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WASHINGTON — House Intelligence Committee chair Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said today that Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, the national security adviser fired by President Trump, may have done the country a “big favor” if he signaled to the Russian ambassador that sanctions imposed by President Barack Obama after the Russian cyberattack on Democratic Party officials would be lifted once President Trump took office.

The comments by Nunes, a vocal defender of the Trump White House, seemed to be the strongest indication to date that Flynn may have sought to undercut Obama’s actions, giving private assurances to Russia’s ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak, that punitive measures just imposed by the then-president would go away under Trump.

Nunes told reporters at a press conference that he had been briefed on the contents of intercepted conversations between Flynn and Kislyak, but had not seen the transcript of those calls. Still, he dismissed the idea that Flynn had done anything wrong, and said that the punitive actions taken by Obama over the election hack were “petty” and “not taken seriously” by Moscow.


Devin Nunes, R-Calif., chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, talks to reporters at the U.S. Capitol about the committee’s Russia investigation on Feb. 27, 2017. (Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“If the discussions occurred around ensuring there was no overreaction by the Russian government, so the new administration could do, like all the other previous administrations who think they can work with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin … if that’s what General Flynn did, to keep the lines of communications open and make sure the Russians didn’t overreact … that did us a big favor, and we should be thanking him,” Nunes said.

“If that’s what was said, I don’t know what the problem with that would be,” Nunes added. “That’s exactly what he [Flynn] should be doing.”

When a reporter noted that at the time of the key phone call between Flynn and Kislyak last Dec. 29, Obama and not Trump was the president, Nunes abruptly dismissed the question.

“Are you a Logan Act guy?” Nunes shot back at the reporter, referring to the never-used 18th century law that prohibits private citizens from conducting their own foreign policy.

Nunes’ innocuous description of the Flynn phone call was later strongly rejected by Rep. Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the intelligence panel, underscoring the partisan rift within Congress over the investigations into Russian hacking.