White House, Congress battle over whistleblower report

Congressional Democrats are pushing for more details about a whistleblower complaint that they think involves President Donald Trump. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said inspector general Michael Atkinson notified the committee that the complaint existed, and the Trump administration’s acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, ordered Atkinson not to give the committee any more information about the matter.

What’s in the complaint? Little is known about the allegation at this point, but Atkinson told the committee in a letter that the complaint “met the definition of an urgent concern, i.e. ‘a serious or flagrant problem, abuse, violation of the law or executive order, or deficiency’” in the director of national intelligence’s area of responsibility. Trump denied all wrongdoing, tweeting: “is anybody dumb enough to believe that I would say something inappropriate with a foreign leader while on such a potentially ‘heavy populated’ call. I would only do what is right anyway, and only do good for the USA!”

Dig deeper: Read the inspector general’s letters to the House Intelligence Committee.