Senate intelligence panel rejects Trump wiretap claim

There are "no indications" that Trump Tower was under surveillance by the US government before or after the election, a Senate committee has said, the BBC News reported today.

The statement from Republican Senator Richard Burr, Senate Intelligence Committee chairman, dismissed US President Donald Trump’s claim that his phones were tapped.

President Trump had accused his predecessor Barack Obama of wiretapping Trump Tower during the presidential race. However, White House Spokesman Sean Spicer said President Trump maintains his claims. "He stands by it," Mr. Spicer said at a daily news briefing on Thursday.

The press secretary refused to accept the Senate Intelligence Committee report, saying "they're not findings".

Mr. Spicer quoted at length from an unproven Fox News report suggesting former president Obama had dodged US restrictions by asking Britain's GCHQ electronic surveillance agency to monitor President Trump, an allegation already dismissed as "utterly ridiculous" by the Cheltenham-based complex.

Mr. Burr joins a cadre of Republican lawmakers who have rejected the 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" Mr. Burr said in a joint statement with Senator Mark Warner, the committee's vice-chairman.

Earlier on Thursday, House Speaker Paul Ryan also said "no such wiretap existed".
Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee Devin Nunes said on Wednesday he doesn't believe "there was an actual tap of Trump Tower".

But that has not deterred President Trump, who on Wednesday told Fox News a "wiretap covers a lot of different things". He also hinted that more details about the alleged surveillance could be revealed in the coming weeks.

"Wiretap covers a lot of different things. I think you're going to find some very interesting items coming to the forefront over the next two weeks," he said in an interview broadcast on Wednesday night.