House Intel Chair Drops Bombshell: Trump Team Was Under Surveillance

WASHINGTON – The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee has dropped a big bombshell that appears to undermine some of the ongoing liberal attacks on President Donald Trump. 

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., has revealed that Trump's team and possibly the president himself were indeed under surveillance during November's election.

Nunes says the intercepted communications don't appear to be related to the ongoing FBI investigation into Russia's efforts to interfere in the 2016 election.

He announced Wednesday that a source had shown him information that Trump transition team members had come under apparently legal surveillance after the election during the final months of the Obama administration.

The news comes just two days after FBI Director James Comey confirmed his agency is investigating ties between Trump officials and Russia.

"I recently confirmed that on numerous occasions the intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition," Nunes told reporters Wednesday.

"Details about U.S. persons associated with the incoming administration, details with little or no apparent foreign intelligence value were widely disseminated in intelligence community reporting," he said.

The California lawmaker says names of Trump transition officials were unmasked, or revealed improperly, and that they are going to conduct an investigation into who was aware of it and whether any laws were violated.
 
Nunes briefed President Trump, who has said Trump Tower was wiretapped by the Obama administration. The president says he feels somewhat vindicated by the findings.

"I somewhat do," he said. "I must tell you I somewhat do. I very much appreciated the fact that they found what they found. I somewhat do."

Meanwhile, the ranking Democrat on the committee, Rep. Adam Schiff, criticized Nunes for failing to share the information with himself and other members of the committee before announcing it.

"I have expressed my grave concerns with the chairman that a credible investigation cannot be conducted this way," Schiff said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Nunes says he believes the intelligence collections were done legally and collected in November, December and January.

It's still unclear if Trump's own communications were monitored. Nunes says it's possible the president's communications were picked up during intelligence monitoring.

When asked whether he believed the transition team had been spied on, Nunes said, "It all depends on one's definition of spying."