NYT reporter blames Infowars for spreading ‘wiretap’ theory
Steve Watson
Prison Planet.com
March 17, 2017
The White House has issued a formal apology to the British government after Press secretary Sean Spicer repeated claims that the Obama administration used British spies to wiretap Donald Trump.
The claims were made earlier this week by legal analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano, who said that three separate intelligence sources had indicated to him that the Obama administration had asked Britain’s GCHQ to carry out the surveillance.
.@Judgenap: Three intel sources have disclosed that Pres. Obama turned to British spies to get surveillance on Trump pic.twitter.com/IghCFm7qhO
— FOX & friends (@foxandfriends) March 14, 2017
“Three intelligence sources have informed Fox News that President Obama went outside the chain of command,” Napolitano said. “He didn’t use the NSA, he didn’t use the CIA, he didn’t use the FBI, and he didn’t use the Department of Justice. He used GCHQ.” Napolitano said on Fox & Friends.
- A d v e r t i s e m e n t
Napolitano indicated that this was done to secure plausible deniability. In other words, even if the Obama administration did spy on Trump, there may never be a way to prove it.
“So by simply having two people go to them saying, ‘President Obama needs transcripts of conversations involving candidate Trump, conversations involving president-elect Trump,’ he’s able to get it, and there’s no American fingerprints on this. ”Napolitano added.
Napolitano also noted that the sources informed him that the individual who personally ordered the surveillance, who remains unnamed “[r]esigned three days after Trump was inaugurated.”
The claims made headlines, but were not followed up on until Trump’s press officer Sean Spicer repeated them at an official briefing during a heated back and forth with John Karl, an ABC reporter.