Rep. Adam Schiff says the idea that the Trump campaign was spied on by the Justice Department is “nonsense.”
“The most I can tell you, Chuck, is that this claim by the president, the suggestion by [Rudy] Giuliani that there is a political spy embedded in the Trump campaign is nonsense,” Mr. Schiff told NBC’s Chuck Todd on “Meet the Press.” “And you hear it in the same terms that Trump often speaks, which is ’people are saying,’ or ’I’m hearing,’ or ’we’re being told.’ That’s another way of saying, ’This is patently untrue, but we would like to spread it anyway.’ And it’s singularly destructive of our institutions, but then that’s the point.”
Multiple reports have identified University of Cambridge Professor Stefan Halper as an informant who worked for the FBI to snoop on the Trump presidential campaign.
The 73-year-old professor, who has ties to American and British intelligence, reportedly met with Trump campaign aides Carter Page and George Papadopoulos in the summer of 2016.
Mr. Page was the subject of a federal surveillance warrant, while Mr. Papodopoulous has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.
In a tweet on Friday, Mr. Trump said it could be the “all time biggest political scandal!”
SEE ALSO: President Trump demands DOJ give informant documents to Congress
Mr. Schiff accused the president and his allies of making “meritless” accusations about the Justice Department’s surveillance of his campaign.
“This is part of a string of meritless allegations from the beginning,” Mr. Schiff said. “’I was wiretapped from Trump Tower,’ ’there’s a vast unmasking conspiracy,’ ’the investigation began with the Christopher Steele dossier,’ all of which was untrue, all of which as you pointed out at the outset is designed to create this alternate reality for Trump supporters to live in.”
• Bradford Richardson can be reached at brichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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