President Trump on Wednesday previewed the emergence of some “very interesting items” related to his claim that Barack Obama ordered a wiretap on Trump Tower, arguing in an interview with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson that his mention of “wiretapping” was meant to reference a variety of alleged surveillance tactics.
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“Don’t forget, when I say wiretapping, those words were in quotes,” Trump said. “That really covers, because wiretapping is pretty old fashioned stuff. But that really covers surveillance and many other things. And nobody ever talks about the fact that it was in quotes, but that’s a very important thing.”
Indeed, Trump’s series of tweets on March 4 contained a reference to wiretapping that the president placed in quotations.
“Is it legal for a sitting President to be ‘wiretapping’ a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!” Trump tweeted at the time.
“Wiretap covers a lot of different things,” the president told Carlson in an interview that aired Wednesday evening. “I think you’re going to find some very interesting items coming to the forefront over the next two weeks.”
Trump has come under fire from Democrats for his failure to provide evidence to support his allegation against Obama. The White House has asked the House and Senate Intelligence Committees to look into whether the Obama administration surveilled Trump’s campaign.
The president attributed his controversial claim to reports published in the New York Times and aired by Carlson’s Fox News colleague, Bret Baier.
“Well, I’ve been reading about things,” Trump said. “I read in, I think it was January 20 a New York Times article where they were talking about wiretapping. There was an article, I think they used that exact term.”
“I watched your friend Bret Baier the day previous where he was talking about certain very complex sets of things happening, and wiretapping,” Trump added. “I said, wait a minute, there’s a lot of wiretapping being talked about. I’ve been seeing a lot of things.”
Obama has denied that he ordered a wiretap on Trump during the presidential campaign. But Trump’s allies have noted that the former president did not deny the potential existence of a law enforcement wiretap during that time frame.
“Now, for the most part, I’m not going to discuss it, because we have it before the committee and we will be submitting things before the committee very soon that hasn’t been submitted as of yet,” Trump said. “But it’s potentially a very serious situation.”
Trump’s Twitter feed has been a source of constant interest for both Trump’s supporters and his detractors, as the president has frequently used it to air his grievances with the press and his political opponents. Citing the unfair treatment he feels he receives from reporters, Trump said his social media use has provided him with a direct outlet for his thoughts.
“Let me tell you about Twitter. I think that maybe I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for Twitter, because I get such a fake press, such a dishonest press,” Trump said. “And when I have close to 100 million people watching me on Twitter, including Facebook, including all of the Instagram, including POTUS, including lots of things — but we have — I guess pretty close to 100 million people. I have my own form of media. So if I tweet two or three or four or five times a day, and if most of them are good — and I really want them all to be good — but if I make one mistake in a month — this one, I don’t think is going to prove to be a mistake at all.”
