Friday, July 28, 2017

Obama's Hundreds of Unmasking Requests

By Douglas V. Gibbs
AuthorSpeakerInstructorRadio Host

An Obama official made “hundreds of unmasking requests” during the final year of the previous administration.  

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., has questioned whether Obama officials improperly sought the names of Trump transition members.

“[T]his Committee has learned that one official, whose position has no apparent intelligence-related function, made hundreds of unmasking requests during the final year of the Obama Administration,” he wrote to Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats.

Only one request, Nunes wrote, “offered a justification that was not boilerplate and articulated why” the identity was needed for official duties.

Three of the nation’s intelligence agencies received subpoenas in May explicitly naming three top Obama administration officials: Former CIA director John Brennan, former national security adviser Susan Rice, and former U.N. ambassador Samantha Power.

Nunes’ letter appears to make reference to Power as the official who made “hundreds” of requests.

Intelligence agencies typically are required to conceal the identities of Americans picked up or mentioned in surveillance of foreigners in the U.S. Formal requests need to be made to release those names.

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