FBI director deals Trump stiff rebuke
Comey tells Senate panel no evidence supports president’s assertion he was bugged by Obama
FBI Director James Comey dealt President Donald Trump a stinging rebuke on Monday at a time of acute political vulnerability for the White House.
In his opening statement before the House Intelligence Committee, Comey confirmed the FBI is investigating Russia’s interference in the election, and whether any of Trump’s associates collaborated with Vladimir Putin’s government.
But Comey also said that the president’s charge his predecessor had wiretapped him was false. Working systematically, tweet by explosive tweet, under questioning from lawmakers Comey repeatedly insisted there was “no evidence” to substantiate Trump’s March 4 claims.
Nothing to prove Barack Obama had ordered phones tapped at Trump Tower. Nothing to indicate Obama had somehow subverted Nixon-era safeguards enacted to prevent abuses of power and protect Americans from top-secret foreign electronic surveillance programs. No reason to conclude Obama had violated the rules of a decades-old intelligence alliance and solicited a foreign ally to carry out the spying.
“I’m not going to try and characterize the tweets themselves,” Comey said. “All I can tell you is we have no information that supports them.”
Taken in sum, the same FBI director who boosted Trump’s political fortunes in the closing days of the presidential campaign by acknowledging his agency had reopened an investigation into rival Hillary Clinton’s use of private email dealt the president one of the worst political blows of his young administration.
Comey’s testimony opened a crucial week for the White House. Senators have begun weighing the nomination of Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and members of the House of Representatives are set to vote on Trump’s preferred plan to repeal and replace Obamacare. That vote is certain to be close, and vulnerable House Republicans already skittish about a plan that manages to both institutionalize government involvement in the health-care industry while also risking the coverage of their constituents are certain to be taking stock of Trump’s political capital.
A Gallup poll released Sunday showed Trump’s approval rating at 37 per cent — down 8 percentage points from a week earlier, and lower than Obama’s at any point in his presidency.
But the White House and congressional Republicans have reason not to panic, yet.
For one, Gorsuch seems likely to be confirmed, barring a dramatic misstep in his confirmation hearing. That will provide the president a political win and buoy conservatives who expected deceased Justice Antonin Scalia to be replaced with a jurist of a similar ilk.
And while Comey’s testimony is certain to give fodder to Trump’s critics, White House aides were ebullient after House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, a California Republican, said his panel hadn’t seen evidence to indicate collusion between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.