Four Democrats will join the House Intelligence Committee as the panel resuscitates its inquiry into President Donald Trump's ties to Russia under a new Democratic majority and new chairman Adam Schiff.
Reps. Val Demings of Florida, Raja Krishnamoorthi or Illinois, Sean Maloney of New York and Peter Welch of New York will serve on the committee during the 116th Congress, according to a Wednesday release from Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The intelligence committee pursued a limited investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election under Republican committee chairman Devin Nunes of California, but Democrats' efforts to pursue their own lines of inquiry were largely stymied.
Under Republican leadership, the committee cleared the president and his associates of wrongdoing and criticized the intelligence community for "significant intelligence tradecraft failings."
The committee's new chairman, California's Schiff, said at the time that the report signed by the committee's Republicans reached flawed conclusions and was based on politics. In a statement Wednesday, he said that he looked forward to working with the new members "to restore regular order and comity" on the powerful select committee.
A representative declined to comment about Schiff's plans for pursuing the Russia investigation. But the committee has reportedly made a number of recent hires, including an expert in corruption and illicit finance, in line with its plans to pursue the matter.
"There's a lot of work yet to be done on Russia," a senior committee official was quoted telling CBS News in an article published Tuesday. "What we're doing is we are creating a purpose-built team that will take the point on that."
Schiff said ahead of the midterm elections that Republicans had dropped the inquiry but Democrats had continued. In an interview with CNN in October, he said that "work won't stop when we take the majority."
"We will be able to get answers the Republicans were unwilling to pursue. Records that the Republicans wouldn't ask for," he said.
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