In a stunning admission, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) revealed to Fox News host Brett Baier Tuesday that former UN Ambassador Samantha Power testified to House lawmakers that she did not make all the unmasking requests that were attributed to her name.
Trey Gowdy tells @BretBaier that Samantha Power testified that she didn’t make all those unmasking request documents attribute to her.
— Brit Hume (@brithume) October 17, 2017
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULwCDLnbuIs&t=4m36s
BAIER: “You are also looking, and have talked to the former Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power. We reported that she requested or her officer requested 260 plus efforts to unmask, in other words, get who was talking about picked up in surveillance. How did she answer that question? Why so many?”
GOWDY: “Well, I’ll tell you broadly, Brett, I think if she was on your show, she would say those attempt to unmask may have been attributed to her. But they greatly exceed, by an exponential factor, the number of requests that she actually made.”
Former UN Ambassador Samantha Power met with House officials on Friday to explain her record unmaskings of Trump campaign officials.
Samantha Power set a record as political hack for the Obama administration. The former ambassador was ‘unmasking’ at such a rapid pace in the final months of the Obama administration that she averaged more than one request for every working day in 2016.
Samantha Power’s involvement in the Obama unmasking scandal raised red flags as an attempt by the Obama administration to undermine President Trump and his team.
Last Friday Power testified under oath in front of the House Intelligence Committee.
Power used her position to spy on her political opponents.
Circa reported:
Samantha Power, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, spoke to members of the House Intelligence Committee on Friday, addressing the members’ concerns over the hundreds of unmaskings of Americans’ names she requested during her tenure with the Obama administration.
Power is believed to have unmasked more than 260 names last year before and after the 2016 presidential election. However, Power increased the number of “unmaskings” extensively after the 2016 election and before she left her post she was unmasking at a rate of one per day, according to several sources familiar with the investigation who were not authorized to speak on the record.
Power was not seen by the media as she made her way into the Capitol Hill room where the questioning took place, but there are numerous entrances that could have obstructed her from view of the cameras waiting for her outside. She is expected to continue speaking to members until 12:30 p.m.
A U.S. intelligence official with knowledge of unmaskings and who has spent more than two decades working in counterterrorism told Circa that requesting an unmasking is highly unusual and “in my entire career I only conducted two and filed extensive reports stating the reason why.”
“On its face, there appears to be extensive abuse of powers and there should be enormous concern that tools supposed to be used against enemies are now being used for political espionage.”
