As president, Trump seeks answers on his own wiretap mystery

[Mileage Psycho]

Hmmm
 

Quote

 

As president, Trump seeks answers on his own wiretap mystery

Associated Press

By ERIC TUCKER and EILEEN SULLIVAN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON — If Donald Trump wants to know whether he was the subject of surveillance by the U.S. government, he may be uniquely positioned to get an answer.

In a series of weekend tweets, the president accused his predecessor, Barack Obama, of ordering wiretaps on his phones but offered no proof to back the claim. The White House then called on Congress to investigate the allegations.

But former government lawyers say Trump hardly needs Congress to answer this question.

"The intelligence community works for the president, so if a president wanted to know whether surveillance had been conducted on a particular target, all he'd have to do is ask," said Todd Hinnen, head of the Justice Department's National Security Division during the Obama administration and a National Security Council staff member under George W. Bush.

The latest storm began Saturday when Trump tweeted: "Is it legal for a sitting President to be 'wire tapping' a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!" He followed up with: "How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!"

The Justice Department, not the president, would have the authority to conduct such surveillance, and officials have not confirmed any such action. Through a spokesman, Obama said neither he nor any White House official had ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Obama's top intelligence official, James Clapper, also said Trump's claims were false, and a U.S. official said the FBI asked the Justice Department to rebut Trump's assertions.

Why turn to Congress, Trump spokesman Sean Spicer was asked Monday.

"My understanding is that the president directing the Department of Justice to do something with respect to an investigation that may or may not occur with evidence may be seen as trying to interfere," Spicer said. "And I think that we're trying to do this in the proper way."

He indicated that Trump was responding to media reports rather than any word from the intelligence community. Other officials have suggested the president was acting on other information.

Sen. John McCain, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said Monday that Trump needs to give more information to the American people and Congress about his wiretapping accusations. "The dimensions of this are huge," McCain said. "It's accusing a former president of the United States of violating the law. That's never happened before."

As for the genesis of a possible wiretap, it is possible the president was referring to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a 1978 law that permits investigators, with a warrant, to collect the communications of someone they suspect of being an agent of a foreign power. That can include foreign ambassadors or other foreign officials who operate in the U.S. whose communications are monitored as a matter of routine for counterintelligence purposes.

The warrant application process is done in secret in a classified process. But, as president, Trump has the authority to declassify anything. And were such a warrant to exist, he could theoretically move to make it public as well.

If the president demands to know what happened, "the Justice Department can decide what's appropriate to share and what's not," said Amy Jeffress, another former Obama administration national security lawyer.

The Justice Department applies for the warrants in a one-sided process before judges of the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Permission is granted if a judge agrees that there's probable cause that the target is an agent of a foreign power. Though the standard is a high bar to meet, applications are hardly ever denied.

Targets of wiretaps are not alerted that their communications are being recorded. Defendants later charged in the criminal justice system may ultimately learn the government intends to use at trial evidence collected through a FISA warrant, but they are not presented with the actual application for a warrant.

"Unfortunately, the public has never seen an actual FISA application over nearly 40 years, so we don't know exactly how the FISA Court has applied or interpreted the probable cause standard in this context," Patrick Toomey, an American Civil Liberties Union staff attorney specializing in national security, said in an email.

Trump also could have been referring to wiretapping authorized under the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968. The Justice Department can obtain a warrant for that surveillance by convincing a judge that there's probable cause to believe the target has committed or is committing a crime.

The White House turned Sunday to Congress — which is already investigating ties between Trump associates and Russians — for help finding evidence to support his assertions. Some Republicans seemed inclined to try to help Trump get answers.

For Congress, getting to the bottom of this should not be difficult, said Dan Jones, a former Senate investigator and currently president of the Penn Quarter Research and Investigations Group.

"It's a knowable, 'yes or no,'" Jones said. If the answer is there was no such warrant, he said, the next step would be to ask the president why he made the claim. "That information would then be investigated to find out if it's right or wrong."

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/as-president-trump-seeks-answers-on-his-own-wiretap-mystery/ar-AAnUImR

 

 

[Mainecat]

He can as president request the info.........unless the investigation is still going......mmmmmm

[Momorider]

[Zambroski]

1 minute ago, Momorider said:

Done.  Thread closed.

Try again later, Ballsack.

[DriftBusta]

Until he gets control of the unelected bureaucrats who dominate some of these agencies, who were almost exclusively behind Clinton, expect more messy fireworks.  I hope he has the mother of all purges in the next year, and people go to jail.  Because many of them deserve to.

[JEFF]

13 minutes ago, Momorider said:

Priceless...

[Mainecat]

Nixon tried to get info when he was being investigated and was told the same as Trump was.

 

Mmmmmmmm Putingate

[Snoslinger]

but, but, but the ny times article?

 

[Snoslinger]

46 minutes ago, DriftBusta said:

Until he gets control of the unelected bureaucrats who dominate some of these agencies, who were almost exclusively behind Clinton, expect more messy fireworks.  I hope he has the mother of all purges in the next year, and people go to jail.  Because many of them deserve to.

kinda like a dictator?

[Sleepr2]

5 minutes ago, Snoslinger said:

kinda like a dictator?

No, like someone enforcing laws a against leaking information 

[spin_dry]

trump comes up with a conspiracy and his minion race around and jump through hoops to make it look like it could be true. face it kids, you've been punked.  

[Momorider]

26 minutes ago, spin_dry said:

trump comes up with a conspiracy and his minion race around and jump through hoops to make it look like it could be true. face it kids, you've been punked.  

[ICEMAN!]

1 hour ago, DriftBusta said:

Until he gets control of the unelected bureaucrats who dominate some of these agencies, who were almost exclusively behind Clinton, expect more messy fireworks.  I hope he has the mother of all purges in the next year, and people go to jail.  Because many of them deserve to.

Nat Sec agencies tend to be dominated by white, conservative men ya fuckin dummy.  Very little change takes place between administrations and most of the people in these agencies have served under both Republican and Democrat admins.  Your narrative is BS and you're an idiot for believing it. 

[ICEMAN!]

2 hours ago, Momorider said:

FAIL

This issue isn't about spying on "elected leaders."  It's about spying on an American citizen and the President doesn't have the authority to order that.

nice #fakemoronicmeme though 

[Cold War]

I"D TAP THAT! 

[Highmark]

Article is wrong.   The POTUS can order a wiretap thru the DOJ without a court order.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-04/obama-advisor-rhodes-wrong-president-can-order-wiretap-and-why-trump-may-have-last-l

It would appear, however, that Rhodes is wrong, especially as pertains to matters of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance, and its associated FISA court, under which the alleged wiretap of Donald Trump would have been granted, as it pertained specifically to Trump's alleged illicit interactions with Russian entities.

In Chapter 36 of Title 50 of the US Code *War and National Defense", Subchapter 1, Section 1802, we read the following:

 

 

(1) Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year if the Attorney General certifies in writing under oath that—

(A) the electronic surveillance is solely directed at—
(i) the acquisition of the contents of communications transmitted by means of communications used exclusively between or among foreign powers, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3) of this title; or
(ii) the acquisition of technical intelligence, other than the spoken communications of individuals, from property or premises under the open and exclusive control of a foreign power, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3) of this title;

(B) there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party; and

(C) the proposed minimization procedures with respect to such surveillance meet the definition of minimization procedures under section 1801(h) of this title; and
if the Attorney General reports such minimization procedures and any changes thereto to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence at least thirty days prior to their effective date, unless the Attorney General determines immediate action is required and notifies the committees immediately of such minimization procedures and the reason for their becoming effective immediately.

While (B) seems to contradict the underlying permissive nature of Section 1802 as it involves a United States person, what the Snowden affair has demonstrated all too clearly, is how frequently the NSA and FISA court would make US citizens collateral damage. To be sure, many pointed out the fact that Fox News correspondent James Rosen was notoriously wiretapped in 2013 when the DOJ was investigating government leaks. The Associated Press was also infamously wiretapped in relation to the same investigation.

 

As pertains to Trump, the Guardian reported as much in early January, when news of the alleged anti-Trump dossier by former UK spy Chris Steele broke in January:

 

 

The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation.

Furthermore, while most Democrats - not to mention former president Obama himself - have been harshly critical of Trump's comments, some such as former Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau was quite clear in his warning to reporters that Obama did not say there was no wiretapping, effectively confirming it:

[Snoslinger]

17 fucking agencies agreed Russia meddled in our election to help trump. you don't think that would have been enough to generate any warrants?

 

[Highmark]

It is smart for Trump to make congress investigate and not go after it himself as the MSM will just hang him for abuse of power. 

[Highmark]

6 minutes ago, Snoslinger said:

17 fucking agencies agreed Russia meddled in our election to help trump. you don't think that would have been enough to generate any warrants?

 

Yet there is no evidence from any of the "17 agencies" of collusion between the Trump Camp and the Russians or proof that the results were impacted.   

[ICEMAN!]

"Tyler Durden" over at Zero Hedge is Highmark's touchstone for journalistic integrity now.

OMG

 

Zero Hedge is an English-language financial blogthat aggregates news and presents editorial opinions from original and outside sources. The news portion of the site is written by a group of editors who collectively write under the pseudonym "Tyler Durden" (a character from the novel and film Fight Club).

Zero Hedge's content has been classified as conspiratorial, anti-establishment, and economically pessimistic,^[3] and has been criticized for presenting extreme and sometimes pro-Russian views.^[1][4][5]

[Snoslinger]

Just now, Highmark said:

Yet there is no evidence from any of the "17 agencies" of collusion between the Trump Camp and the Russians or proof that the results were impacted.   

just wait dingaling. the walls are closing in and the ones closing it are making sure everything is legit, for a clean, cut case. if you think anyone, whether it's our own gov agents or foreign, is going to allow trump to escape all this you're freaking crazy. with his last line of defense, sessions, out of the picture and unable to protect him, trump knows he's in trouble.

[Highmark]

Just now, Snoslinger said:

just wait dingaling. the walls are closing in and the ones closing it are making sure everything is legit, for a clean, cut case. if you think anyone, whether it's our own gov agents or foreign, is going to allow trump to escape all this you're freaking crazy. with his last line of defense, sessions, out of the picture and unable to protect him, trump knows he's in trouble.

You actually think this will take Trump down?   They would have hit them the week prior to the election if they had anything.   

Edited March 7, 2017 by Highmark

[Snoslinger]

1 minute ago, Highmark said:

You actually think this will take Trump down?   They would have hit them the week prior to the election if they had anything.   

they didn't have a solid case then, duh. look at all that's happened since then. god damn you're concerning.

[ICEMAN!]

3 minutes ago, Highmark said:

You actually think this will take Trump down?   

Who knows?  What's with the coverup?  What are they all hiding?  Any patriotic American would want to know that, except you.  Team politics is more important than country to you and your ilk.  Sad!

Edited March 7, 2017 by ICEMAN!

[Highmark]

4 minutes ago, ICEMAN! said:

"Tyler Durden" over at Zero Hedge is Highmark's touchstone for journalistic integrity now.

OMG

 

Zero Hedge is an English-language financial blogthat aggregates news and presents editorial opinions from original and outside sources. The news portion of the site is written by a group of editors who collectively write under the pseudonym "Tyler Durden" (a character from the novel and film Fight Club).

Zero Hedge's content has been classified as conspiratorial, anti-establishment, and economically pessimistic,^[3] and has been criticized for presenting extreme and sometimes pro-Russian views.^[1][4][5]

Are you denying Chapter 36 of Title 50 was somehow misrepresented or does not exist?

http://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title50-section1802&num=0&edition=prelim

§1802. Electronic surveillance authorization without court order; certification by Attorney General; reports to Congressional committees; transmittal under seal; duties and compensation of communication common carrier; applications; jurisdiction of court

(a)(1) Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year if the Attorney General certifies in writing under oath that-

(A) the electronic surveillance is solely directed at-

(i) the acquisition of the contents of communications transmitted by means of communications used exclusively between or among foreign powers, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3) of this title; or

(ii) the acquisition of technical intelligence, other than the spoken communications of individuals, from property or premises under the open and exclusive control of a foreign power, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3) of this title;

(B) there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party; and

(C) the proposed minimization procedures with respect to such surveillance meet the definition of minimization procedures under section 1801(h) of this title; and

 

if the Attorney General reports such minimization procedures and any changes thereto to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence at least thirty days prior to their effective date, unless the Attorney General determines immediate action is required and notifies the committees immediately of such minimization procedures and the reason for their becoming effective immediately.

(2) An electronic surveillance authorized by this subsection may be conducted only in accordance with the Attorney General's certification and the minimization procedures adopted by him. The Attorney General shall assess compliance with such procedures and shall report such assessments to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence under the provisions of section 1808(a) of this title.

(3) The Attorney General shall immediately transmit under seal to the court established under section 1803(a) of this title a copy of his certification. Such certification shall be maintained under security measures established by the Chief Justice with the concurrence of the Attorney General, in consultation with the Director of National Intelligence, and shall remain sealed unless-

(A) an application for a court order with respect to the surveillance is made under sections 1801(h)(4) and 1804 of this title; or

(B) the certification is necessary to determine the legality of the surveillance under section 1806(f) of this title.

(4) With respect to electronic surveillance authorized by this subsection, the Attorney General may direct a specified communication common carrier to-

(A) furnish all information, facilities, or technical assistance necessary to accomplish the electronic surveillance in such a manner as will protect its secrecy and produce a minimum of interference with the services that such carrier is providing its customers; and

(B) maintain under security procedures approved by the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence any records concerning the surveillance or the aid furnished which such carrier wishes to retain.

 

The Government shall compensate, at the prevailing rate, such carrier for furnishing such aid.

(b) Applications for a court order under this subchapter are authorized if the President has, by written authorization, empowered the Attorney General to approve applications to the court having jurisdiction under section 1803 of this title, and a judge to whom an application is made may, notwithstanding any other law, grant an order, in conformity with section 1805 of this title, approving electronic surveillance of a foreign power or an agent of a foreign power for the purpose of obtaining foreign intelligence information, except that the court shall not have jurisdiction to grant any order approving electronic surveillance directed solely as described in paragraph (1)(A) of subsection (a) unless such surveillance may involve the acquisition of communications of any United States person.

Edited March 7, 2017 by Highmark