WASHINGTON—Donald Trump’s personal communications were picked up by U.S. intelligence operations that were monitoring foreign espionage targets, a top Republican said Wednesday in a major twist in the real-life spy drama unfolding in Washington.Devin Nunes, the senior congressional watchdog on U.S. intelligence agencies, made that announcement to the news media, then went straight to the White House to brief the president on what he’d found.Nunes said he had seen dozens of intercepted communications from November, December, and January between the Trump transition team and foreign targets who were under U.S. surveillance by legally obtained security-court orders.Read more:Fox pulls legal analyst Andrew Napolitano from air after Trump wiretap claimsFBI investigation of Russian links to Trump’s team could take a long time, director James Comey saysBut he suggested the material was then improperly spread.He offered a crisp one-word answer when asked whether Trump’s own communications were picked up: “Yes,” he said. Later in a news conference, he elaborated only slightly: “It was clear who was in those reports.”The dramatic events came just after the FBI announced that it had launched a criminal investigation into illegal email hacking and collusion between Russian government entities and the Trump campaign team.For some Trump fans, this latest event was something to celebrate. To them, it proved the president’s claim that he was illegally monitored by the previous president and unfairly targeted by political enemies.Trump himself appeared to agree when asked whether he felt vindicated: “I somewhat do.”The alleged illicit activity, however, was not the intelligence collection itself, Nunes said — but the way it was subsequently spread around with the names of American citizens included in the reports.“I think the president is concerned — and he should be,” ...
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