If Trump is making recordings in the White House (or in the course of his official duties), those recordings could be subject to discovery or disclosure under subpoena or FOIA. Even they aren’t, there will certainly be a legal fight about them. Therefore, by insinuating he was making recordings, Trump has set himself up for a legal fight he didn’t need whether the recordings exist or not.
And if they don’t exist, while I’m sure he’ll claim he was speaking in the hypothetical, it makes him look disingenuous (and won’t necessarily stop the legal fight).
This one was a mistake.
Speaking as an attorney, this is a horrifying mistake. The number of attempts to prove the existence of these “tapes” and acquire them if they exist are nearly unending.
The fact that Spicer didn’t flat out dismiss this notion is crazy as well.
Trump is currently in court fighting for his travel ban executive order. The silly argument being made is that his past campaign statements show an attempt to target Muslims.
What’s to stop the ACLU or anyone from attempting to subpoena the tapes of conversations regarding discussion around the order?
He insinuated no such thing. Maybe Comey is the one doing the "recordings" and Trump became aware of them. There were two telephone calls and one dinner.
How would a legal fight be triggered? Certainly not with a tweet.
And if they don’t exist, while I’m sure he’ll claim he was speaking in the hypothetical, it makes him look disingenuous (and won’t necessarily stop the legal fight). This one was a mistake.
He wasn't tweeting in the hypothetical. He just said, "James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!"
Remember when Trump tweeted that Obama was "wiretapping" him? The MSM and the Dems said he was crazy. It turns out it was true as we now know about the FISA warrant on the Trump campaign and transition teams.
Maybe NSA has the recordings of the telephone calls. We also know that the DOJ IG is investigating Comey and his leadership team.