Devin Nunes, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, had to rush to the White House to inform Donald Trump that he had come across information connecting Trump associates to intelligence investigations. Nunes refuses to reveal where he got this information, but after multiple sources pinned down his location the night before his revelations, we at least have a bit of geography …
The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee met at the White House complex with the source of documents detailing the intelligence community's incidental collection of communications involving associates of President Trump, the chairman's top aide confirmed Monday.
So Nunes was on the White House grounds, but apparently not in the White House. Then … where was he? Strolling in the rose garden? Skulking on the east lawn? Did his source want to sit by the fountain? Really, there are not a lot of places actually on the White House grounds that aren’t the White House.
A Nunes spokesperson has provided a comment from the congressman.
Chairman Nunes met with his source at the White House grounds in order to have proximity to a secure location where he could view the information provided by the source.
Not to be too glib but, what the hell does that mean? How could you have “proximity” to a secure location? Doesn’t that mean you’re looking at information in an insecure location? Was Devin Nunes crouched outside a window while Trump held up documents for him to peek at? Did Bannon toss him notes in the form of paper planes? This makes exactly zero sense.
The chairman is extremely concerned by the possible improper unmasking of names of U.S. citizens, and he began looking into this issue even before President Trump tweeted his assertion that the White House had been wiretapped.
Nunes is so concerned about the leaking of confidential information, that he was forced to get an anonymous leak from someone at the White House, then hold a press conference to leak it. Then, after stopping off to talk to Paul Ryan, he rushed back to the White House to inform them on what he had discovered. At the White House. There are fewer levels of insanity in a Hieronymus Bosch painting.
Following the initial statement, Nunes’ spokesperson was forced to issue a second announcement in correction.
You can only assume that Nunes means that it was Trump Tower that was getting “wiretapped” rather than the White House. But who knows? Maybe Nunes was actually sneaking around the lobby at Trump Tower during his missing hours, waiting for Paul Manafort to ride an elevator down from his apartment for a chat.
It makes as much sense as anything else Nunes has done in the last week. Because, to repeat, Devin Nunes is so concerned about leaks that he has no choice but to leak.
"To protect his source, the chairman has repeatedly said he will not reveal any information at all about the source,'' Langer said.
And he is so worried by things he discovered at the White House, he had no choice but to tell … the White House.