Confirmed: Donald Trump’s phony Obama wiretap claim came from the Kremlin
After Donald Trump couldn’t sell most of the American public on his original false suggestion that President Obama had used the U.S. intelligence community to spy on Trump Tower, he then tried floating a variation: Obama had used the British to spy on Trump Tower instead. This one went over even more poorly, and offended a key U.S. ally in the process. Now it turns out that false claim can be traced directly back to the Kremlin.
This one isn’t even particularly difficult to connect the dots on. Donald Trump now acknowledges that he heard the claim on Fox News, from on-air contributor Andrew Napolitano (Fox has since officially acknowledged that it can find no evidence to support Napolitano’s claim, dismissing it as being “off the rails”). But a new report from the New York Times confirms that Napolitano got the story from his associate Larry C. Johnson. And in turn, The Independent is reporting that Johnson first revealed the claim on Russia Today. Russia Today is funded and controlled by the Russian government, and nothing is said on its airwaves unless it has the blessing of the Kremlin itself.
In other words, the false claim about President Obama using the British to wiretap Trump Tower had a clear lineage. It went from the Kremlin, to Johnson on Russia Today, to Napolitano on Fox News, to Donald Trump’s ears. Whether Trump realizes it or not, the Kremlin planted this phony story for Trump to pick up on. Contribute to Palmer Report
Bill Palmer is the publisher of the political news outlet Palmer Report