Trump’s spy chief declassifies list of Obama administration officials ‘involved in unmasking Michael Flynn’

Richard Grenell turned over list just as Trump launched ‘Obamagate’ attacks

The acting director of US national intelligence, Richard Grenell, has reportedly handed the Department of Justice a declassified list of former Obama administration officials involved in the “unmasking” of General Michael Flynn in 2017.

The news comes just as Donald Trump has ramped up accusations of criminality against his predecessor – albeit without spelling out exactly what he means.

According to a report from ABC News, Mr Grenell, who also serves as ambassador to Germany, took the list to the department last week. The people on the list were supposedly party to Mr Flynn’s “unmasking” – that is, the disclosing of his name per the request of select officials seeking to understand the significance of intelligence reports involving a US citizen.

The fate of the former national security adviser has become a flashpoint in the aftermath of Robert Muller’s report on the Russian matter, which is regarded by Mr Trump as a failed “witch-hunt”. The president and his allies, as well as many in the conservative media, have lately pointed to documents released by Mr Flynn’s legal team that they say prove the FBI tried to “trick” him into lying.

Mr Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI, agreeing to co-operate with the then-active inquiry into contact between Trump associates and Russian counterparts. However, he has since tried to withdraw his guilty plea.

He met with some success last week when attorney general Bill Barr moved to drop the charges against him, citing “a considered review of all the facts and circumstances of this case, including newly discovered and disclosed information”.

The decision provoked a furious backlash, including from nearly 2,000 former department employees who signed a letter of protest.

At the same time Mr Grennell moved to declassify the list of names from the Obama administration, Donald Trump and various of his supporters began levelling nebulous allegations against the previous president under the umbrella term “Obamagate”, which Mr Trump claims refers to “the biggest political crime in American history”.

However, when asked by a reporter what crime he was referring to, he offered no details, and simply said: “You know what the crime is. The crime is very obvious to everybody.”