NYT: Trump Didn't Know How FISA Worked Before Making Obama Wiretap Claim [View all]

[DonViejo]

Source: Talking Points Memo



By ALLEGRA KIRKLAND Published APRIL 14, 2017, 11:14 AM EDT

President Donald Trump waited until after publicly accusing his predecessor of wiretapping his campaign headquarters to ask aides how Barack Obama would have been able to obtain a warrant to do so, the New York Times reported Thursday.

According to the Times’ article, which chronicled Trump’s steep learning curve in the Oval Office, the President did not understand the system that governs the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Obama would have needed to ask his Justice Department to request a FISA warrant to eavesdrop on a U.S. building like Trump Tower, which the court would have only granted if there was substantial evidence that the individuals that would be under surveillance were working as agents of a foreign power.

In his explosive pre-dawn tweets on March 4, Trump alleged that Obama had his “wires tapped” ahead of the election.

Despite a total lack of evidence, Trump’s aides backed that wild claim, with White House counselor Kellyanne Conway telling “Fox and Friends” that as President, Trump “has information and intelligence that the rest of us do not.”

Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/trump-reportedly-didnt-know-fisa-worked-before-obama-wiretap-allegation

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The Daily 202: Trump doesn’t know much about history. It’s making his on-the-job training harder.

By James Hohmann April 14 at 11:25 AM

THE BIG IDEA: Donald Trump believed he could convince China to pressure North Korea to stop its nuclear activities. Then President Xi Jinping tutored him on the history of the region.

“After listening for 10 minutes, I realized that it’s not so easy,” Trump told the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday, recounting the session at Mar-a-Lago. “You know, I felt pretty strongly that they had a tremendous power over North Korea. But it’s not what you would think."

This comment is funny because, in 2011, Trump claimed that he has read “hundreds of books about China over the decades,” including works by Henry Kissinger, American journalists and Chinese novelists. Looking to do more business with Beijing, he provided a list of 20 books about China to Xinhua, the official Chinese news agency, that he said had helped him understand the country, its politics and its people. “I know the Chinese. I've made a lot of money with the Chinese. I understand the Chinese mind,” Trump said six years ago. His list had some surprising titles on it, including “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.”

Color me skeptical that Trump has read anything by Amy Chua.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2017/04/14/daily-202-trump-doesn-t-know-much-about-history-it-s-making-his-on-the-job-training-harder/58f06ba2e9b69b3a72331e84/?utm_term=.8530a6cd483a&wpisrc=nl_daily202&wpmm=1