FBI refutes Trump’s wiretapping claim

Justice department told to reject claim

Palm Beach, United

States, March 6: FBI director James Comey has asked the Justice Department to publicly refute President Donald Trump’s explosive, unsubstantiated accusation that former President Barack Obama tapped his phone during last year’s election campaign, US media reported on Monday.

Mr Comey’s extraordinary measure questioning the President’s truthfulness provides an indication of the implications of Mr Trump’s incendiary claim about his predecessor. The department has not made any statement.

Mr Trump’s aides were scrambling on Monday to limit the political fallout of Mr Trump’s accusation 24 hours after it was made — admitting it was still unproven, and calling on Congress to investigate.

Citing still undefined “reports” of “politically motivated investigations,” press secretary Sean Spicer said Mr Trump was calling on Congress to “determine whether executive investigative powers were abused in 2016.”

Mr Obama's director of national intelligence James Clapper told NBC there was “no such wiretap activity mounted against the presidentelect at the time as a candidate or against his campaign.”

Mr Trump’s comments appear to have been based on unverified claims made by the right-wing Breitbart news outlet. His chief strategist, Steve Bannon, used to run it.

The New York Times, citing senior US officials, first reported that Mr Comey believes Mr Trump’s claim to be false.

The FBI director made the request on Saturday because “there is no evidence to support it, and it insinuates that the FBI broke the law,” the paper reported the officials as saying.

Previous media reports have indicated that US prosecutors investigated communications between a server registered to the Trump Organisation and a Russian bank.

Mr Trump leveled the latest charges in a string of tweets early Saturday, at the end of a week in which his administration was battered by controversy over Russia links. — AFP