Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff Probes River-raising For Jd Vance's Birthday Kayak Trip

A caller family picnic Vice President JD Vance took for his 41st day is coming nether renewed scrutiny arsenic Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff launches a caller probe into a national petition to raise nan level of a stream to accommodate his kayak trip.

In a missive first shared pinch NBC News, Schiff, of California, requests accusation astir nan move, which he calls “unjustified and frivolous.”

“I constitute to you to definitive superior concerns regarding nan imaginable maltreatment of powerfulness exercised by Vice President Vance and nan U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) connected August 2, successful which nan Secret Service directed USACE to alteration nan outflow of Ohio’s Caesar Creek Lake for a recreational vessel outing for nan Vice President’s birthday,” Schiff wrote.

The letter, which is addressed to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth; Adam Telle, nan adjunct caput of nan Army for civilian works; and Secret Service Director Sean Curran, requests answers to complete a half-dozen questions by Sept. 5.

The Associated Press and different news outlets reported this month that nan Army Corps of Engineers accrued outflows from Caesar Creek Lake to nan Little Miami River, wherever nan Vances were kayaking, “to support safe navigation of U.S. Secret Service personnel."

A spokesperson for Vance, Taylor Van Kirk, told nan AP that Vance was unaware of nan determination to raise nan river. Van Kirk said astatine nan time: “The Secret Service often employs protective measures without nan knowledge of nan Vice President aliases his staff, arsenic was nan lawsuit past weekend.”

In nan letter, Schiff asks for confirmation that Vance was not told and, then, why he was "not informed of this planned manipulation of nationalist resources for his individual benefit."

Schiff besides cites nan Trump administration’s determination during nan Los Angeles fires to release billions of gallons of h2o from 2 California reservoirs that were not positioned to thief put retired nan wildfires.

“With nan astir caller enactment astatine Caesar Creek Lake, nan Trump management is providing further grounds of its willingness to utilization nationalist resources for nan individual and governmental use of management officials,” Schiff wrote. “I dream that nan nationalist scrutiny of nan Caesar Creek Lake h2o merchandise will refocus nan Army Corps connected its ngo to present captious engineering solutions that unafraid nan country, energize nan economy, and trim consequence from disasters.”

Schiff is being investigated himself by nan Trump administration. The Justice Department past week appointed a "special attorney" to analyse allegations of owe fraud, which Schiff has denied, suggesting nan investigation is political. President Donald Trump was consistently a target of Schiff’s investigations during his first term, pinch Schiff playing cardinal parts successful some of his impeachments.