Dem lawmaker: I expect more indictments in Mueller probe in 2018

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) said Tuesday he expects more indictments to be handed down in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s election interference in 2018.

“We know that George Papadopoulos has now agreed to cooperate with special counsel Mueller, and keep in mind he was on no one’s radar screen until the guilty plea was unveiled,” Lieu said on MSNBC. “That tells me that special counsel Mueller knows a lot about facts and circumstances surrounding the Russia investigation, and he’s not letting people know what he knows until public documents come out with indictments and guilty pleas.”

“I expect next year to see more indictments coming.”

{mosads}Lieu’s remarks come after a new report detailed how the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election began.

The New York Times reported Saturday that former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos prompted the investigation by drunkenly revealing knowledge of Russian opposition research on then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

In May 2016, Papadopoulos allegedly revealed to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer that Russian officials were shopping possible damaging information on Clinton, likely implying that Russian officials were offering the information to the Trump campaign, the newspaper reported.

Papadopoulos apparently shared information provided to him by Joseph Mifsud, a London-based professor with ties to Moscow officials, who told him that the Russians had “thousands of emails” obtained by hackers from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) that had yet to be released.

Australian officials informed their U.S. counterparts after leaked DNC emails began to surface online, according to the report.

Papadopoulos pleaded guilty in October to lying to the FBI for misrepresenting his communications with Mifsud and Olga Polonskaya, a woman who, along with Mifsud, attempted to broker a meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

President Trump and other former campaign officials have denied Papadopoulos had a large role in the campaign. One former campaign aide, Michael Caputo, said Papadopoulos was a “coffee boy” who had “nothing to do with the campaign.”

Lieu, who sits on the House Judiciary Committee, said Saturday that Mueller knows “far more than people think” and said Trump’s White House “should be scared.”