Trump's allies melting away on wiretapping claims
House Intel Committee chairman: ‘We don’t have any evidence’ to back up Trump’s wiretap claim
The Republican leader of the House Intelligence Committee says he has yet to see any evidence of President Trump’s claim that former President Barack Obama tapped his phones at Trump Tower before the 2016 presidential election.
“That evidence still remains the same,” Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., told reporters at a press conference Wednesday on Capitol Hill. “We don’t have any evidence that that took place.”
Trump leveled the explosive allegation against his predecessor on Twitter earlier this month.
“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!” Trump declared.
“Is it legal for a sitting President to be ‘wire tapping’ a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!” he added.
Obama’s office categorically denied the charge that the former president had been involved in ordering any wiretapping. It did not address the possibility that some branch of the government had carried out surveillance of Trump or his aides during the 2016 campaign.
“I don’t think there was an actual tap of Trump Tower,” Nunes said.
But Nunes also said that his assessment depends on how literally you take Trump’s tweets.
“I think the challenge here is, President Obama wouldn’t physically go over and wiretap Trump Tower,” he said. “So now you have to decide, Are you going to take the tweets literally? And if you are, then clearly the president is wrong.”
Earlier this week, Kellyanne Conway, a counselor to Trump, offered a rather creative suggestion for how such surveillance could have been carried out.
“There are many ways to surveil each other,” Conway told the Record, a New Jersey newspaper, on Sunday. “There was an article this week that talked about how you can surveil someone through their phones, through certainly their television sets — any number of different ways. Microwaves that turn into cameras, et cetera. So we know that is just a fact of modern life.”
At a press conference in Richmond, Va., Attorney General Jeff Sessions was asked if he had briefed Trump on evidence of preelection surveillance before the president raised the issue on Twitter.
“Look,” Sessions replied. “The answer’s no.”
Under pressure, Sessions has recused himself from any investigations related to the Trump campaignfollowing the revelation that he met twice with Russia’s ambassador to the United States during the campaign while he was an informal adviser to then-candidate Trump. During his confirmation hearings, Sessions denied having contact with Russian officials.
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the ranking member on the committee, said the panel still has not received evidence from the Justice Department related to Trump’s assertion, and that it is has given the department a March 20 deadline to provide any information.
FBI Director James Comey, who was reportedly incensed by Trump’s wiretapping allegation, has agreed to testify before the committee at a public hearing on Monday.
