Spying claims ignite privacy debate
Trump’s assertion on wiretapping to be scrutinized on Capitol Hill
Standing beside Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany on Friday at the White House, President Donald Trump told her, “at least we have something in common.”
Trump was comparing himself to a foreign leader whose cellphone calls had been intercepted by the National Security Agency. He was doubling down, again, on his much-disputed claim that his calls, too, had been wiretapped on orders of President Barack Obama.
It was the latest in a series of extraordinary statements in which Trump, with awkward support from his aides, took an unusual stance for a U.S. commander-in-chief: He spoke not as the boss of the intelligence agencies but as their victim.
Even if his wiretap claim was groundless, as seems all but certain, it has unexpectedly renewed a debate on the left as well as the right over whether security agencies invade Americans’ privacy and could undermine democracy. Whether the president intended such a discussion or even welcomes it, his repeated undercutting of the spy agencies has been striking.
Shortly before taking office, he infuriated intelligence officials by comparing their agencies to Nazi Germany. In February, he suggested that intelligence leaks were “just like Russia”; his aides, with his encouragement, have pushed the
idea that the “deep state” of security agencies sought to undermine his presidency.
If such charges were previously unseen in the history of the U.S. presidency, so were the circumstances in which Trump took office. In a public report before his inauguration, the intelligence agencies concluded that Russian hacking and disinformation were intended to help him defeat Hillary Clinton. He bitterly resisted the claim, which cast a shadow of doubt over the legitimacy of his victory.
All of those tensions will be in the air Monday, when the leaders of the FBI, James Comey, and the National Security Agency, Adm. Michael S. Rogers, testify before the House Intelligence Committee. Trump’s wiretap accusations are certain to come up.
Constrained both by classification rules and by deference to the president, the intelligence officials will have to pick their way carefully through secret programs and Trump’s attacks.
‘This has to be answered’
Of all of Trump’s Twitter eruptions, his March 4 outburst on surveillance may have been the most disturbing, both for those who believed it and for those who dismissed it as outrageous nonsense.
“How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process,” Trump asked, with erratic spelling. “This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”
The claims, denied by Obama, have been definitively discredited by intelligence officials and members of Congress in both parties. When the president’s spokesman, Sean Spicer, floated a new theory that Obama had enlisted British eavesdroppers for the illicit job, British officials indignantly denied it, and the White House quickly backed down.
U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, said Sunday that Trump’s repeated claims could provide grounds for impeachment if the hearing with the FBI director does not produce evidence to substantiate the allegation.
“Tomorrow will be a very important day,” she said. “There should be a final statement made, yes or no. Did President Barack Obama wiretap the now 45th president of the United States? Did a sitting president violate the law, perpetrate a criminal act? This has to be answered.”
In the face of bipartisan pushback, the president has refused to relinquish his claims.
“It’s in keeping with his attitude toward government in general,” said Elizabeth Goitein, a director of the liberty and national security program at the Brennan Center for Justice. “He has nothing but antipathy for the agencies he controls.”
Yet Goitein, who has no sympathy for Trump’s policies, believes his clumsy comments on wiretapping, even if not true, should be an opening for a broader discussion of government surveillance and U.S. privacy. She is among the civil libertarians who believe Trump’s critics have been too quick to dismiss the real possibility that the National Security Agency or FBI might actually have picked up Trump campaign communications.
Intentionally or otherwise, Trump has rejuvenated the debate over the proper balance of privacy and security. When libertarian Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., used the Trump claims to suggest a broader concern about privacy, Glenn Greenwald, a leftwing writer for the online publication The Intercept, backed him up in a column titled “Rand Paul Is Right.”
Incidental collection
What these odd political bedfellows were pointing out is a truism inside the intelligence world but less understood outside it: When the National Security Agency or the FBI eavesdrop on foreigners’ communications, they often pick up the Americans who are talking to them. National Security Agency and FBI officials call this “incidental” collection, but it can have serious consequences.
It appears that such incidental collection, for instance, decided the fate of Michael Flynn, who stepped down as national security adviser after he was picked up talking to the Russian ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, and lied about the conversations.
There is also the possibility of what is called “reverse targeting” — say, eavesdropping on Kislyak, ostensibly to find out what the Russian ambassador is up to — but with the real goal of catching Flynn. Reverse targeting is prohibited by law, but Goitein points out that it is difficult to prove because it requires showing what was in the eavesdropper’s mind.