# Trump accuses Obama of wiretapping him **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 4, 2017, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384 "2017-03-04T15:07:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 28
**Author:** ![HeweyLogan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heweylogan/32/547_2.png) [@HeweyLogan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeweyLogan)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/541 "2017-03-23T04:24:33Z")
> [@Johnny\_Ace](#): > > No, you really don’t want to know. But please, agitate all you want to have it published. Agitate? No. I just can’t wait for it all to come out. You know, the truth. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Ace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/6bbea6/32.png) [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/542 "2017-03-23T04:38:03Z")
> [@HeweyLogan](#): > > Agitate? No. I just can’t wait for it all to come out. You know, the truth. Really an interesting thing for a Trump supporter to say, what with all the ‘truth’ that has come out so far from Trump. ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/543 "2017-03-23T13:09:39Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > If communications with Russian principals were above board, why did they lie about talking to them? > [@Okrahoma](#): > > Nunes: > > "Today I briefed the President on the concerns that I had about incidental collection and how it relates to the President-elect Trump and his transition team and the concerns that I have. As I said earlier, there will be more information, hopefully by Friday. The NSA is cooperating very, very well. **And lastly I’ll say that the reports that I was able to see did not have anything to do with Russia or the Russia investigation or any tie to the Trump team."** Please answer the question I’m asking, not the question you’d prefer I was asking. ---
**Author:** ![Fiveyearlurker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/da6949/32.png) [@Fiveyearlurker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiveyearlurker)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/544 "2017-03-23T13:24:36Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > I think a comment at the Talking Points Memo (where a lot of coments also do point out how Nunes is an incompetent at his job.) makes a very good point: > > [What In The World Is Devin Nunes Up To? - TPM – Talking Points Memo](http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/nunes-trump-incidental-surveillance-fisa-warrants) As Kellyanne Conway helpfully pointed out during the campaign: “If you’re under your 2nd FBI investigation in the same year then you do have a … corruption & an ethics problem.” and “Most honest people I know are not under FBI investigation, let alone two.” ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/545 "2017-03-23T14:16:28Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > ["Members of the Donald Trump transition team, possibly including Trump himself, were under surveillance during the Obama administration following November’s election, House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes told reporters Wednesday. > > Nunes said the surveillance appears to have been legal, incidental collection and that it does not appear to have been related to concerns over collusion with Russia." Exactly what I said I expected to happen back on page five of this thread about two weeks ago. Agencies under Obama’s control were listening to conversations of Trump’s team. Obama himself didn’t order it, but an agency that reports directly to him was doing it which is close enough to ‘Obama did it’ for colloquial language, and certainly for Trump supporters. They didn’t have a literal wiretap, but those aren’t widely used and ‘listening to communications’ is a reasonable thing to refer to as ‘wiretapping’. It was ‘incidental’, which doesn’t change that it happened. “Legality” is a sketchy defense to start off with, since the FISA court that approves surveillance warrants may as well just be a rubber stamp, approving 99.97% of warrants it’s looked at in it’s secret proceedings. But if the surveillance reports were being circulated without removing the names of Americans from the reports like Nunes claims, that is actually illegal (plus they probably weren’t supposed to be distributed to the New York Times for their article). And now that means you’ve got an agency that reports to Obama listening in on the communications of Trump’s team and illegally distributing the reports of what they said. So all of a sudden instead of being an absurd, flat-out lie about Obama that clearly has no evidence, it now seems to be using sloppy language but actually true. Like I expected, Obama’s quick flat denial now looks like he’s hiding behind Clintonian technicality like arguing over what the definition of ‘is’ is. I don’t see how Trump pointing out a major issue is going to make any of his supporters stop supporting him or convince people who aren’t already opposed to him to oppose him, and the Democrats hiding behind technicalities will probably make more people support him. People like McCain may be making noise, but he made noise against Trump back during the election cycle, then neatly fell into step with the party once they pulled his reins, and I expect that to happen again. I think Democrats believe too much of their ‘Trump is stupid’ hype and forget that he’s a damn good politician who won an election despite significant opposition from both parties, and that lying and twisting the truth is second nature to him. These scandals that are supposed to bring him down seem to be actually strengthening him, and all of the energy arguing about whether listening in on phone conversations is actually surveillance or ‘incidental’ is energy that’s not going in to oppose any of the substantive work that he’s doing. “He’s completely defunding the EPA,” should be a bigger news story, but it’s definitely not getting much focus. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/546 "2017-03-23T14:17:23Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > So under this scenario, a person involved with the Trump campaign was communicating by shortwave radio or satellite communications with an agent of a foreign power? > > Jesus Christ, that’s the most smoking gun evidence of foreign collusion of the Trump campaign that would have come out so far. > > Seems clear that we should declassify these intercepts immediately and let the chips fall where they may. Do you agree? Trump could do this with the stroke of a pen. The Scooter Libby affair taught us that no pen is needed. PotUS could just tweet them, that would de facto declassify them. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/547 "2017-03-23T14:19:50Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Obama himself didn’t order it, but an agency that reports directly to him was doing it which is close enough to ‘Obama did it’ for colloquial language, and certainly for Trump supporters. It’s close enough for persons who’re highly motivated for it to be close enough. If the headline was “ **President busts sex-trafficking ring** ” we’d all expect that the PotUS had a heavy hand in the operation…or that the author of the headline was a suck-up. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/548 "2017-03-23T14:29:03Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > And now that means you’ve got an agency that reports to Obama listening in on the communications of Trump’s team and illegally distributing the reports of what they said. We don’t even know when the names were unmasked. Do you concede that the President himself could have ordered the names unmasked and the information delivered to Nunes yesterday? > [@](#): > > So all of a sudden instead of being an absurd, flat-out lie about Obama that clearly has no evidence, it now seems to be using sloppy language but actually true. Nunes himself said multiple times yesterday that the President’s tweets were wrong. On what basis do you think you know more than this partisan shill working for the best interests of the White House? ---
**Author:** ![drad\_dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@drad\_dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drad_dog)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/549 "2017-03-23T14:32:19Z")
don the con said obama was a sick or bad guy for wiretapping him. This is not a semantic question. The president needs to be taken literally until he is not president anymore and goes to jail. Then you can have pedantic arguments about what his words mean. I won’t be there but have at it. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/550 "2017-03-23T14:50:09Z")
Oh, I can tell you what Trump’s words mean right now. They mean he’s a blithering idiot. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/551 "2017-03-23T15:20:52Z")
> [@PatriotX](#): > > It’s close enough for persons who’re highly motivated for it to be close enough. Or for people who don’t care much and see that agencies that answer directly to Obama were spying on Trump’s inner circle and passing around the reports. > [@](#): > > If the headline was “ **President busts sex-trafficking ring** ” we’d all expect that the PotUS had a heavy hand in the operation…or that the author of the headline was a suck-up. First off, this was a tweet by someone who is known for speaking off the cuff who doesn’t care much about consequences for saying stuff, not a headline carefully crafted by a major newspaper. So while you might “expect” it to mean that, certainly not all of us did - as I said two weeks ago, I expected it to mean that an agency that directly reports to Obama did it. And even further, here’s an article [Huffington Post](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/10/obama-police-militarization_n_3566478.html) about police militarization that, particularly in item 1 attributes things to “the Obama administration” that are being done by agencies but not directly ordered by Obama. So it’s not just a Trump practice to attribute actions of agencies that report to the president to the president. ---
**Author:** ![drad\_dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@drad\_dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drad_dog)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/552 "2017-03-23T15:29:59Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Or for people who don’t care much and see that agencies that answer directly to Obama were spying on Trump’s inner circle and passing around the reports. > > First off, this was a tweet by someone who is known for speaking off the cuff who doesn’t care much about consequences for saying stuff, not a headline carefully crafted by a major newspaper. So while you might “expect” it to mean that, certainly not all of us did - as I said two weeks ago, I expected it to mean that an agency that directly reports to Obama did it. And even further, here’s an article [Huffington Post](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/10/obama-police-militarization_n_3566478.html) about police militarization that, particularly in item 1 attributes things to “the Obama administration” that are being done by agencies but not directly ordered by Obama. So it’s not just a Trump practice to attribute actions of agencies that report to the president to the president. don the con said obama was a sick or bad guy for wiretapping him. This is not a semantic question. The president needs to be taken literally until he is not president anymore and goes to jail. Then you can have pedantic arguments about what his words mean. I won’t be there but have at it. ---
**Author:** ![HeweyLogan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heweylogan/32/547_2.png) [@HeweyLogan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeweyLogan)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/553 "2017-03-23T15:32:09Z")
> [@Johnny\_Ace](#): > > Really an interesting thing for a Trump supporter to say, what with all the ‘truth’ that has come out so far from Trump. I don’t know why you’d think that. Not everyone thinks he’s the pathological liar the left is trying to make him out to be (he’s not in the same league as Hillary, that’s for sure). He’s an exaggerator. He wants to put things in the best light possible, and doesn’t always explain the details that the opposition wants to focus on. If he did I don’t think his overall position on things would change any, and I don’t think it would change the number of his critics or supporters, it would just sound more like the politicians we’ve become used to these days - substance-free gobbledegook. I don’t care if he exaggerates or skips the details on bigger issues so long as the general theme he’s promoting is true. And in this case his Russian ties allegations, and those about wiretaps. I think the truth will be come out - his ties to Russia were and are minimal to nonexistent, and the Obama administration acted irresponsibly if not illegally in how it handled intercepted communications and targeting thereof of his phone and other devices during the campaign. I seriously look forward to the truth being told about both. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/554 "2017-03-23T15:32:19Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > We don’t even know when the names were unmasked. Do you concede that the President himself could have ordered the names unmasked and the information delivered to Nunes yesterday? Your “Trump ordered it yesterday” scenario doesn’t fit with the New York Times report that mentioned the monitoring of Trump’s team much further back than “yesterday”. So while the events you listed are not technically impossible, they don’t appear to be likely, and fail to explain all of the facts that we know of at this time. Also, if we’re demanding concessions, do you concede that your earlier claim that I was wrong for believing that evidence exists but had not been shown yet was in fact completely wrong, and that your claim that the evidence did not exist was wrong? > [@](#): > > Nunes himself said multiple times yesterday that the President’s tweets were wrong. On what basis do you think you know more than this partisan shill working for the best interests of the White House? First off Nunes didn’t say that, I quoted him below. And I’m really not sure what the rest of your question is supposed to mean; I don’t claim to know more than he does, I have made a speculation about what is happening based on the information released so far and supposition that has been correct so far. Also, if your are taking Nunes as an authoritative source on this matter, why do you repeatedly claim that the conversations being monitored were with Russians when he explicitly stated that they were not with Russians? [https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/a...s-surveillance](https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/a...s-surveillance) “Nunes told reporters outside the White House, where he briefed the president on his findings, that “it is possible” Trump’s tweets were correct concerning surveillance.” ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/555 "2017-03-23T15:35:43Z")
> [@HeweyLogan](#): > > I don’t know why you’d think that. Not everyone thinks he’s the pathological liar the left is trying to make him out to be (he’s not in the same league as Hillary, that’s for sure). He’s an exaggerator. He wants to put things in the best light possible, and doesn’t always explain the details that the opposition wants to focus on. If he did I don’t think his overall position on things would change any, and I don’t think it would change the number of his critics or supporters, it would just sound more like the politicians we’ve become used to these days - substance-free gobbledegook. > > I don’t care if he exaggerates or skips the details on bigger issues so long as the general theme he’s promoting is true. And in this case his Russian ties allegations, and those about wiretaps. I think the truth will be come out - his ties to Russia were and are minimal to nonexistent, and the Obama administration acted irresponsibly if not illegally in how it handled intercepted communications and targeting thereof of his phone and other devices during the campaign. > > I seriously look forward to the truth being told about both. How about his years of spreading evidence-free lies about Obama? Why wouldn’t this just be another example, considering that zero evidence has been presented? Trump lying about Obama just seems to be his default mode. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/556 "2017-03-23T15:38:40Z")
> [@HeweyLogan](#): > > I don’t know why you’d think that. Not everyone thinks he’s the pathological liar the left is trying to make him out to be (he’s not in the same league as Hillary, that’s for sure). _Practically_ everyone, [on both sides of the aisle,](http://www.businessinsider.com/republicans-trash-trump-hillary-clinton-attack-ad-gop-2016-5) thinks he’s a pathological liar. ---
**Author:** ![HeweyLogan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heweylogan/32/547_2.png) [@HeweyLogan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeweyLogan)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/557 "2017-03-23T15:42:28Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > How about his years of spreading evidence-free lies about Obama? Why wouldn’t this just be another example, considering that zero evidence has been presented? Trump lying about Obama just seems to be his default mode. If you’re talking about ‘birther’ issue, it’s not really the topic of this thread. It will (and is intended to) derail the issue at hand - Obama wiretapping Trump. (Besides, I’ve addressed that in other threads, as have any number of other people). ---
**Author:** ![HeweyLogan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heweylogan/32/547_2.png) [@HeweyLogan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeweyLogan)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/558 "2017-03-23T15:46:21Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > _Practically_ everyone, [on both sides of the aisle,](http://www.businessinsider.com/republicans-trash-trump-hillary-clinton-attack-ad-gop-2016-5) thinks he’s a pathological liar. Who cares what their opinion is. I don’t think he is and I voted for him. It appears quite a few others did too. But we’ll see, right? And like I said above, I look forward to it. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/559 "2017-03-23T16:08:36Z")
> [@HeweyLogan](#): > > Who cares what their opinion is. I don’t think he is and I voted for him. It appears quite a few others did too. > > But we’ll see, right? And like I said above, I look forward to it. He’ll die in prison. This Russian treason makes Watergate look like jaywalking. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Ace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/6bbea6/32.png) [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2017, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384/560 "2017-03-23T16:08:37Z")
> [@HeweyLogan](#): > > I don’t know why you’d think that. Not everyone thinks he’s the pathological liar the left is trying to make him out to be (he’s not in the same league as Hillary, that’s for sure). He’s an exaggerator. He wants to put things in the best light possible, and doesn’t always explain the details that the opposition wants to focus on. If he did I don’t think his overall position on things would change any, and I don’t think it would change the number of his critics or supporters, it would just sound more like the politicians we’ve become used to these days - substance-free gobbledegook. You’re right. Hillary is a rank amateur compared to Trump when it comes to lying. And Trump has the highest percentage of untrue statements ever recorded by Politifact. > [@](#): > > I don’t care if he exaggerates or skips the details on bigger issues so long as the general theme he’s promoting is true. And in this case his Russian ties allegations, and those about wiretaps. I think the truth will be come out - his ties to Russia were and are minimal to nonexistent, and the Obama administration acted irresponsibly if not illegally in how it handled intercepted communications and targeting thereof of his phone and other devices during the campaign. Which general theme would that be? Did he mean 3 to 5 (as in 1,2,3,4,5) when he said there were 3 to 5 million illegal votes against him in the election? Did he mean that his inauguration was really attended by a much smaller number of people than Obama’s was? Did he mean that it’s actually legal for him to release his tax returns while under IRS audit? Did he mean that all media outlets except right-wing-oriented ones aren’t really ‘fake news?’ Did he really not accuse Obama of a felony, in contradiction of our lyin’ eyes? You should replace the word ‘think’ in that last paragraph with the word ‘believe.’ You have no evidence of your assertions whatsoever. Unless, of course, you’re privy to Trump’s private tax and business information and specific classified government documents. How do you know what his Russia ties or lack of same are or were? As for the wiretap thing, usually the way it works is that you gather evidence and then you make the accusation, unless your objectives include something other than actually getting at the truth…like creating a narrative to vilify someone who’s in political opposition to you. Not the way it seems to work with Trump. He makes the accusation while providing no proof whatsoever, then the White House asks Justice to find evidence for the accusation? Yeah, sorry, doesn’t pass the sniff test. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384.md?page=27) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-accuses-obama-of-wiretapping-him/781384.md?page=29)