House

Former White House staffer Hope Hicks to cooperate with Dems’ probe into Trump

Hope Hicks, a former White House communications director, will cooperate with the House Judiciary Committee and provide documents to the panel in its probe of President Trump and his administration.

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the committee, requested documents from Hicks earlier this month on a variety of topics, including former national security adviser Michael Flynn’s false statements to the FBI, the firing of former FBI Director James Comey and the payments made in connection to President Trump’s alleged affairs.

{mosads}Committee spokesperson Daniel Schwartz confirmed to The Hill that Hicks intends to comply with Nadler’s request. The news was first reported by CNN.

Nadler asked Hicks for documents from “any personal or work diary, journal or other book containing notes, a record or a description of daily events” about Trump, the Trump campaign, the Trump Organization and the executive office of the president, according to CNN.

Democrats expressed frustration with Hicks last year, saying she did not answer all their questions about her time in the White House during a private appearance in front of the House Intelligence Committee. 

Republicans on the Judiciary Committee told The Hill on Monday that eight individuals and entities have already provided the panel with a total of 8,195 pages related to its sprawling investigation into President Trump’s administration, campaign and businesses.

Among those eight are the National Rifle Association and former Trump campaign aides George Papadopoulos, Stephen Bannon, J.D. Gordon and Sam Nunberg.

Nadler said he was “encouraged” by the responses so far to his request earlier this month for documents from 81 individuals and entities in the probe focusing on obstruction of justice, public corruption and abuses of power.

Monday was the deadline to submit the requested documents.

The New York Democrat added that others had asked for a friendly subpoena to have public cover for their cooperation with the panel’s probe.

Schwartz told The Hill that the panel has no intention of sending out a second wave of document requests.

“We have no definite plans to send out a second wave, nor do we have a list of names for a possible second wave. It is possible that there will be additional document requests at some point, but nothing like this story describes,” Schwartz said, responding to a Wall Street Journal report saying a second round of requests was in the works.