Trump’s Wiretap Allegation Was a Self-Inflicted Wound

From the words, “just found out,” one would think that the evidence for such an extraordinary accusation was forthcoming. After all, Trump is now the president. At any moment he can call the FBI Director, the NSA director, or anyone else into his office and ask, “What is the meaning of this?” He can declassify anything he likes — logs, records, transcripts — particularly if it exposes criminal behavior by government officials. When he made his shocking charge, he was in the best possible position to back it up.

.. By Friday afternoon, Trump was acting as if the White House could repeat others’ accusations against allied intelligence agencies without consequence:

We said nothing — all we did was quote a certain very talented legal mind who was the one responsible for saying that on television. I didn’t make any opinion on it. That was a statement made by a very talented lawyer on Fox and so you shouldn’t be talking to me, you should be talking to Fox, okay?

.. Maybe during his decades as a star of the New York tabloids, Trump came to believe that he could get out of trouble by making outrageous counter-accusations against his tormentors. Maybe in that realm, his belief was well founded. But the rules are different when you’re president. The commander in chief cannot publicly accuse anyone, much less his predecessor, of criminal wrongdoing and expect that the accusation won’t be investigated. The White House press secretary cannot suggest that an allied intelligence agency spied on American citizens for political reasons and expect that the rest of the world won’t sit up, take notice, and demand proof.

.. With every such unsubstantiated accusation, the administration loses a bit of credibility that it will need when it makes an accurate charge. Unless it wants to spend the next four years perceived as the boy who cried wolf, the White House should show more regard for the truth going forward.

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/445929/donald-trump-obama-wiretap-allegation-self-inflicted-political-wound

FBI Probe Could Hurt Donald Trump’s Clout in Congress

Questions about credibility come as president pushes for health-care overhaul, Supreme Court confirmation

 .. The Comey appearance also threatens to further erode Mr. Trump’s job-approval ratings, possibly giving Republicans in more moderate districts an incentive to keep their distance from the president as the FBI investigation plays out.
.. The poll found that 58% of Americans disapprove of the president’s job performance and just 37% approve.
.. “If you like him, you’re blowing it off as the swamp going back at him,”
.. “If you’re one of our activists, all you care about is, are you getting these things done—Supreme Court, Obamacare repeal?”
.. Some of the centrist Republicans whom Mr. Trump needs for his governing coalition skipped an opportunity on Monday to defend the president, with intelligence panel members such as Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R., Fla.) saying it was important to conduct an investigation of Russian election meddling in a spirit of bipartisanship.
.. But when Mr. Comey confirmed the FBI was investigating Russian meddling in the elections, including potential links between Russians and people in Mr. Trump’s orbit, Republicans seemed to realize that embracing Mr. Trump might expose them to unwanted political risks.
By the end of the hearing, they were openly worrying that the revelations could interfere with the ability of the Trump administration to succeed.
.. Mr. Spicer predicted that the FBI investigation will inevitably conclude there were no illicit contacts between the campaign and Russian operatives.
.. “Republicans have a historic opportunity for conservative change if they keep their eyes on governing and away from the shiny objects,” Mr. Holmes said.
.. some Republicans had been questioning Mr. Trump’s credibility in the sausage-making aspects of passing laws. When Mr. Trump last Friday said he had won the support for the health bill from of an influential bloc of House conservatives, some House Republicans openly challenged him on Twitter.
“Absolutely not true that conservatives have flipped to yes on the health care bill,” wrote Rep. Justin Amash (R., Mich.) in a post that was retweeted by Rep. Thomas Massie (R., Ky.). “It doesn’t repeal Obamacare. It remains a disaster.”
.. Republicans may be reaching a point where they can challenge Mr. Trump with impunity.
.. “GOP lawmakers are criticizing him with impunity—and that makes it easier for them to oppose him on Obamacare, his budget, tax policies, etc.,” he said. “Trump is squandering his political capital, which he needs to win enactment of his agenda.”

Janet Yellen’s Uneasy New Role: Defending the Fed From Historic Political Pressure

Over two days, the Fed chairwoman spoke with five Republicans, some of whom she had never met privately since taking over at the central bank, according to her public calendar. She stuck to a script she had delivered many times, said a person familiar with the calls: The bill could allow politicians to interfere with Fed policy; academic studies show countries with independent central banks have lower inflation; the Fed is already audited.

 Ms. Yellen didn’t persuade them. Though the Senate voted not to move forward with the bill—a relief for the Fed—only one of the chamber’s 54 Republicans voted in the Fed’s favor.
..The person leading the institution isn’t a politician—she’s a macroeconomist who spent most of her career at the Fed and in academia. Yet the task ahead of her, now that Donald Trump is president, might require a different set of skills. The new president thrust Ms. Yellen and the Fed onto the national political stage by criticizing them sharply during the campaign, and his election raised expectations that GOP bills to rein in the central bank could become law.
The president has also said he would probably find a replacement when Ms. Yellen’s term is up in February 2018, which means he would likely nominate a successor by late summer, rendering her a lame duck.
..Ideas include requiring the Fed to establish a mathematical formula to guide interest-rate policy, limiting its emergency-lending powers and forcing the central bank to return billions of dollars banks paid to be members of the Fed system. The phenomenon is apparent outside the U.S., too, with central banks from Japan to the U.K. grappling with skepticism of their efforts to boost their economies.
..The financial crisis, however, battered the Fed’s credibility. Many lawmakers and some economists want more information about how the central bank operates and what it may do in the future.
..Though Mr. Trump hasn’t said whether he would support the measures, his campaign remarks—such as accusing Ms. Yellen of keeping rates low to help Democrats—suggest he has no qualms about criticizing Fed policy or its leadership, a departure from the recent tradition of presidents staying mum on such issues.
.. Former Chairman Alan Greenspan, who scheduled his own breakfasts with members of Congress, had extensive relationships in Washington when he became chairman and often operated as a one-man congressional-relations shop.
His successor, Ben Bernanke came from academia, but developed a rapport with members on both sides of the aisle during the crisis. Those relationships later helped him beat back legislative efforts to strip the Fed of its powers to supervise banks.
.. She has met two dozen times with members of Congress since November 2015, either hosting them for breakfast or lunch in a private dining room at the Fed or shuttling to meetings on Capitol Hill, in addition to logging more than a dozen phone calls.
..More typical is what happened when Congress considered tapping the Fed to help pay for federal highway programs. Ms. Yellen warned it could set a dangerous precedent. Congress took even more money from the Fed than initially proposed, including $19.3 billion from its capital account.