Examining Trump’s Wiretap Claim
With no evidence, President Donald Trump called it a “fact” that “President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!” He compared the alleged surveillance to the criminal acts of “Nixon/Watergate.”
It was a startling and serious allegation about a former president, made in a series of four tweets on March 4. Yet, Trump provided no support for it, and the White House remained silent for a day. When the White House press office finally got around to explaining the president’s tweets, it undercut Trump’s baseless claim:
- In a brief statement, Press Secretary Sean Spicer urged a congressional investigation into news “reports concerning potentially politically motivated investigations.” But Trump didn’t say it possibly happened; he claimed it actually did.
- Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told ABC News that Trump wasn’t the “one that came up with this idea,” citing “multiple news outlets that have reported this.” The White House provided us with five stories, but none of them support Trump’s claim about Obama.
We will break this down into two
