FBI director: ‘No information’ to support Trump wiretapping claims

Both the chairman and ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee have previously said there is no evidence of Trump’s claim that Obama had his “wires tapped” in Trump Tower ahead of the presidential election, a charge the president made on Twitter earlier in March.

Trump has stood by his claims, though the White House has worked to walk back the accusation, saying it referred more broadly to surveillance activities by the Obama administration.

The Justice Department on Friday sent documents to the committee related to Trump’s claims, which both Reps. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and Adam Schiff (R-Calif.) have said did not back up the president’s claims.

Republicans have suggested that Trump associates may have been caught up incidentally in legitimate surveillance of non-U.S. targets — and were perhaps then unmasked within the administration by intelligence officials and leaked to the media.

They have pointed to former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, who was forced to resign after it was reported that government surveillance exposed that he had misled Vice President Pence about the content of a December phone call with the Russian ambassador.

“We know there was not a wiretap on Trump Tower,” Nunes said in his opening statement. “However, it’s still possible that other surveillance activities were used against President Trump and his associates.”