WASHINGTON _ The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee said he's making progress getting the Justice Department to turn over documents on a salacious dossier that asserted Donald Trump's presidential campaign colluded with Russians.
Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said in an interview that he met privately Thursday with Justice Department officials to discuss when and how they'll provide documents sought in committee subpoenas he signed in August. He declined to identify those officials.
"It seems like we're making progress. I don't want to say there's a breakthrough yet," said Nunes. "We'll know more next week."
Nunes has been seeking information on whether U.S. intelligence agencies directly supported or helped pay for any of the compilation of the dossier on Trump, or whether the FBI relied on information in the document as part of its probe into Russian meddling in last year's election. If the agencies did rely on some of its information _ compiled mostly by former British spy Christopher Steele _ Nunes has said he wants to know what steps were taken to verify its accuracy.
As part of this effort, Nunes last week sent separate subpoenas _ without cooperation from committee Democrats _ to Fusion GPS, the investigative firm that helped produce the dossier as part of opposition research in the presidential campaign.
Nunes stepped back from running the panel's probe into Russian meddling in the U.S. election amid controversy in April, but kept his job running the committee and remains involved in some issues related to the probe.
