10 things you need to know today: March 4, 2017

Trump accuses Obama of spying on Trump Tower, White House denies inappropriate Russia ties as six aides admit to meetings, and more

President Trump
(Image credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

1. Trump accuses Obama of spying on Trump Tower

President Trump on Saturday made a four-tweet accusation that former President Obama spied on him in the run-up to the 2016 election. "Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!" Trump began, suggesting that Obama — a "Bad (or sick) guy!" — could be prosecuted for illegal surveillance if there was a "good lawyer" to make a "great case." Trump's tweetstorm appears to be inspired by the Thursday evening show of right-wing talk radio host Mark Levin, who argued Obama orchestrated a "silent coup" on Trump using "police state" tactics. A Breitbart article on Friday published a timeline to support Levin's allegation, emphasizing a Heat Street report of an October FISA court request from the Obama administration "focused on a computer server in Trump Tower suspected of links to Russian banks. No evidence [was] found — but the wiretaps continue[d], ostensibly for national security reasons." The Breitbart piece concludes the Obama team monitored Trump and then relaxed information sharing rules to foster embarrassing leaks.

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.