FORMER OBAMA OFFICIAL ADMITS:
WE SPIED ON TRUMP, 'I became very worried because not
enough was coming out into the open', by Garth Kant, 3/29/17, WND
WASHINGTON – A former Obama official
appears to have inadvertently confirmed the former president’s
administration spied on then President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team for
political purposes.
Speaking on MSNBC March 2, Evelyn
Farkas, deputy assistant secretary of
defense under Obama, confirmed that not only was the previous administration
collecting intelligence on the Trump team, it was attempting to share it
as far and wide as possible.
Farkas said the reason for that was,
“We have very good intelligence on Russia,” and she “very worried because not
enough was coming out into the open.” However, intelligence chiefs who have
seen the classified information in question, including Obama’s own former
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper as well as former acting CIA
Director Michael Morell, have said they have seen no evidence of collusion
between the Trump team and the Russian government.
That would appear to indicate the
real reason the Obama administration was feverishly collecting and sharing the
classified information was not for national security purposes, but for
political reasons.
On “Meet the Press” on
March 5, host Chuck Todd asked Clapper,
“Does intelligence exist that can definitively answer the following question,
whether there were improper contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian
officials?”
Citing a report compiled by the
“NSA, FBI and CIA, with my office, the Director of National Intelligence,”
Clapper answered, “There was no evidence of that included in our report.” Did
any such evidence exist, asked Todd? “Not to my knowledge,” replied Clapper.
On
March 16, Hillary Clinton supporter and
severe Trump critic Michael Morell, the former acting CIA director under Obama,
said, “On the question of the Trump campaign conspiring with the Russians here,
there is smoke, but there is no fire, at all.” “And there’s a lot of people
looking for it,” he added. Morrell also cited “a pretty strong statement by
General Clapper.” So what was in the intelligence information that Farkas sought
to spread far and wide?
It apparently had no foreign
intelligence value and no evidence of Russian collusion with the Trump team.
On March 22, House Intelligence
Committee chair Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif, announced he had seen classified
information collected by the Obama administration that consisted of:
“Details about U.S. persons
associated with the incoming administration – details with little or no
apparent foreign intelligence value – (which) were widely disseminated in
intelligence community reporting. “I have confirmed that additional names of
Trump transition team members were unmasked (revealed.) “To be clear, none of
this surveillance was related to Russia or any investigation of Russian
activities or of the Trump team.”
Now compare what Nunes described
with the details of what Farkas said. She encouraged not just administration
members, but also lawmakers (and apparently their staffs), to collect as much
information on the Trump team and Russia as possible: “I was urging my former
colleagues and, frankly speaking, the people on the Hill, it was more actually
aimed at telling the Hill people, get as much information as you can, get as
much intelligence as you can, before President Obama leaves the
administration.”
She insisted the intelligence
concerned collusion between Trump staff and Russians, despite statements to the
contrary by Clapper and Morrell: “Because I had a fear that somehow that
information would disappear with the senior [Obama] people who left, so it
would be hidden away in the bureaucracy … that the Trump folks – if they found
out how we knew what we knew about their … the Trump staff dealing with
Russians – that they would try to compromise those sources and methods, meaning
we no longer have access to that intelligence.”
She admitted trying to share
classified information as far and wide as possible: “So I became very worried
because not enough was coming out into the open, and I knew that there was
more. We have very good intelligence on Russia,” she said. “So then I had talked
to some of my former colleagues and I knew that they were trying to also help
get information to the Hill.”
That would appear to raise serious
questions about the legality of sharing classified information so widely, as
well as whether she was, in effect, facilitating the illegal leaking of
classified information.
There is also the question of how
Farkas, a deputy assistant secretary of defense, was able to see classified
information on the Trump team. That may have been answered Wednesday when CIRCA reported that an executive order signed by Obama
during the end of his tenure allowing 16 agencies, in addition to the CIA, NSA
and FBI, to view classified material resulted in top Obama aides “routinely”
reviewing “intelligence reports gleaned from the National Security Agency’s
incidental intercepts of Americans abroad.”
The paper also said the rule changes
allowed “NSA intercepts of Americans to reach political hands.”
Here’s how talk-radio king Rush
Limbaugh described the significance of the CIRCA story on his show Wednesday:
“What this story is about is how
Obama changed the rules on incidental wiretapping. In other words, if NSA, CIA
are targeting foreign actors, and that surveillance picks up Americans, such as
(former National Security Adviser Gen. Michael) Mike Flynn, Obama changed the
rules to share the transcripts of that intel with his political people.
“(Former National Security Adviser)
Susan Rice, (top Obama adviser) Valerie Jarrett, John Brennan, opening, or I
should say expanding, the universe of possible leakers to the media about what
was going on.
“So an Obama late rules change, two
now, sharing intel with 16 different intel agencies, including foreign
governments, and now opening the door for NSA intercepted intelligence of
Americans to reach the political operatives in his administration.”
Obama’s executive order putting
classified intelligence in the hands of political operatives is one reason why
Nunes declared on March 22: “The House Intelligence Committee will thoroughly
investigate this surveillance (by the Obama administration) and its subsequent
dissemination to determine:
·
“Who was aware of it,
·
“Why it was not disclosed to
Congress,
·
“Who requested and authorized the
additional unmasking (revealing of names),
·
“Whether anyone directed the
intelligence community to focus on Trump associates, and
·
“Whether any laws, regulations, or
procedures were violated.”
In another twist to the Russia saga,
Democrats are not pleased that Nunes has turned the focus of the investigation
from whether there was collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian
government to whether the Obama administration spied on the Trump campaign, as
the president has alleged. And now that Nunes has said he has seen proof that
the Obama administration did spy on the Trump team, Democrats appear
particularly desperate to get rid of the chairman.
For weeks, reporters have demanded
to know: Where is the evidence to back up President Trump’s claim that the
Obama administration spied on him? But now that Nunes has said he has evidence
to confirm the spying, the media are in an uproar, demanding to know how he got
such information. Nunes said he got the information from sources in the
intelligence community.
On Monday, NBC’s Hallie Jackson
asked White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer, “Why is this leak OK, but other
leaks are not?” Because, he replied by pointing out the obvious, the chairman
of the intelligence committee is cleared to see classified material. Reporters
are not.
Then reporters demanded to know
details about how Nunes got the intelligence
information showing the Obama administration spied on the Trump team and where he got it.
Nunes said he went to the White
House to meet a source and review dozens of intelligence reports on the Trump
transition team acquired via government spying.
He explained it was not to meet with
members of the Trump administration, but that the White House was simply the
most convenient secure location that had a computer connected to the system
that housed the reports.
The chairman told Bloomberg
News, “We don’t have networked access to
these kinds of reports in Congress.”
Still, reporters demanded to know
during Monday’s White House press briefing if the information had been leaked
to Nunes by the Trump administration.
However, Nunes had said earlier that
day that his source was an intelligence official and not a member of the White
House staff. He also made it clear that the information he obtained, although
circulated “widely through the executive branch,” was done so during the Obama
administration, not the Trump administration, because the documents were from
November, December and January.
Nonetheless, House Minority Leader
Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the ranking member on
the intelligence committee, along with a growing number of Democrats, have
accused Nunes of colluding with the Trump administration and are demanding the
chairman recuse himself from leading the investigation. “I’m sure that the
Democrats do want me to quit because they know that I am quite effective at
getting to the bottom of things,” Nunes said Monday night on Fox News.
When asked if he should recuse
himself, the chairman replied, “Why should I?” The bad news for the Democrats
may be just beginning. President Trump is now asking the Intelligence committee
to investigate lucrative Russian ties to Hillary and former President Bill
Clinton. A deal between a Russian state-owned energy company and a
Canadian-owned mining company closely tied to the Clinton Foundation led to
Russian control over one-fifth of U.S. uranium interests.
As WND
reported, tens of millions of dollars from
uranium investors flowed into the Clinton Foundation before then-Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton helped decide whether to approve the sale of the Canadian
company to the Russian government. Before she approved the deal, Clinton’s
husband, Bill, was paid $500,000 for giving a speech in Moscow. The 2010 deal
for a majority stake of Canadian-based Uranium One – which required approval
from Clinton’s State Department and eight other federal agencies – and its
plausible connection to major donations to the Clinton Foundation was exposed
by author Peter Schweizer in his book “Clinton Cash” and confirmed in a 3,000
word, front-page story by the New York Times. Former Uranium One chairman Ian
Telfer was among several individuals connected to the deal who made donations
to the Clinton Foundation. Telfer made four foreign donations totaling $2.35
million, the Times reported.
The donations flowed as the Russians
gradually assumed control of Uranium One in three separate transactions from
2009 to 2013. Snopes and other “fact checkers” who insist there was no quid pro
quo have argued that most of the donations were made in 2008, before Hillary
Clinton became secretary of state. But she was running for president at that
time.
President Trump also wants Congress
to investigate business ties between Hillary campaign manager John Podesta and
Russian business interests. Learn more about the man front and center in the news
today. Get Rep. Devin Nunes’ manifesto for “Restoring the Republic.”
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