President Donald Trump's public claim of wiretapping "makes no sense," merely feeding the "conspiracy parking meter," and the only winner in this is Russian President Vladimir Putin, former Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., said Sunday.
"I don't understand why [Trump] did it — he just put another quarter in the conspiracy parking meter," Rogers, a former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told CNN's "State of the Union" host Jake Tapper. "They've extended this story for a week, two weeks. It makes no sense to me whatsoever."
Rogers said the White House should not have litigated this publicly and only Putin wins here.
"If he had that belief, and if he believed there was inappropriate behavior on behalf of the justice department doing this, then there are internal investigative mechanisms he should have used and called for," Rogers told Tapper's panel. "Making this a big public fight like this, I just think is wrong.
"Matter of fact, the only winner in this whole thing has been Vladimir Putin."
Rogers is a former FBI agent and had advised Trump on national security during the presidential transition, per The Hill.
Rogers added Trump "has a higher responsibility" and has "to make transition from candidate to president of the United States," which is distracting any good movement his agenda is doing for the American people.
"The problem here is that he climbs right back down into this bucket of causing problems for every other big issue that's out there," Rogers told the panel. "Think of what happened to him this week.: He was out pitching the growth in the United States Navy — has to happen, great message — promoting jobs in the domestic defense industry — great message . . . all that is lost for some kind of a weak tweet."
Rogers concluded there needs to be more "discipline" in messaging from the White House, if not a staff shake-up.
"This should be the sign that they need to impose discipline in the White House with a new communications director and get this thing back under control," Rogers said. "If they don't, they're going to lose huge opportunity on big issues."
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