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas), the president’s director of national intelligence nominee, will face senators as Congress deals with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, which has kept the Senate largely out of session for more than a month. The Senate is expected to return to Washington on Monday, while the House canceled plans to reconvene next week.

Confirming Ratcliffe as the nation’s top intelligence official would send Richard Grenell, the acting director of national intelligence, back to Berlin for his primary job of U.S. ambassador to Germany. Grenell is a Trump loyalist who took over when Trump forced out Joseph Maguire after the president learned Maguire had authorized congressional briefings on Russia’s attempts to interfere in the 2020 election.

Republican senators were cool to Ratcliffe the first time Trump signaled his intention last July to nominate the firebrand conservative congressman, who initially withdrew from consideration over questions about whether he embellished his résumé.

GOP leaders and rank-and-file senators alike have largely avoided commenting on Ratcliffe’s qualifications to lead the U.S. intelligence apparatus. Several said they simply did not know much about Ratcliffe, but they appeared eager to consider his nomination quickly so that Grenell, who had no experience within the intelligence community, could return to Germany.

Ratcliffe rose to national prominence during the House hearings with former special counsel Robert Mueller and, later, the chamber’s impeachment inquiry, during which he emerged as a vocal defender of the president. Some GOP senators, including members of the intelligence committee, have indicated that they will support Ratcliffe’s nomination.

CNN first reported the committee’s plans. A spokeswoman for Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), the panel’s chairman, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The details for a possible hearing next week have not been confirmed, as aides consider a format that takes into account the federal coronavirus guidelines on social distancing.

Ratcliffe previously served as U.S. attorney in Texas, and he was first elected to the House in 2014. He serves on the House intelligence and judiciary committees, giving him a prominent stage as House Democrats led myriad investigations targeting the president last year. Democrats have argued that Ratcliffe is too much of a partisan to occupy the chief intelligence post, and they are expected to largely oppose his nomination.

Trump’s first director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, was widely respected on both sides of the political aisle and often broke with the president in public statements, in particular with regard to Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

The Senate Intelligence Committee has distinguished itself as one of the few functional bipartisan entities on Capitol Hill. Just last week, the panel released a report backing up the intelligence community’s initial assessment of Russia’s attempts to meddle in the 2016 campaign — specifically, that the efforts were aimed at helping put Trump in the White House. That report was voted out of the committee unanimously by the panel’s members, which range from Trump loyalists to progressive insurgents.

Martin Matishak contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump’s recent hostility toward independent federal watchdogs has jolted the very Senate Republicans who are among his most outspoken defenders.

Two months after acquitting Trump on charges of obstructing Congress, GOP senators are sounding subtle but unmistakable alarms about Trump’s efforts to brush back lawmakers’ oversight of the government’s behemoth, $3 trillion response to the coronavirus pandemic. And their warnings have grown more urgent as Trump mounts a concerted campaign against inspectors general, one of the last functional checks on his administration’s performance.

“We need to empower inspectors general to be able to do their work — especially when you’re dealing with trillions of dollars, you’ve got to have good, reasonable oversight over those things,” Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who penned a letter to Trump last week on the topic, said in an interview.

That Lankford and other GOP senators like Chuck Grassley of Iowa have felt compelled to speak out publicly underscores the degree to which Trump has undermined routine congressional oversight — including the very mechanisms that Republicans themselves have crafted to rein in a rogue executive.

The public disapproval come as Trump faces criticism over his abrupt removal of the intelligence community’s inspector general, Michael Atkinson, and his refusal to provide Congress with an adequate explanation, as required by law.

And without responses from the White House, GOP senators have stepped up their public rebukes of the president as they try to convince him that independent government watchdogs are his friend, not his enemy. Lankford and Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) in their letter to Trump last week outlined why they believe it’s in the president’s best interest to “work with IGs, not against them.”

Grassley in particular has spent his career building up the watchdog community, and he led a similar crusade against President Barack Obama when he fired an inspector general without proper congressional notification. And now, as Trump takes actions that threaten the protections he perhaps cares about the most, Grassley is sending a mild-mannered but unambiguous plea to get the president to back off.

“Sen. Grassley has been a pain in the side of every president since he stepped foot in Congress back in 1975,” said Michael Davis, who served as the chief nominations counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee under Grassley’s chairmanship.

But despite Grassley’s uncharacteristically outspoken criticism of the president, he has yet to threaten to issue subpoenas or place holds on Trump’s prized nominations in order to secure the information he is seeking. It’s unclear how Grassley would proceed if his demands continue to go unanswered and unfulfilled.

Democrats say they’ll take what they can get from a Republican party that has been reticent to scrutinize the president.

“While I appreciate the steps Chairman Grassley has taken to request oversight of this administration, it is not enough to defend taxpayer funds and other government resources against abuse,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Grassley’s counterpart atop the Finance Committee.

Defending his direct pleas to Trump, Lankford specifically cited “some of the statements the president has made about inspectors general” which present a “growing challenge” for Congress’ ability to safeguard independent watchdogs from the political whims of a president, regardless of party.

Lankford is one of a handful of Republican senators who has, in recent weeks, appealed directly to Trump urging him to support the inspector general community and send qualified, permanent nominees to the Senate for consideration instead of relying on “acting” watchdogs.

But beyond their concerns about having Senate-confirmed personnel in place across the government, these lawmakers — many of them loyal allies of the president — are tacitly arguing that Trump is undermining watchdogs’ ability to do their job independent of the political winds and, in turn, shivving Congress’ built-in mechanisms to ensure their independence.

“I do want inspectors general to have the freedom to be able to make decisions and to not fear that they’re going to be released from their jobs at any point,” Lankford added, referring to Trump’s decision to fire Atkinson. “But I think there’s a better way to be able to handle it other than just saying, ‘I’m firing [you] because we disagree on some things.’ The president’s team has to be able to give all their reasons for that, just like the Obama team did as well.”

The spread of the coronavirus has brought with it an onslaught of new congressional demands for information and lawmaker-led pressure campaigns, and the price tags of the relief packages present lawmakers with challenges to rein in the waste, fraud and abuse that is likely to accompany the process.

But less than three months after avoiding removal from office on charges of stonewalling Congress, Trump is doubling down on his hostility toward the legislative branch’s oversight requests — including and especially ones coming from his fellow Republicans.

In response to their overtures, Trump has deployed a more expansive view than ever before on his ability to quash lawmakers’ oversight demands.

The most recent spate began when Trump stated his intention to chip away at key oversight mechanisms built into the $2 trillion coronavirus relief package, including on requiring congressional notification if the newly-created inspector general is “unreasonably refused or not provided with” any information. Trump later removed the inspector general charged with overseeing the pandemic response, Glenn Fine, and he blasted the Health and Human Services Department’s watchdog over a report detailing widespread failures to provide adequate coronavirus testing at hospitals.

Trump’s recent confrontations with the inspectors general community haven’t been limited to the congressional response to the ongoing pandemic; Republicans and Democrats alike were roundly critical of his decision to sack Atkinson — a move which prompted Grassley to seek an explanation for the firing and to question whether the president sought to circumvent Congress’ authority.

Trump has yet to respond to Grassley’s bipartisan letter demanding a fuller explanation for the termination of Atkinson, who provoked Trump’s ire when he transferred a whistleblower complaint to Congress that jump-started the House’s impeachment inquiry last year. Trump was due to respond to the lawmakers by April 13.

“That’s not really giving Congress the ability to understand the reason,” Lankford said of Trump’s non-response to the Atkinson inquiry. “When the Obama administration did that, they followed back up and said, ‘here’s why, here’s what.’ We expect the Trump administration to be able to do the same.”

Grassley is unique in his crusade. No GOP lawmaker has perhaps been more outspoken about Trump’s hostility toward inspectors general, and the seven-term senator brings with him a resume that includes authoring several laws on whistleblower protections and the independence of the federal government’s watchdogs. In his letters to Trump, he often notes his previous efforts to hold the Obama administration accountable for similar erosions of congressional authority.

“IGs can help drain the swamp,” Grassley wrote in an April 21 letter to Trump, his second direct plea to the president on the issue of inspectors general in recent weeks. “They find the waste, fraud, and abuse in government programs and they find ways to save taxpayer money.”

Grassley, who now chairs the Senate Finance Committee, has found that his legacy is on the line when it comes to inspectors general. His criticisms of Trump — in the careful way that defines this political era — are getting noticed; but Trump has shown no signs of letting up.

Grassley, though, has leverage — and lots of it. The Iowa Republican has been instrumental in helping Trump secure some of the most significant wins of his presidency, including tax cuts, criminal justice reform and the successful Senate confirmations of two Supreme Court justices. At the same time, Grassley has sent a handful of judicial nominees packing after they couldn’t answer basic questions in committee hearings or were unqualified to sit on the federal bench. Trump needs Grassley more than Grassley needs Trump, his allies say, giving serious heft to the 86-year-old’s efforts.

“He’s not a rubber stamp,” Davis argued. “He’s a team player, but when he feels strongly about things, he has no problem voicing his disagreements.”

Wyden has joined at least one of Grassley’s efforts on inspectors general. The pair wrote a letter last week to Michael Horowitz, the Justice Department’s inspector general who also serves as chairman of the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, demanding information about the vetting process for IG nominees.

Grassley has also written to top health officials to inquire about how they are handling coronavirus outbreaks at nursing homes; and he most recently joined forces with Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) to seek a review of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons’ compliance with guidance from the Centers for Disease Control in order to ensure the safety of inmates and employees.

Democrats continue to argue, though, that simply writing letters isn’t enough unless they are backed up with concrete action.

“The sad fact is, the Republican caucus has by and large been willing to let Donald Trump use the federal government like a personal piggy bank for his donors and political allies, and to retaliate against those who stand up to him,” Wyden said.

Kyle Cheney contributed to this report.