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Stein Says No to ‘Overbroad' Docs Requested by Committee Looking Into Russiagate

It was revealed on Thursday that the Green Party's 2016 presidential candidate, Jill Stein, would not be fully cooperating with a Senate intelligence committee's request for documents pertinent to its investigation of Russia's alleged interference in the US 2016 presidential campaign.
Sputnik

Stein's campaign had previously agreed to turn over some documents, but in a letter released to The Intercept it declared that it would be not be complying with some of their demands as they "suffer[ed] from substantial defects."

Some of the faults are, "using vague and ambiguously defined language in certain material respects" and "being so overbroad in reach as to demand constitutionally protected materials," the letter states. "The vagueness and overbreadth of some of the committee's requests also make it difficult to determine how those requests serve a valid legislative purpose."

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"For example, the request for communications with all ‘Russian persons,' a category which encompasses millions of Americans of Russian heritage, casts suspicion upon these individuals based purely on national origin or ancestry."

The letter, written by Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund, went on to detail each of the committee's six requests and specify which they would comply with and which they would not.

To read the letter, click here.

Following the reveal, Stein took to Facebook and released a statement regarding the decision to shoot down some of the requests.

"Today, I'm breaking months of silence on ‘Russiagate' and announcing that we have completed handing over emails and other documents in response to the Senate Intelligence Committee's request for information pertaining to Russian interference in the 2016 election," she wrote. "We strongly support legitimate inquiry into corruption, quid pro quo deals, money laundering, obstruction of justice and other illegal activity in the 2016 election."

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"We caution, however, against over-reach and misuse of ‘Russiagate' to promote warmongering, censorship and suppression of principled opposition to the political establishment. ‘Russiagate' is both a symptom and further cause of the current state of rampant militarism that is harming our democracy," she continued.

"We objected to requests for constitutionally protected materials, including the improper request by the bipartisan committee for internal policy deliberations of our campaign, the flagship for an opposition political party. We declined to provide this material, as the request intrudes into the First Amendment rights of political and associational freedom that are critical to political liberty for all Americans," she concluded.

News first broke on April 11 that the committee had received some of the documents requested from Stein's campaign. Prior to that, the 68-year-old Chicagoan announced in December 2017 that she would be cooperating with committee's investigation.

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