New Senate Intel report on Russia’s election interference expected next week

A new bipartisan report from the Senate Intelligence Committee on Russia’s election interference is expected to be released next week, lawmakers said Friday.

The third installment of the panel’s five-part investigation into Russia’s election interference efforts is set to focus on how the Obama administration responded to hacking and disinformation operations directed by the Kremlin.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) told reporters Friday that the third volume “should be back from final review today,” and that he hoped the declassified version would be released publicly “first of the week.”

Burr said the delay was a result of the intelligence community needing to review and declassify the findings, and to include majority and minority views in the report.

Sen. Mark Warner (Va.), the top Democrat on the committee, told reporters Friday he was “anxious” to release the report to the public. He blamed the intelligence community’s declassification process for slowing the release of both the third and fourth volumes of the investigation.

“Both of them, they have been done for months now. I do worry that a declassification process that has always been legitimate, I start to have increasing questions about whether it’s being politicized,” Warner said.

A congressional source told The Hill that while the committee is hoping to release the third report early next week, the release could be delayed if President Trump’s impeachment trial continues beyond Saturday.

The first volume, which dealt with Russian attempts to target voting infrastructure in the lead-up to the 2016 election, was released in July. The second volume, on Russian efforts to spread disinformation on social media, was made public in October.

Both reports were made public with large portions redacted after going through the declassification process.

The first volume was released the same week former special counsel Robert Mueller testified before two House committees about his Russia report. Mueller told lawmakers that Russia would attempt to interfere in the 2020 elections as well.

The fourth and fifth volumes, compiled after a three-year investigation by the committee, will examine the intelligence community’s assessment of Russian interference and any remaining counterintelligence questions involved in Moscow’s interference efforts.

–Updated at 5:30 p.m.