Billionaire real estate mogul Donald Trump, left, and President Barack Obama, right.
A spokesman for Barack Obama denied he ordered a wiretap on Donald Trump before he took office, but his statement parses words and raises questions. The pushback comes as President Trump said on Twitter he just “found out that Obama had my “wires tapped” in Trump Tower just before the victory.”
“A cardinal rule of the Obama administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice,” Kevin Lewis, a spokesman for the former president said in a statement. “As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false.”
The response by the former president, who now heads up the leftwing opposition to the president aided by ideological bureaucrats, notably does not deny the wiretap and is not entirely consistent with the historical record.
The Obama administration sought and obtained a FISA warrant to surveil Fox News journalist James Rosen, who had been assigned to cover the State Department. In order to do so, Eric Holder’s Justice Department erroneously told the judge he was a co-conspirator in a plot that threatened national security, which the former president claimed he had no knowledge of at the time. Reporters for the Associated Press (AP) were also targeted and surveilled. Mr. Obama claimed he “heard about it watching the news.”
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As People’s Pundit Daily previously reported, the wiretap that picked up on the conversation between Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the presidential transition was one of several surrounding the then-president-elect and members of his transition team. Federal law prohibits the government from listening in on the conversations of a private U.S. citizen without a warrant, which sources–and now the president–say the Obama administration tried to get and failed before finding a more favorable judge.
The wiretap did not reveal any criminal wrongdoing on behalf of President Trump or members of his transition team.
President-Elect Donald J. Trump meets with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office on November 10, 2016. (Photo: AP)
President Trump took to Twitter earlier to level the charge.
Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
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!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
I'd bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
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martykayzee / March 5, 2017
Yes, let’s investigate the entire former Obama administration. Inquiring minds want to know: Did he shoot the sheriff? Did he kill Cock Robin? Was he born in America? Did he smoke pot as a teen? Did he cheat on his exams at Harvard? Is he a secret Jihadi Muslim? Is he a gay anti-Semite? Did he wiretap Trump? Let’s put the entire Trump administration transition, Congress, the Judiciary and military on the case and dedicate the entire government to answering those questions and any more that Bannon, Breitbart, Fox, Putin and CPAC, et al can come up with. A budget of $6 billion should be enough to get ‘er done, and also lock her up. Ready, begin…
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