To Those Who Don’t Understand Why the Susan Rice Story is a Big Deal
I want take this opportunity to speak directly to those who are dismissing the story that broke this week about Susan Rice.
Back in March, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) told the press that he obtained documents that show that the Trump transition team were “incidentally surveilled,” meaning individuals associated with Trump were picked up by the intelligence community in surveilled communications of foreign nationals, and that their identities were unmasked and shared in intelligence reports. He added that none of the reports he came across had anything to do with Russia. Unfortunately, the way he handled this development was muddled by poor optics and Democrats and the media made him the story instead of the surveillance of the Trump team. And we know now in more recent reports that the surveillance has been going on long before Trump even became the GOP nominee.
Normally, US citizens caught in incidental surveillance of foreign nationals are kept anonymous. However, high-ranking officials in an administration can request the unmasking of US citizens for reasons involving national security, a criminal investigation, or the safety and well-being of such individuals. While we currently don’t know the contents of such surveillance, we do know about one classified transcript that was leaked to the press that unmasked General Mike Flynn in communications he had with the Russian ambassador, which ultimately resulted in his firing from the Trump administration as National Security Advisor. And to this day, between all the investigations that are going on in Washington, the only definitive crime that was proven to be committed was the unmasking of Flynn and the leaking of the classified transcript.
Meanwhile, on an interview on PBS, Susan Rice, the National Security Advisor under President Obama, was asked about Nunes’s claim that the Trump team was incidentally surveilled and unmasked as the story broke. She said she “knew nothing” about it.
Fast forward to this week, when media outlets were reporting that Rice was the person who requested the unmasking of Trump’s team. This has Republicans and the Trump White House alarmed since Rice was known as Obama’s “right-hand woman” who had a history of stirring controversy during the previous administration and that her requests to unmask the Trump team were politically motivated. She insisted during an interview on MSNBC that her requests were not politically motivated, even though just two weeks ago on PBS she said she had no knowledge about the unmasking to begin with! But after lying about how a video sparked the Benghazi terrorist attacks and that alleged deserter Bowe Bergdahl served “with honor and distinction,” her credibility is shot either way.
So what does this all mean? Worst case scenario, the Obama administration used legal loopholes and abused the intel community to spy on their political enemies. This is at the heart of government surveillance and privacy rights of US citizens. At this point, the only way that Susan Rice and her former boss can be completely exonerated is to prove that their collection of incidental surveillance of the Trump team had a legitimate reason (like if members of the Trump team were involved in illegal activity… like colluding with Russia).
Now let’s talk about why Democrats and the media keep dismissing this story.
It has been almost five months since the election, and to this day, Democrats are still livid that Trump is our president. Many to them firmly believe that had it not been for Russia’s meddling in our election, we’d have a President Hillary Clinton today. And they hate Trump so much, that they’re hoping that it is proven that he and his campaign colluded with the Kremlin so that they could impeach him and/or delegitimize his presidency. So they see this Susan Rice story as a sideshow, a distraction from the one scandal they believe matters when the fact is they both matter.
Much of that can be said for the media, who are purposefully diminishing the significance of this story. CNN in particular has been going out of their way to even defend Rice. In the end, the media has shielded the Obama administration from almost any criticism for the past eight years, so it’s not a complete shock. And since we all know that the media colluded with the Clinton campaign (thanks WikiLeaks) and they’ve made it clear that they also hate Trump, they will do whatever they can to keep talking about the ongoing investigation involving potential collusion with Russia, which to this day there is still no evidence of.
I mean, just imagine if the Bush administration “incidentally” surveilled the Obama team during the 2008 election. There’d be scorched earth from Democrats and the media and they’d rightfully treat it as Watergate 2.0. So their dismissal of this potentially growing scandal is inexcusable.
So whether you voted for Trump or you voted for Hillary, whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat, this surveillance scandal is just as important as the Russia investigation. Because digging for the truth no matter what the outcome is better than being ignorant of reality.
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