WASHINGTON — The head of the House Intelligence Committee partially backed away from his dramatic claim that officials in President Donald Trump’s transition team had been subjects of surveillance by U.S. intelligence agencies, with an aide saying that Chairman Devin Nunes did not know “for sure.”
On Wednesday, Nunes, R-Calif., said that names of transition team members had come up in conversations that were referred to in U.S. intelligence documents summarizing surveillance. But until Nunes sees the actual documents, he does not know whether any of the transition officials were actually part of the surveilled conversations or were just talked about by others, spokesman Jack Langer said Thursday.
“He’ll have to get all the documents he requested from the (intelligence community) about this before he knows for sure,” Langer said.
The partial walkback of Nunes’ claim came as lawmakers stepped up calls for an independent investigation of possible links between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia. Nunes’ decision to brief Trump about the surveillance claims before sharing them with other members of his committee put the House investigation under a cloud, say Democrats and some Republicans.
