On May 8 former acting Attorney General Sally Yates testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that she warned the White House that Flynn was vulnerable to blackmail by Russian Federation after he misled Pence.
Yates, appearing before a Senate panel investigating Russian interference in the election, described discussions with Don McGahn, the Trump White House counsel, in which she warned that Flynn apparently had misled the administration about his communications with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador.
Testimonies of two key former officials before a Senate committee that is investigating alleged Russian interference in the USA presidential election past year brought the issue into sharp focus again even as President Donald Trump termed the ongoing inquiry a "taxpayer-funded charade".
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former acting Attorney General Sally Yates said reaffirmed what has been stated repeatedly: there is NO EVIDENCE of collusion between the Trump campaign in 2016 and the Russians. Compromise meaning blackmail. She reported this directly to the White House, she said, so officials could "take action". The former Acting Attorney General is due to testify before the House committee investigating Russian Federation but no date has been set.
The image, which has since been deleted, was apparently meant to emphasize Clapper's assertion that he knew of no evidence that the Trump campaign colluded with Russian Federation during the 2016 election.
National security adviser General Michael Flynn arrives to deliver a statement during the daily briefing at the White House in Washington U.S., February 1, 2017. "I hope that the American people recognize the severity of this threat and that we collectively counter it before it further erodes the fabric of our democracy", Clapper said yesterday.
Senior White House officials tout Trump's first foreign trip as president
Then he'll move on for visits to North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and a summit in Italy. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has frequently praised Trump.
The president himself had earlier tweeted that it was Obama administration which had given Mr Flynn "the highest security clearance" when he worked at the Pentagon.
Three days later, for reasons unrelated to Flynn, Trump fired Yates for refusing to defend his travel ban on individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries. Mr Obama had cautioned against Mr Flynn, whom he fired in 2014 as head of the Defence Intelligence Agency because of his poor record in administration and personnel management.
The scope of the committee's investigation includes looking into whether any members of the 2016 presidential campaigns had ties to Russian Federation.
Meanwhile, Yates also warned in her opening testimony that there were some issues she could not address publicly because they involved classified information.
The Trump White House was told again, after they hired Flynn, that he was compromised.
Comey was set to testify before the Intelligence Committee Thursday, but Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe will take his place.
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