Posted on 03/05/2017 4:09:59 PM PST by NYer
Former White House speechwriter suggests president was under election-time surveillance
A spokesman for former President Obama responded to President Donald Trump’s accusations of wiretapping in a statement Saturday, saying that “neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen.”
The statement failed to indicate whether or not there could be any truth to Department of Justice or FBI wiretaps on communications to and from Trump Tower during the 2016 election — an omission that left the political world ablaze with speculation Saturday.
Trump first made waves in the early hours of the morning Saturday morning by firing off a series of tweets alleging his predecessor "had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower" during the presidential campaign.
"Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!" Trump tweeted. "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!"
"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!" Trump added. "How low has President Obama gone to tap my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!"
In response to Trump's allegations, Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis released a statement Saturday saying, "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. 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."
In addition, Ben Rhodes, a former foreign policy adviser to Obama, tweeted earlier in the day, "No President can order a wiretap. Those restrictions were put in place to protect citizens from people like you."
Although Lewis claimed that neither Obama nor any White House officials under him ordered a wiretap on Trump, his statement neither explicitly confirmed nor denied whether or not Trump was under surveillance at any time.
"Obama spox: Trump's allegation that Obama had him wiretapped is 'simply false' (Doesn't deny wiretapping happened — denies Obama ordered it)," Bradd Jaffy, a senior news editor and writer for NBC News, tweeted Saturday.
Errol Barnett, a Washington correspondent for CBS News, also questioned the omission, tweeting, "Note that the statement does not deny a wiretapping of Trump tower, only that Pres. Obama didn't order it."
Trump's Saturday morning tweets came several days after the president said during an interview on "Fox & Friends" that he believed Obama and his officials potentially were behind the string of protests that have unfurled across the country in the wake of Trump's inauguration, as well as the recent onslaught of leaks that have been dogging the administration.
“How low has President Obama gone to tap my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”
The speculation was fueled further when a former speechwriter for Obama warned the media not to suggest the former president was denying the existence of election-time surveillance on Trump.
“I’d be careful about reporting that Obama said there was no wiretapping. Statement just said that neither he nor the WH ordered it,” tweeted former Obama communications staffer Jon Favreau Saturday.
Trump first made waves in the early hours of the morning Saturday morning by firing off a series of tweets alleging his predecessor "had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower" during the presidential campaign.
The media never questioned his sealed records team players in action.
No, go straight to (rhymes with jail).
I suppose the FISA request will show who requested the surveillance.
Well...he’s headed to Dubai tomorrow
Guess several of them need to travel out of the country and communicate.
Why would 0dunga or Hillary get directly involved when they can use their surrogates/husband?
No, he did not “suggest” any such thing. His statement denies Obama involvement, but make no implications that it did or did not occur.
This issue is too important to get wrong.
No, he did not “suggest” any such thing. His statement denies Obama involvement, but make no implications that it did or did not occur.
This issue is too important to get wrong.
Yeah well, Michael’s the president now and we all know how that ended for the other side.
Fake.
Don’t spread fake stuff.
I think DIRTY Harry Reid instigated the FISA warrant.
He was always vehemently opposed to GOP candidate and person Donald J. Trump.
I made a comment on a different thread that ties in with this post also. It says, “Yes, one can look at parsing the word “ordered.” However, there is a key subject being entirely overlooked. The term US Citizen denotes an individual and as such was not a part of the wiretap request.
Obama’s spokesperson made sure there was no reference to the business entity called, “Trump Tower” or to the so called “Russian bank server.” These entities are certainly not US Citizens.
Therefore, while the statement we were given is correct, it has absolutely nothing to do with the ex-Obama administration’s actions regarding the wiretap episode in question.”
It would be damning in any case if Obama ordered it, requested it, approved of it, accepted it, ignored it, or forgave it.
Why did the administration refer to the the Russians who were expelled as ‘diplomats’ when they were actually intelligence operatives?
“Obama put sanctions on two Russian intelligence agencies, the GRU and the FSB, four GRU officers and three companies that he said “provided material support to the GRU’s cyber operations.”
He said the State Department declared as “persona non grata” 35 Russian intelligence operatives and is closing two Russian compounds in New York and Maryland that were used by Russian personnel for “intelligence-related purposes.” The State Department originally said the 35 were diplomats.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-usa-russia-cyber-idUKKBN14I1TU
“neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen.”
Well that is military grade BS.
On a another note, why were the spies that were expelled called diplomats?
Did the admin not know spies were operating in the country?
I found an article with names and details
“The sanctions were targeted against nine organizations and people, including the FSB and GRU and four senior GRU leaders. They include Igor Valentinovich Korobov, current GRU director; Sergey Aleksandrovich Gizunov, GRU deputy director; and two other deputy directors, Igor Olegovich Kostyukov and Vladimir Stepanovich Alexseyev.
The GRU was sanctioned for “tampering, altering, or causing a misappropriation of information with the purpose or effect of interfering with the 2016 U.S. election processes.” The FSB supported the GRU in conducting the activities.
Additionally, U.S. intelligence agencies identified three support groups used by the Russians in the election hacking. They include the St. Petersburg-based Special Technology Center that supported GRU signals intelligence operations. A company called Zorsecurity (also known as Esage Lab) conducted technical research for GRU hackers. Training for the GRU was supplied by the Autonomous Noncommercial Organization “Professional Association of Designers of Data Processing Systems,” known as ANO PO KSI.
Two other Russians described by U.S. officials as notorious cyber criminals also were sanctioned. They are Evgeniy Bogachev and Aleksey Belan.
Bogachev conducted cyber attacks for financial gain, including theft of over $100 million from U.S. financial institutions and large corporations.
Belan used cyber attacks to steal personal information for financial gain, including penetrations of three large American e-commerce companies.
The State Department also took action to limit Russian diplomats by restricting the use of two diplomatic facilities—Russia’s Pioneer Point residence near Centerville, Md., and a second facility in New York.
Both facilities are used for Russian intelligence activities, administration officials said. The officials declined to say whether the election hacking was linked directly to the two facilities.
The Russian officials expelled were based at the embassy in Washington and the consulate in San Francisco.
It was the largest mass expulsion of Russian intelligence officers since 1986, when 25 senior KGB and GRU intelligence officers were ordered out of the country.”
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