Sean Spicer tries (and fails) to justify Trump's bullshit story about wiretapping

Donald Trump pretty much admitted to Tucker Carlson he made up his accusation against Barack Obama that he wiretapped Trump Tower, but Trump tried to weasel himself out of it by claiming The New York Times published an article claiming the Obama Administration was investigating the Russian hacking of the 2016 election:

Trump says he learned about wiretapping from NYT & Bret Baier—says he didn't wait for proof "because The New York Times wrote about it." pic.twitter.com/0dFHVVZZ7q

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) March 16, 2017

The NYT article, of course, does NOT accuse Obama of wiretapping Trump. It merely points to the fact that there was an investigation focusing on people from the Trump campaign having contacts with Russian officials. Something that did happen, as in the case of Michael Flynn.

And yet, Sean Spicer tried to use that same bullshit excuse to justify Trump's bullshit story about wiretapping. And he did it by reading The New York Times and a Fox News piece (also with no evidence) for over 9 minutes without providing a shred of evidence to support Trump's claim. It all started with one question from the press. Here's the video:

So, after House, Senate, and Speaker Ryan say they haven't seen evidence of wiretap, does Trump stand by claim?

Spicer: "He stands by it." pic.twitter.com/XM5goa66IS

— Steve Kopack (@SteveKopack) March 16, 2017

Then Spicer went on over 9 minutes of bullshit:

Here's Spicer reading reporters "what we do know" (internet clippings) about wiretap claims for 9 minutes. But none is evidence of wiretaps pic.twitter.com/tIy1SRucEI

— Steve Kopack (@SteveKopack) March 16, 2017

The whole thing Sean Spicer read provided NO EVIDENCE to back Trump's claim. What Spicer is saying is that the NSA intercepts communications. What he didn't say is that the NSA can't do that to American citizens without a court order. The government can only monitor communications of foreign agents, which means the only calls the government would've been able to monitor are the calls between Trump's campaign people and Russian officials. And those calls did exist. But that is NOT a wiretap of Trump Tower. That's the normal monitoring of foreign officials.

But that interesting thing is NOT that. In the end we all know Trump and Spicer are lying. What's interesting about the Spicer rant is the fact that he quoted ANONYMOUS sources. He does it at minute 3:53. Why is that interesting? Because both, Spicer and Trump, have attacked the media for quoting anonymous sources. This was pointed out by The Washington Post on February 21, 2017 after leaks from the disaster at the White House were pouring over the media:

Over the holiday weekend, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus turned the Sunday shows into his personal Poynter Seminar on Ethical Sourcing in Journalism. Riled by articles in the New York Times — about alleged contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian intelligence — and the Wall Street Journal — about the intel community allegedly abridging Trump briefings — that relied on unnamed sources, Priebus ripped away in a discussion with “Face the Nation” host John Dickerson: “I think that the media should stop with this unnamed source stuff,” Priebus told Dickerson. “Put names on a piece of paper and print it. If people aren’t willing to put their name next to a quote, then the quote shouldn’t be listed.”

Oh, so not anonymous sources are okay?

So there you have it: Trump and Spicer do like anonymous sources. Just the ones that are convenient to them.

And by the way, in the end Spicer's rant was a waste of time, as the Senate also confirmed Trump pulled the wiretap accusation out of his ass. Accordin to Politico:

President Donald Trump suffered the second bipartisan rebuke from Congress over his wiretapping claims in two days — and left it to his embattled spokesman, Sean Spicer, to explain that the president didn’t actually mean what he wrote.

The Republican chairman and top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday shot down Trump’s claim that former President Barack Obama wiretapped Trump Tower in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election.

...

Spicer's news conference came after Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr of North Carolina and ranking member Mark Warner of Virginia issued a joint statement saying they had seen no evidence to support Trump’s wiretap allegation.

“Based on the information available to us, we see no indications that Trump Tower was the subject of surveillance by any element of the United States government either before or after Election Day 2016,” Burr and Warner said.

And the more Trump insists on this, the more he will get closer to impeachment. Because if Congress questions him officially on the issue, and Trump lies, he can get impeached.