Radio Sputnik has discussed this with Dr Kyle Kopko, Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the Honours and Pre-Law Programs with Elizabethtown College.
Sputnik: Can you please talk about the situation where US attorney for Utah John Huber won't testify before the House panel on the Clinton probe, what is his reasoning do you think behind that?
I think it's pretty clear that this is an effort by some Republicans in Congress to exercise some power during the lame duck session to try to get any evidence that they possibly can to link Hillary Clinton or Bill Clinton to wrongdoing in relation to the Clinton Foundation and, perhaps, a pay-to-play scheme during then-Secretary Clinton's time at the State Department.
Sputnik: The Oversight Committee and other House panels will be transferred to Democratic control next month, how will that likely affect the probe into the Clinton Foundation?
Dr Kyle Kopko: I think there's two ways. First of all, I don't think it's likely that a committee controlled by Democrats would be calling forward US Attorney Huber to testify. This is definitely not going to be a priority for the Democrats, at least in the House of Representatives. So they're just not going to have any hearings on this matter. I would be very surprised if they did. Perhaps, in the Senate where that is still going to be controlled by Republicans, there might be some hearings around that.
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As far as the investigation is concerned, I think that is going to continue. That's going to be under the supervision of the Justice Department, which is, obviously, part of the Trump administration and it's been going on now for some time. This investigation was started at the direction of then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Sputnik: Can you tell us, maybe elaborate a bit, on what exactly the Clinton association is being investigated for?
Sputnik: What does this probe, on the back of the probe into Donald Trump, what does it signal about the state of American politics? Does this kind of give everybody the feeling that there's a lot of corruption, that this is just the tip of the iceberg and is this being blown out a bit more?
Dr Kyle Kopko: In terms of corruption, I'm not quite sure. But I think it's safe to say that this is partisan politics on both sides; but there's also elements of truth, I think, in both situations and that's why there are active investigations ongoing and you have seasoned members of the Justice Department actively pursuing the probe against President Trump and his involvement with Russia during the campaign and also then-Secretary Clinton and her involvement in any pay-for-play schemes.
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Plus too, there is a popular perception of the Clintons being corrupt public officials at least among conservative voters and certainly, that's a message that President Trump has emphasised throughout the 2016 campaign and ever since he took office. So I think that too is playing a part into this larger scheme of the investigation.
Sputnik: How much incentive has been given by President Trump to really step up this probe?
Dr Kyle Kopko: I think that there is definitely a political strategy here where it benefits President Trump to not only raise this as a potential legitimate investigation issue and point out that there could be some unfairness in how he's being investigated and also just to provide a political distraction, to change the news media cycle. So I think that there are incentives there for President Trump to draw attention to this particular issue.
Sputnik: If the suspicions are actually confirmed through this probe regarding the Clinton association, what kind of consequences could these have for Hillary Clinton and for Bill Clinton?
The views expressed in this article are solely those of Dr Kyle Kopko and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Sputnik.