the subject of surveillance by any element of the United States government either before or after Election Day 2016.

In other words, nobody in the Intelligence Community was spying on the Republican candidate or president-elect, period. While it seems highly likely that members of Trump’s inner circle—perhaps even the president himself—wound up on the radar of NSA and other Western spy agencies due to their frequent chats with senior Kremlin officials, in no way were the Americans the intended target of that intelligence collection, which was legal and legitimate under our laws.

By midday Thursday, President Trump was fully exposed before the world, including by upset members of his own party who are clearly frustrated by the White House’s inability to shoot straight on issues of the gravest importance toour national security. It must be particularly frustrating that this distraction is occurring just as his approval rating is finally starting to tick upwards.

Team Trump quickly proceeded to demonstrate its total inability to learn lessons from its errors and decided to publicly double down, yet again. The chosen instrument was Sean Spicer, the White House spokesman, whose Thursday afternoon press conference devolved into a complete circus.

Out of the gate, Spicer stated that the president still stands by his allegation of wiretapping, even after both the House and Senate have pronounced it false, then proceeded to initiate verbal fights with journalists, which media outlets have fairly termed wild and angry. Next, Spicer rehashed the increasingly threadbare accusations of the right-wing media, backing up the White House’s claim against President