Ex-spy chief slams wiretap claim
UNITED STATES: James Clapper, the longtime director of national intelligence under President Barack Obama, said unequivocally yesterday that Donald Trump’s home and office were not wiretapped before the presidential election last year.
Clapper, who was director for more than six years before he left in January, also said he knew of no evidence that members of Trump’s campaign had colluded with Russia during the election campaign and that no suggestion that they had was made in a January report on the subject.
‘‘We did not include anything in our report that had any reflection of collusion between members of the Trump campaign and the Russians,’’ he said. ‘‘There was no evidence of that included in our report. We had no evidence of such collusion.’’
Clapper said, however, that he still agrees with that report’s conclusion that Russian President Vladimir Putin had developed a ‘‘clear preference’’ for Trump and that the release of Democratic operatives’ emails stolen by Russian computer hackers was part of the effort to support the Republican candidate. An unclassified version of the report was made public on January 6, two weeks before Trump was sworn in as president.
Earlier yesterday, the White House demanded that the Republican-led Congress expand its investigation into Russian meddling to include Trump’s allegation that Obama ordered wiretaps on Trump’s New York offices. Trump made the claim on Saturday via Twitter, but offered no evidence for the claim. An Obama spokesman, Kevin Lewis, said the allegation was ‘‘simply false’’.
And Clapper was categorical. ‘‘There was no such wiretap activity mounted against the president, the president-elect at the time, or as a candidate, or against his campaign,’’ Clapper said.
Clapper also denied that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court had authorised any wiretap. ‘‘I can deny it,’’ he said. But he said he couldn’t speak for ‘‘other authorised entities in the government or a state or local entity’’.
Allegations that Trump’s team possibly colluded with Russia have cast a shadow over his presidency.
Last week, US Attorneygeneral Jeff Sessions was forced to withdraw from Justice Department investigations into Russian influence after revelations he offered possibly misleading testimony during his confirmation hearing about his contacts with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. In February, Trump fired national security adviser Michael Flynn for misleading Vicepresident Mike Pence about his contacts with Kislyak.
Democrats slammed Trump for the wiretap accusation.
‘‘The president is the deflectorin-chief - anything to change the subject from where the heat is,’’ House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said. ‘‘It’s just ridiculous for President Trump to say President Obama would ever order any wiretap of an American citizen any president - we don’t do that.’’
Leon Panetta, who was a CIA director and secretary of defence under Obama, said the controversy was damaging to national security. ’’Every time these things happen, every time he tweets, every time these issues come up that indicate that, you know, there’s obviously something to this Russian issue and the administration is not co-operating, when that happens, when he accuses a past president of wiretapping without any evidence ... it makes us vulnerable,’’ Panetta said. ‘‘It weakens the US, and it makes us vulnerable to our enemies.‘‘ - TNS