A Republican on the House Intelligence Committee said Monday “we haven’t seen any evidence at this point” to back up President Donald Trump’s wiretapping claims.
In the interview on CNN’s “New Day,” Rep. Frank LoBiondo added: “If there is evidence, we need to see it.”
The New Jersey Republican was speaking ahead of his committee’s public hearings with FBI Director James Comey, who is expected to field questions both about Trump’s charge that former President Barack Obama “wiretapped” him during the 2016 campaign and Russia’s alleged meddling in the election.
“It’s very important, because it’s a big distraction and I expect it to be put to rest pretty quickly,” LoBiondo said of Trump’s wiretapping allegation. “Unless Comey drops a bombshell today, I don’t think there is any evidence and I think we’ll move on from this issue quickly.”
LoBiondo also said that he “won’t press on it” if other Republicans try to expand the definition of “wiretapping” to include other forms of surveillance that could justify the President’s claim.
“There’s precious time with Director Comey and Admiral Mike Rogers, so the main focus is going to be with the Russian connection,” he said.
LoBiondo also expressed some frustration with the President’s penchant for stirring controversy with his tweets — exemplified by the current imbroglio over the wiretapping allegation.
“It’s pretty clear that we can’t control the President’s tweets. I have people that want me to respond to every tweet that Mr. Trump makes. We would spend all of our days just doing that. The reality is there is no evidence. We haven’t seen any evidence at this point. If there is evidence, we need to see it. We need to hear conclusively from Director Comey that there is no evidence.”
LoBiondo also suggested that “it’ll be very interesting” to hear Comey’s answers on questions about the wiretapping charges.
“Whether (Comey) answers that directly or somehow punts and circumvents it, that might give us an indication that there’s something more being looked at that we don’t know about, and I’m sure that we’ll get more of this in a classified setting.”
Previewing his questions, LoBiondo added, “I don’t know that the question has been asked of Director Comey: is this investigation over? Can you conclusively say this? That’s what I’m going to be looking to hear.”
