特朗普指控奥巴马窃听其电话

Donald Trump’s extraordinary and unsubstantiated accusation that Barack Obama ordered the tapping of his phones before the November election raises three possible scenarios, each of which have serious implications for his young presidency.

唐纳德?特朗普(Donald Trump)在Twitter发文指责巴拉克?奥巴马(Barack Obama)在去年11月大选前下令窃听他的电话，这一未被证实的不同寻常的指控引发了三种可能情况，每种都会对他刚刚开始的总统任期产生重大影响。

The first is that Mr Obama illegally ordered surveillance on the Trump campaign. The second is that the FBI obtained a warrant for surveillance from a special Intelligence court (Fisa), implying some level of evidence of contact between Trump associates and Russian officials. Either, according to Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican senator, would amount to “the biggest scandal since Watergate”. Mr Graham has vowed to ascertain the truth about what he described as “earth-shattering” charges.

第一种情况是，奥巴马非法命令情报机构监听特朗普竞选团队。第二种情况是美国联邦调查局(FBI)获得了《外国情报监视法》(Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act，简称Fisa)法庭的监听令，这意味着有某种证据显示特朗普的手下与俄罗斯官员之间有联系。南卡罗来纳州共和党参议员林塞?格雷厄姆(Lindsey Graham)表示，这两种情况都会导致“‘水门事件’以来最大的丑闻”。格雷厄姆发誓要查明此事真相，他将此事中的指控描述为“惊天动地”。

Larry Sabato, a University of Virginia politics expert, alluded to the third scenario — that Mr Trump was once again making up facts — saying: “Claiming Obama bugged him is an extremely serious charge. Trump needs to put up or shut up.”

弗尼吉亚大学(University of Virginia)政治问题专家拉里?萨巴托(Larry Sabato)暗示还有第三种情况，即特朗普再次捏造事实，他说：“宣称奥巴马窃听他是极为严重的指控，特朗普要么拿出证据，要么就闭嘴。”

Some Republicans have privately told associates that they are worried about Mr Trump’s state of mind. The White House did not respond to a request for comment. David Frum, former White House speech writer to George W Bush, tweeted that one possibility was “Trump is flipping into an outright personality breakdown in full public view”.

一些共和党人私下对同事们表示，他们担心特朗普的精神状态。白宫没有回应记者置评的请求。曾在小布什(George W Bush)政府时期担任白宫发言稿作者的戴维?弗拉姆(David Frum)在Twitter上发文称，一个可能性是“特朗普在众目睽睽之下的完全的人格崩溃”。

The White House said yesterday it would not comment on the claim until congressional committees investigating Russian interference in the election determined if “executive branch investigative powers were abused in 2016”.

白宫昨日表示，不会就该指控置评，直至调查俄罗斯干预美国大选的国会委员会就“行政分支的调查权是否在2016年被滥用”得出结论。

Mr Trump’s allegations were challenged when James Clapper, who was director of national intelligence in the final years of the Obama administration, revealed that there had been no wiretap that involved the Trump campaign. But he told NBC News that he had seen no evidence during his tenure that the Trump campaign had colluded in some way with the Kremlin.

在奥巴马政府时期后几年担任美国国家情报总监(DNI)的詹姆斯?克拉珀(James Clapper)披露称，不存在涉及特朗普竞选团队的窃听活动，这挑战了特朗普的指控。但克拉珀向NBC新闻(NBC News)表示，他在任期间没有发现特朗普竞选团队与克里姆林宫存在某种勾结的证据。

Some experts believe that Mr Trump was tweeting in response to a story that Breitbart News, a rightwing news website, ran on Friday about a conservative radio host who wanted Mr Trump to investigate Mr Obama’s “police state” tactics. It referred to older stories that claimed the FBI made two requests — one unsuccessful and another successful — to the Fisa court. Mr Trump appeared to refer to the issue when he tweeted: “Is it legal for a sitting President to be ‘wire tapping’ a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!”

一些专家认为，特朗普在Twitter上发文是对右翼新闻网站Breitbart News上周五刊登的一篇关于一个保守派电台主持人的报道的回应，这名主持人希望特朗普调查奥巴马的“警察国家”手段。从该报道引用的较早的几篇报道中可以看到，FBI曾两次向Fisa法庭提出窃听请求，其中一次没有获批，另一次则获得批准。特朗普在Twitter上的这段话似乎就是指的这件事：“在任总统在选举前‘窃听’总统候选人的竞选活动，这合法吗？之前已经遭到过法庭的拒绝。又刷新了下限！”

As Mr Trump continues to attack anyone who raises questions about his team and their potential ties with Russia, one key question is whether Democrats and Republicans will unite in calling for a special prosecutor to investigate the relationship between the president and his campaign officials and the Kremlin.

在特朗普持续攻击质疑其团队以及他们与俄罗斯潜在关系的人士之际，一个关键问题是，民主党和共和党是否会联合呼吁任命一位特别检察官，调查特朗普及其竞选官员与克里姆林宫的关系。

While Democrats are using the issue to hammer Mr Trump, Republicans are worried that the Russia scandal — and the president’s related comments on Twitter — are hampering their efforts to push through their legislative agenda.

在民主党利用这个问题打击特朗普之际，共和党人担心，俄罗斯丑闻（以及特朗普在Twitter上的相关评论）妨碍他们推进立法议程的努力。

Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican senator who has been a Trump critic, described the situation as a “civilisation-warping crisis of public trust”. He said the president needed to explain the background to his allegations. “If there were wiretaps?.?.?.? then it was either with Fisa court authorisation or without such authorisation,” said Mr Sasse. “If without, the president should explain what sort of wiretap it was and how he knows this. If it was with a legal Fisa court order, then an application for surveillance exists that the court found credible.”

内布拉斯加州共和党参议员本?萨斯(Ben Sasse)是特朗普的批评者，他将这种局面描述为“扭曲文明的公共信任危机”。他说，特朗普需要解释他的指控的背景。萨斯表示：“如果有窃听行为……那么这种行为要么有Fisa法庭的授权，要么没有。如果没有，特朗普应该解释它是何种窃听行为，以及他如何知道的。如果是Fisa法庭授权的合法行为，那么应该有该法庭认为有说服力的监听申请。”

Many national security experts said it was unlikely that Mr Obama would have requested a Fisa warrant, and that any such move would have provoked a backlash against political interference by law enforcement officials.

许多国家安全专家表示，奥巴马不太可能向Fisa申请监听令，此类行为将会引发执法部门官员对政治干预的反弹。

“Theoretically it’s possible for a president to pressure the FBI and Justice Department to request a warrant, but Fisa was designed in the first place to check this sort of abuse,” said Matthew Waxman, a national security law expert at Columbia University. “Trump’s allegations probably say more about his own beliefs about a president’s powers than anything that really happened.”

哥伦比亚大学(Columbia University)国家安全法律专家马修?韦克斯曼(Matthew Waxman)表示：“从理论上来说，总统可能会迫使FBI和司法部申请监听令，但最初成立Fisa的目的就是防止这种不当行为。特朗普的指控可能更多地说明了他自己对总统权力的看法，而不是真正发生的事情。”

Mieke Ouyang, a national security expert at the Third Way think-tank, said the tweets showed Mr Trump did not understand the Fisa process, including that requests were made by law enforcement officials and not the White House.

智库Third Way的国家安全专家麦基?欧阳(Mieke Ouyang)表示，推文显示出特朗普不明白Fisa的做事流程，包括申请是由执法部门官员、而非白宫提出的。

“If there’s a wiretap, the FBI and a judge thought there was something to it,” she said. “If President Obama tried to order a wiretap without going through that process, there’s no way either law enforcement or the phone companies would comply.”

她说：“如果存在窃听行为，那一定是FBI和法官认为有这种必要。如果奥巴马总统试图不经过这种流程下令窃听，执法部门或电话公司不会听从。”

Cindy Cohn, an expert on surveillance who runs the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group for civil liberties, said the intelligence community had such powers that Mr Trump should not be immediately dismissed as completely off base. “It is a big problem for the country if Trump tweets this out and nobody knows [what’s true],” she said.

运营着公民自由保护团体“电子前沿基金会”(Electronic Frontier Foundation)的监听专家辛迪?科恩(Cindy Cohn)表示，情报部门拥有如此大的权力，不能立刻说特朗普大错特错。她说：“如果特朗普在Twitter上曝光此事，而没有人知道（真相是什么），这对美国来说是很严重的问题。”