James Clapper, the longtime director of national intelligence under former President Barack Obama, said unequivocally Sunday that Donald Trump’s home and office were not wiretapped before the presidential election last year.
Clapper, who served as director for more than six years before he departed in January, also said he knew of no evidence that members of Trump’s campaign had colluded with Russia during the election campaign and that no suggestion that they had was made in a January report on the subject.
“We did not include anything in our report … that had any reflection of collusion between members of the Trump campaign and the Russians,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “There was no evidence of that included in our report. We had no evidence of such collusion.”
Clapper said, however, that he still agrees with that report’s conclusion that Russian President Vladimir Putin had developed a “clear preference” for Trump and that the release of Democratic operatives’ emails stolen by Russian computer hackers was part of an effort to support the Republican candidate. An unclassified version of the report was made public Jan. 6, two weeks before Trump assumed the presidency.
Clapper’s flat denial of wiretapping came after the White House demanded Sunday that the Republican-led Congress expand its investigation into Russian meddling to include Trump’s allegation that Obama ordered wiretaps on Trump’s New York offices. Trump made the claim Saturday via Twitter, but offered no evidence for the claim. An Obama spokesman, Kevin Lewis, denied the allegation in a statement as “simply false.”
Clapper was categorical in his “Meet the Press” appearance.
“There was no such wiretap activity mounted against the president, the president-elect at the time, or as a candidate, or against his campaign,” Clapper said.
Clapper also denied that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court had authorized any wiretap. “I can deny it,” he said. But he said he couldn’t speak for “other authorized entities in the government or a state or local entity.”
Allegations that Trump’s team possibly colluded with Russia have cast a shadow over his young presidency.
Just last week, Attorney General Jeff Sessions was forced to withdraw from Justice Department probes into Russian influence after revelations that he offered possibly misleading testimony during his confirmation hearing about his contacts with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. In February, Trump fired then national security adviser Michael Flynn for misleading Vice President Mike Pence about his contacts with Kislyak.