On Thursday, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer once again accomplished the incredible trick of creating a bigger scandal while trying to smooth over another scandal created by his boss, President Donald Trump.
During a press briefing, Spicer suggested that President Barack Obama used London’s spy agency to go around American laws and wiretap then presidential candidate Trump in Trump Tower. Spicer summarized a comment made by Fox News’ Judge Andrew Napolitano in which the judge stated that several anonymous intelligence sources implicated Obama in using British spies to bug Trump’s office. Spicer said:
“Last, on Fox News on March 14th, Judge Andrew Napolitano made the following statement — quote — Three intelligence sources have informed Fox News that President Obama went outside the chain of command. 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. What is that? It’s the initials for the British intelligence spying agency. So simply by having two people saying to them the president needs transcripts of conversations involving candidate Trump’s conversations, involving President-elect Trump, he’s able to get it and there’s no American fingerprints on this. Putting the published accounts and common sense together, this leads to a lot.”
Spicer’s remarks didn’t go over well with America’s strongest allies over the pond. A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Theresa May issued a statement on Friday claiming that the White House has since walked back the allegation. However, it’s not clear on whether the administration apologized for airing the remarks in the first place. In keeping with British protocol, a spokesperson said on the condition of anonymity:
“We’ve made clear to the administration that these claims are ridiculous and should be ignored. We’ve received assurances these allegations won’t be repeated. We have a close relationship which allows us to raise concerns when they arise, as was true in this case. This shows the administration doesn’t give the allegations any credence.”
The New York Times reports that on Thursday night Spicer spoke with Kim Darroch, the British Ambassador to Washington, trying to clean up yet another major international incident created by the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, in a swift response, the GCHQ issued a rare statement condemning Spicer’s assertion and labeling the allegations as “nonsense” and “utterly ridiculous.” And by Friday morning Spicer’s comment inflamed British lawmakers who expressed their outrage and demanded apologies and retractions from the Trump administration.
The Times reported that two British officials confirmed on Friday that Spicer and Mr. Darroch did speak on Thursday, but would not confirm if the press secretary apologized. “We won’t get into private conversations,” said one of the British officials.
Trump’s early Saturday morning tweet on March 4th has since sent administration officials scrambling to either downplay or justify the president’s serious allegations against a former U.S. president. In Spicer’s case, he’s managed to do both, by insisting that Trump wasn’t referring to actual “wiretapping” in his tweet and now by implicating the British government in physically bugging an American presidential candidate’s office.
On Friday a white house official told the CNN:
“Sean was pointing to the breadth of reporting, not endorsing any specific story.”
There’s also the issue of Spicer’s use of a Fox News report which used three anonymous sources, which flies in the face one of Trump’s biggest complaints against the mainstream media. In late February Trump accused news organizations who used such sources of peddling “fake news,” stating that reporters would often “make up stories and make up sources.” The president declared:
“They shouldn’t be allowed to use sources unless they use somebody’s name. Let their name be put out there.”
So by Trump’s own standards, his administration used a “fake news” story to imply that President Obama broke U.S. law and possibly committed treason. Once again the administration continues its well-established tradition of embarrassing America with dizzying displays of incompetence and hypocrisy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KncfC3DYoQ
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