Well, campers, it turns out that the FISA Court did actually authorize monitoring of some people close to the Trump Presidential campaign in the summer of 2016. While Clapper and Comey were clearly very careful in their wording, when appearing before a public Congressional hearing, it is worth parsing their denials–in light of the fact that it is now publicly confirmed that the Obama Administration agencies were, indeed, monitoring some close Trump advisers. Carter Page was listed by candidate Trump as part of his advisory team, but I understand that they never even met face-to-face. But let's wait for further drip by drip revelations. If Page was tracked under a FISA-approved order, what about Paul Manafort and Roger Stone? Both of them have said they are prepared to testify under oath, with no immunity, before any Congressional committee that wants to call them in for public grilling. It seems that President Trump may have been on to something, in his tweets about Trump Tower being "wiretapped." Twentieth century terminology aside and dropping the nit-picking evasions, it seems that there is a growing pile of evidence that candidate Trump was targeted by the Obama White House, the FBI and the DOJ. Let's not forget that Susan Rice has now admitted that she asked for the "unmasking" of General Michael Flynn and other Trump advisers. And remember the March 1, 2017 New York Times report that, just prior to the Trump inauguration, in his final weeks in office, President Obama loosened regulations on circulation of classified material to make sure that the Trump-Russian probe was widely disseminated and could not be buried. It doesn't matter if Susan Rice was actually telling the truth when she denied being the leaker to the media. There were plenty of others with the means and motive.
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OK, someone smarter and more clued in than I, please explain this to me:
Why is it that some of the same people who were questioning the preposterous “Trump = Russian tool” narrative that the IC was pushing as recently as a week ago are now insisting that we can take the intelligence community’s take on Syria without evidence or question? Was the IC subject to wholesale personnel changes last week or what?
And why is it that some of the same people who took the IC narrative regarding “Trump = Russian tool” seriously are now competing to outdo one another to flatter Trump in words of praise that would embarrass a Mughal sultan?
This paints a disingenuous picture. Yes, Carter Page had a FISA warrant on him but with good reason. His contact with RUS intelligence was already well known to the FBI:
http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/04/04/russian-spy-met-trump-adviser-carter-page-and-thought-he-was-an-idiot/
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/04/us/politics/carter-page-trump-russia.html
I don’t think anyone has shown that the Trump campaign located in the Trump Tower was a target for surveillance. That some of the advisors were is not surprising given their proximity to Russia and Russians. There is also the change in the GOP platform regarding Russian aggression and what set it all off, was the non-reaction when several Russians were kicked out and a pair of facilities closed.
Mr. Trump has still a Russia problem from his campaign and now he has another one. It appears that he creates more problems than he ever solves.
A lot of resources are being used to come to the bottom of this and hopefully they will arrive at a solid understanding.
Is there evidence that Comey was ordered by the White House to do this? Would the White House have even been involved? Why didn’t the FBI release this during the campaign if they did this just to hurt Trump? Comey actually released information about investigating Clinton, but did not do so when investigating A Trump aide. It is pretty hard to make a case here that the FBI is anti-Trump.
Steve
The FBI wiretapped a Russian money-laundering & gambling operation in Trump Tower from 2011-2013, so maybe Trump was confused about that?
Lars,
The geography of the campaign being “in the Trump Tower” is a rather disingenuous dismissal of the campaign’s communications being monitored. It is quite like saying that since my cellphone has no wires it can’t be wiretapped. Trump still has a political smear problem from the campaign but at least he’s not longer Hitler. The biggest issue now is his judgment or lack thereof.
Somewhere someday the FBI will overcome the Hoover fear of internal FBI corruption by illegal drug czars [cartels] and organized crime. 42,000 FBI FTE’s with 13,000 Gold Badge agents? Must be nice and safe 20 and out to the private security world?