Nunes ‘Unmasking’ Report Vindicates Trump Claims on Surveillance, by Joel Pollack.

House Intelligence Committee chair Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) announced on Wednesday that he had learned that members of President Donald Trump’s transition team had been under surveillance by the Obama administration, that individual names had been “unmasked” by the intelligence community, and that those names had been leaked to the media.

Nunes’s information — which he said he would deliver to the White House later — vindicates the bulk of Trump’s claims earlier this month.

Nunes said that while there was no direct “wiretap” by President Barack Obama of Trump Tower, there was indeed surveillance — perhaps collected incidentally — of people close to Trump, possibly including Trump himself.

Much of that had been suspected, on the basis of mainstream media reports, but Rep. Nunes reported something new: that the surveillance did not involve the ongoing Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) inquiry into Russia’s alleged involvement in the 2016 presidential election. Indeed, none of the surveillance had intelligence value, he said. …

Though the media, and the political opposition, had attacked Trump for his claims about wiretapping, he later clarified that he had used the term to refer to surveillance in a general sense. He also suggested that more evidence would soon emerge.

The result is a vindication of Trump’s controversial claims. Questions remain about whether President Obama himself knew of the surveillance, which other Obama administration officials were involved, and whether Trump was monitored directly.

Exactly.

hat-tip Stephen Neil