Stefanik and Cohen are Awful New Additions to House Intelligence Committee

[Source: intelligence.house.gov]

On June 6, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) appointed Elise Stefanik (R-NY), to serve as a ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee alongside Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), extending the committee’s membership to 27.

The addition of Cohen was a concession to Johnson by the House chamber for reinserting Stefanik, who had been on the committee since 2017 but then left it after she was nominated by President Donald Trump to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

When Stefanik’s nomination was withdrawn, she reassumed her previous seat in Congress and has now been placed back on the House Intelligence Committee.

Both Stefanik and Cohen are awful new addition to this committee, which was established in the wake of the Church Committee hearings in the 1970s to provide effective public oversight of the CIA and other intelligence agencies and try and hold them accountable for rogue activity.

1975/76 Church committee. [Source: his.harvard.edu]

Unfortunately, the House committee and its Senate counterpart have repeatedly betrayed its original mission by rubber stamping CIA operations and covering up for its abuses and crimes.

The current head of the House Intelligence Committee, Rick Crawford, aligns with the CIA in supporting harsh legislation targeting leakers and whistleblowers and favors sustaining the pattern of secrecy by which the CIA can carry out illegal covert operations with impunity.

In a statement upon his appointment earlier this year, Crawford suggested a need to “re-focus our nation’s intelligence and counterintelligence community against our adversaries,” adding that “right now, terrorists, rogue regimes, and foreign state-actors are rapidly developing new ways to exploit and harm America’s national interests, and it’s our responsibility to ensure intelligence agencies remain three steps ahead of our enemies.”[1]

The terrorists and rogue regimes Crawford has in mind are China, Iran, North Korea, and leftist regimes in Latin America hated by the MAGA right such as Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, which have immeasurably improved living standards for their people through socialist economic policies and by asserting national control over their natural resources.

Crawford’s suggestion that the intelligence agencies need to remain “three steps ahead” is a signal furthermore for giving them carte blanche to do whatever they feel is necessary to succeed—meaning there will be no proper oversight of their activity.

Rick Crawford, the incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. [Source: arkansasonline.com]

Hawkish Swamp Monster

Stefanik is a protégé of ultra-conservative former House Speaker Paul Ryan and former aide to George W. Bush, who made a name for herself interrogating university presidents for allegedly being too soft on anti-genocide protesters whom she baselessly claimed were anti-Semitic.

Swamp Monster Elise Stefanik. [Source: newsweek.com]

Journalist Dave DeCamp described Stefanik as a “hawkish swamp monster whose political career was primed in some of the most odious neo-conservative think tanks in Washington.”

Stefanik’s racist views were evident in her repeated warnings about immigrants “swarming our streets.” She ridiculously accused the UN of being plagued by “anti-Semitic rot” while proposing blocking funding for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees at a time of growing desperation of the Palestinian population.

Stefanik and George W. Bush. [Source: en.wikipedia.org]

Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Stefanik issued a press release denouncing Joe Biden’s supposedly weak foreign policy and offering a prayer for “the safety of innocent Ukrainians as they endure an unwarranted and unjustified invasion by a gutless, bloodthirsty, authoritarian dictator…. Vladimir Putin… a war criminal and deranged thug.”

Stefanik continued: “We must stand with democracies under assault. If peace is to prevail, the United States and NATO must respond with the only language Putin understands—strength. It’s long past time President Biden take swift and devastating action to cripple the Russian economy and impose severe irrecoverable consequences on the corrupt regime of Vladimir Putin."

This comments show Stefanik’s support for a hawkish foreign policy vis á vis Rusisa and world view in alignment with the disinformation advanced by U.S intelligence agencies to sell support for the new Cold War and massive CIA operation in Ukraine.

This CIA operation has included involvement in the February 2014 Maidan coup and its establishment of 12 bases in Ukraine thereafter to carry out an attack on Russia.

Stefanik’s statements further make it seem like Ukraine was a democracy defending itself against an authoritarian regime, when Ukraine’s government has banned twelve political parties and its CIA trained intelligence services have assassinated political opponents even in exile.

A CIA linked website—which openly advertises that it is headquartered in Langley, Virginia—has celebrated the death of recently murdered opposition leader Andriy Portnov and former head of the socialist party in Ukraine’s parliament Ilya Kyva, along with a number of journalists.[2]

Ilya Kiva [Source: x.com]

Andriy Portnov [Source: bbc.com]

If the House Intelligence Committee were doing its job, it would investigate the Myrotvorets website and its links to the CIA and Ukrainian intelligence services’ establishment of blacklists for assassination.

During the Vietnam War, congressional figures carried out an investigation of the Phoenix assassination program in Vietnam run by the CIA and offered condemnation of it.[3]

If honorable people were placed on the House Intelligence Committee, they would examine how modern day Phoenix programs are again being carried out.

NED as Somehow the “Good Guys”

Steve Cohen is as tainted a figure as Stefanik. He appears to have strong connection to the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a CIA-front organization that specializes in political propaganda and finances regime change operations world wide.

Swamp Monster #2—Steve Cohen [Source: tennesseelookout.com]

In July 2024, Cohen presented the NED’s Democracy Service medal to Vladimir Kara Murza, a Russian dissident who had lobbied for sanctions on his own country with billionaire con man William F. Browder and was so close to neoconservative war hawk John McCain that he served as a pallbearer at his funeral.[4]

Vladimir Kara-Murza receiving NED award with NED director Damon Wilson on far left. [Source: ned.org]

Cohen referred in his presentation to the NED as the “good guys in Washington.”

These “good guys” have been involved in criminal regime change operations that violated the sovereignty of multiple countries around the world, and caused mass chaos and violence.

The House Intelligence Committee in reality should be involved in the investigation of NED—which operates with minimal public transparency.

However, with people like Cohen on it and other supporters of the NED like Joaquin Castro (D-TX), who is on the NED”s board of directors, there is no chance of that.

Stefanik in the past has also served on the NED’s board.

[Source: goodmorningamerica.com]

On his website, Cohen touts his support for NATO, Israel and toughened sanctions against Russia.

After his appointment to the House Intelligence Committee, he released a statement saying that “I am keenly aware of how important intelligence is during a time of wars in Gaza and Ukraine and ongoing cyber and other threats from Russia, China and around the world. I appreciate Leader Jeffries’ confidence in placing me on this very important committee.”

These statements show that Cohen’s priorities are totally misplaced and not in alignment with what the House Intelligence Committee was set up to do—which was to be a watchdog and not cheerleader for the intelligence agencies.

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[1] See Jeremy Kuzmarov, “Tom Cotton as New Head of Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is Frank Church’s Worst Nightmare,” CovertAction Magazine, January 23, 2025.

[2] Ukraine’s intelligence services trained by the CIA openly took credit for murdering Kyva in December 2023, stating that the “criminal was liquidated by using small arms,” the BBC reported. Andriy Yusov, spokesman for Ukraine's military intelligence, told Ukrainian TV. "Yes, we can confirm Kyva is no more. This fate will befall other traitors of Ukraine and puppets of Putin's regime."

[3] See Douglas Valentine, The Phoenix Program (New York: William & Morrow, 1990).

[4] A British citizen, Kara-Murza was an adviser to Boris Nemtsov, Russia’s Minister of Fuel and Energy in 1997 and Deputy Prime Minister from 1998 to 1999 who was involved in corrupt privatization schemes that enabled the looting of Russia by foreign capitalists. Kara-Murza has been a staunch supporter of Western policies in Ukraine against his own country’s interests. Part of the basis for the treason charge was Kara-Murza’s association with the Free Russia Foundation, which has been accused of being a front for Western intelligence agencies’ efforts to destabilize Russia and promote regime change under the guise of democracy promotion. In October 2017, Kara-Murza authored an article in the NED’s Journal of Democracy comparing Putin to Mussolini, claiming falsely that the Bolsheviks seized power in November 1917 in a coup d’état, and advocating for a color revolution in Russia modeled after ones supported by Western intelligence agencies in Serbia, Georgia and Ukraine. See Jeremy Kuzmarov, “National Endowment For Democracy Continues to Weaponize Human Rights,” CovertAction Magazine, May 20, 2024.