WATCH: White House spokeswoman @SarahHuckabee responds to @GStephanopoulos‘ question on evidence of Pres. Trump’s Pres. Obama wiretap claim pic.twitter.com/zbwIwb8SjN
— Good Morning America (@GMA) March 6, 2017
White House Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders appears to be the go-to gal for Donald Trump’s groundless accusations that Obama wiretapped Trump Tower. The president’s still offering no proof for the allegations, and today, Sanders told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos that Trump rejects FBI Director James Comey’s denial of the wiretapping by Obama (via a FISA order or otherwise). The road to this conclusion was fraught with poor Stephanopoulos having to correct his guest multiple times, which was painful to witness.
On Sunday, Sanders unsuccessfully tried to soften Trump’s claims into an “if” format, although the president’s tweets clearly indicated that he believed the wiretapping was a proven fact, and today, she’s edging further into alternative fact territory. She even pays lip service to Kellyanne Conway’s “narrative” buzzword as a way to suggest that all reports of Trump-Russia ties are fiction. Here, Stephanopoulos asked whether Trump accepted Comey’s denial, and Sanders responded like this:
“You know, I don’t think he does, George. I think he firmly believes that this is a storyline that has been reported pretty widely by quite a few outlets. The wiretapping has been discussed in The New York Times, BBC, Fox News and we believe that it should be looked at by the House Intelligence Committee.”
From there, the host told Sanders that she was making false claims — that the mainstream media sources that she cited had not corroborated Trump’s claims. He had to repeat this statement a total of five times to Sanders during this five-minute clip. So, that’s an average of once per minute, which is is generally what one comes to expect from a Trump spokesperson, but dang, this was one awkward interview to watch.
Ultimately, Sanders revealed that Trump doesn’t accept Comey’s denial. “The president wants the truth to come out to the American people,” she said. “And he is asking that it come out through the House Intelligence Committee.” Since we’re Trump land, it’s difficult to predict how this tale will end, but seriously, the GOP-led Congress may end up investigating claims that Trump read on Breitbart, which was parroting a right-wing radio host’s conspiracy theory that Obama was staging a “silent coup.” Sigh.
(Via ABC News)