Is Donald Trump telling the truth when he says former President Barack Obama had Trump Tower wiretapped? House Oversight Committee Chair Jason Chaffetz—bearing in mind that Trump is a confirmed liar who bases his claims on whatever he happens to have just read on Breitbart News—what say you?
“I learned a long time ago, I'm going to keep my eyes wide open,” Chaffetz (R-Utah) said on “CBS This Morning.” “You never know when you turn a corner what you may or may not see. But thus far I have not seen anything directly that would support what the president has said.”
He forgot to keep the liar/Breitbart thing in mind, didn’t he? And surprise! It looks like Chaffetz is ready and willing for Republicans to investigate Trump’s wild claims as seriously as they investigate the reams of evidence connecting Trump’s inner circle with Russia.
Chaffetz was seemingly open to the notion of a Congressional inquiry into Trump’s allegation, telling “CBS This Morning” that the House Intelligence Committee, chaired by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), would take the lead in checking it out. The House Oversight Committee, Chaffetz said, “will play a supporting role.”
In fact, Trump may have given Republicans a great gift here: a “reason” to investigate Obama, and an investigation to distract from the one they aren’t doing into Trump. Although Nunes and Chaffetz and their friends should be careful—since Trump’s claim is Russia-adjacent, if they investigate it they might accidentally uncover something about him that they’d carefully been trying not to investigate.