Understanding “Obamagate”, the New Trump Media Frenzy over Obama and Flynn
Since early May, in the middle of a devastating COVID-19 pandemic that caused almost 100,000 deaths and an economy in complete disarray, the President of the United States is yet again bombarding the media with self-described revelations on a massive scandal he colloquially dubbed “Obamagate”, alleging criminal misconduct of his predecessor against him during and after the 2016 Presidential election. In just two weeks, he posted content on his Twitter account with the words “Obamagate” 18 times.
According to Trump, his former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, who resigned because the Washington Post revealed that he had secretly discussed sanctions with then Russia’s ambassador and pled guilty for lying during FBI interviews, was “set up” by Obama officials. Just recently, Flynn’s case was dismissed by Attorney General William Barr under the premise he committed no federal crime despite admitting lying to the FBI. Trump loudly boosted the case of Flynn because prior to him swearing in, the Obama administration officials are already requesting to unmask, or declassify, a senior official in his campaign later proven to be Flynn, because of his involvements with foreign entities. Since last year, Flynn tried to reverse his guilty plea and repeated attacked the special counsel investigation, and Barr launched a counter-investigation on the origins of the Russia investigation under Trump’s allegation of fraud during the beginning.
In a meeting on January 5th, 2017, 15 days before Trump’s inauguration, three senior Obama administration officials, FBI director James Comey, National Security Advisor Susan Rice and deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, raised concerns to Obama over how Russia involved in the 2016 Presidential election and determined that the Russian intelligence launched a campaign in Trump’s favor. Vice President and currently Democratic Party presumptive nominee is also a part of this meeting. The meeting also raised concern about Flynn, which the investigation revealed had conducted secret discussions with Russian ambassadors, and may be susceptible to blackmail. On May 12th, 2020, Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell declassified the list of officials requesting to reveal Flynn’s identity as the high-level Trump official with Russian connections, which includes Rice, Biden, Comey, then-CIA director John Brennan, then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and then-US ambassador to UN Samantha Power. Trump seized this moment and boasted this as a “big story,” amplifying his scandal narrative.
After Flynn’s Russian connections was known by public on February 9th, 2017, he resigned in four days after the news broke, and was questioned by the FBI immediately. It was revealed by the New York Times’ Michael Schmidt later that Trump told then-FBI director Comey that he wanted Comey would dismiss the case against Flynn, but was rejected.
In Trump’s view, he is the “victim of the biggest political crime in American history.” When Washington Post’s Philip Rucker asked Trump what exact crime is he accusing Obama for, Trump played his usual stint and provided a non-answer with the undertone that people are already aware of what crime it is: “You know what the crime is. The crime is very obvious to everybody. All you have to do is read the newspapers, except yours.” That’s not his only occasion which he claimed that Obama was committing a surveillance campaign against him; earlier during his presidency he proclaimed via social media that Obama had “his wires tapped” in Trump tower during the Presidential campaign, which he provided no evidence (In an Inspector General investigation on the FBI over its handling of the Russian investigation, the Obama administration did in fact wiretap Trump’s once campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who had long served as a foreign agent, but the investigation began before Trump hired Manafort).
Just like every other time, Trump once again has a group of staunch, loyal defenders playing fast and loose with reality to support his nonexistent accusation. In a May 15th press conference, Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said the reasons why the accusations are related to the Steele Dossier and FBI’s strategy to get him to lie, but she did not clarify with evidence other than calling the accusations “serious.” Former White House Physician Ronny Jackson, largely remembered for his failed Veterans Affairs appointment and claiming Trump’s genes can lead him to live 200 years, wrote on Twitter in a similar fashion, calling the officials “Deep State Traitors” and “deserved to be brought to justice.”
There are a number of falsehoods in this non-scandal, which media columnists have been referring to as a ploy to distract reporters from Trump’s management of the COVID-19 outbreak. The most serious crime alleged by Trump and his sycophants in this saga, the so-called unmasking, in neither illegal nor uncommon.
Surveillance of foreign targets such as ambassadors to the United States, especially countries like Russia, are legalized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA. According to AP’s Deb Reichmann, American names sometimes will incidentally appear in the surveillance records, and will usually remain unnamed unless there is a clear intelligence value to reveal their identity. Officials can apply, instead of being directly granted, the right to unmask such persons, only the ground of unmasking their name is important to fully understand the foreign intelligence. In order to successfully unmask an individual, the National Security Agency official will review and approve the application.
According to oversight agencies, in the first period when this data is available from September 2015 to August 2016 during the Obama administration, there were 9,217 unmasking incidents. In 2019 during the Trump administration, there were 10,012. In fact, every year during Trump’s presidency, there has seen more unmasking incidents than that of Obama’s open records.
Other than Trump attempt to distract the media from the coronavirus response, Obama’s recent criticism of Trump may have got under his skin. On a call with Democratic supporters, he called Barr’s dismissal of the Flynn case as something that would “jeopardize the rule of law.” However, the call was mostly related to calls for supporter the Democratic nominee, his former VP Joe Biden, along with harsh criticism of Trump’s management of the coronavirus pandemic.
In the context between a devastating pandemic and a volatile, unprecedented Presidential election year, some analysts, like CNN’s Julian Zelizer argued that Obamagate under this context is Trump’s attempt to feed the public with false memory and to rewrite history in order to benefit himself and trash Biden under a fact-free basis. Even as news and time progress, this will undoubtedly be mentioned again as an ambiguous charge against his opponent and the “Deep State.”
