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'We Have Got to Get to the Bottom of This,' King says of Flynn Probe

FILE: Senate Armed Services Senate Committee member Sen. Angus King, I-Maine questions Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017.
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File
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Associated Press/file
Sen. Angus King on Capitol Hill in Washington earlier this month during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on U.S. involvement in Afghanistan.

AUGUSTA, Maine - Maine U.S. Sen. Angus King says that the Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into Russian attempts to influence U.S. elections will also probe former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn’s communications with Russian officials.

King told MSNBC that the Intelligence Committee, on which he serves, has already started an investigation of Russian efforts to influence last year’s elections. He says there is bipartisan support on the panel to look at communications between Flynn and Russian officials before President Trump took office.

“We have got to get to the bottom of this. We are going to go where the facts take us. And so, yes, the answer is will it be bipartisan, yes. Will it be thorough, yes,” he says.

King says if it isn’t thorough, he will go public with criticism of the investigation’s shortcomings.

“We know now for a fact that there was a conversation between Gen. Flynn and the Russians after the election and there is still an open question if there were contacts before, and that is exactly where our investigation is going to go,” he says.

The New York Times Wednesday reports that they've been told by U.S. officials that there was "repeated contact" between Trump aides and senior Russian officials during the 2016 campaign.  The aides that officials say were involved in the communications deny any wrongdoing.

Maine U.S. Sen. Susan Collins is also a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Journalist Mal Leary spearheads Maine Public's news coverage of politics and government and is based at the State House.