Memo is big, but fights over immigration and government funding now loom bigger | McClatchy Washington Bureau

Friday’s release of the much-debated Nunes memo ended the intrigue over the four-page document, and set a tense stage for what was already shaping up to be a contentious week.

Members of both parties must now resume urgent talks about how to deal with their most pressing public policy issues: Immigration and government funding.

And while those are issues that were already polarizing, Republicans and Democrats have been trying to find common ground, and the evidence on Friday was proof that effort will continue.

Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., who chairs the conservative House Freedom Caucus and championed the release of the memo, said he doesn’t expect it to alter the tone of the debate over the budget and other issues.

"I don't see this as anything that distracts from the legislative process. It certainly is something that can not be ignored ... but we're also not going to put on the sidelines funding for our military men and women and dealing with immigration,” he said.

There will be bickering, but the memo’s significance was likely to fade quickly as lawmakers turn to legislating.

“The pattern now is to make either side look bad, it’s the red shirts and the blue shirts,” said former Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va. “But it won’t affect the day to day.”

Much of the past five days was spent wrangling over the memo.

The four-page document prepared by Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., purports to show a partisan bias by federal investigators and “in my opinion, puts an end to the majority’s ability to do any credible, fact-based intelligence assessments,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Democrats accused Republicans of endangering the pillars of democracy by releasing a GOP-authored memo over the objections of the FBI. Republicans fired back ferociously.

“The top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans - something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago. Rank & File are great people!” President Donald Trump tweeted.

When Congress returns to Washington Monday, it will have four days to figure out how to keep much of the government open past Thursday, when funding runs out. And the immigration debate will resume while nearly 700,000 young immigrants could face risk of deportation as the clock ticks toward a deadline now about a month away.

Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers are engaged in talks to find fixes — because members of Congress are politicians with an eye on the election calendar and a desire to be able to say they got things done.

Democrats last month backed a deal to end a three-day partial government shutdown in exchange for a Republican pledge to address the immigration debate. That agreement extended government funding through Thursday, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., vowing to take up immigration legislation as long as the government remains open.

Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill., have been pushing an immigration proposal which included a pathway to citizenship for DACA recipients. Their proposal is regarded as a starting point for a large group of senators from both parties who have been engaged in meetings to find a consensus.

Progress on resolving either issue has been scant so far, and the negotiators will have to deal with lingering bitterness from the memo.

Davis cautioned that the memo will harden each side’s voters against the other. “It’s poison among the base,” he said. “And if the base is poisoned, that makes compromise harder and creates an atmosphere where voters are not going to be as forgiving of members who work out compromises. It’s where we are politically.”

What will linger from Friday's memo is also a worry of politicizing U.S intelligence and a widening lack of trust, particularly among lawmakers handling intelligence matters.

"It upends the relationship between the intelligence community and Congress," said Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon, charging that the memo threatens "the ability for different branches of government to work together to protect the American people's safety."

The four-page document prepared by Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., purports to show a partisan bias by federal investigators and “in my opinion, puts an end to the majority’s ability to do any credible, fact-based intelligence assessments,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Warned Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Senate Armed Services Committee chairman, “elected officials, including the president, must stop looking at this investigation through the warped lens of politics and manufacturing partisan sideshows. If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s job for him.”

Yet House members said the memo raised serious questions about decisions made by the Justice Department and FBI leadership during the 2016 presidential election.

“We must continue to conduct vigorous Congressional oversight, to root out misconduct, ensure reforms are made, and people are held accountable,” said House Judiciary Committee chairman Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., whose committee in October launched a joint investigation into the FBI’s handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server as Secretary of State.