This Is a Real Thing That Happened at Today's White House Press Briefing

As you may recall, over the weekend, Donald Trump took to Twitter to accuse President Obama of having broken the law by ordering Trump Tower wiretapped during the election.

His exact words were: "Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!"

Since then, Trump has provided no evidence to back up his accusation, and his various spokespeople and surrogates have claimed, incredibly, that Trump was just seeking an investigation into the possibility, despite the fact we can all read his words and see he was levying a serious charge.

At today's White House Press Briefing, Press Secretary Sean Spicer was asked about this untenable bullshit, and his response was expectedly ludicrous.

Surreal exchange here re: Trump's claim Obama wiretapped him: pic.twitter.com/w3aiIa7nOk

— Tom Namako (@TomNamako) March 7, 2017

REPORTER (a young Black woman, whose name I don't know offhand): Two quick questions. So, just to follow up on the follow-up: So does the White House feel that it's appropriate— You say that you want it to be adjudicated by the Congressional committees, but the president made declarative statements on Twitter, so I guess— Is the White House position that the president can make declarative statements about a former president basically committing a crime, and then the Congressional committees should look into that and basically prove it? I mean—

[crosstalk]

SPICER: I take issue with— It's not a question of "prove it." I— As I said now five times to the follow-up to the follow-up, that it's not a question of "prove it." It's that they have the resources and the clearances and the staff to fully and thoroughly and comprehensively investigate this, and then issue a report as to, as to what their findings are.

REPORTER: So, but, but President Trump's Twitter statement shouldn't be taken at face value about what—

SPICER: Sure it should. Of course it— I mean, why—? No. I, I— There's nothing, as I mentioned to Jim, it's not that he's walking anything back or regretting— He's just saying that they have the appropriate venue and capabilities to review this.

So, just to be abundantly clear: The White House position is that Donald Trump has the right to say whatever the fuck he wants to say on his Twitter account, including levying utterly unsubstantiable charges against a former president, and then it's up to Congress to investigate it on the taxpayer dime and write a report determining the veracity (or lack thereof) of whatever random dogshit Trump said.

Sure. Apart from everything else that's wrong with that, that is a position that allows for an incredible abuse of power. JFC.