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The question of whether former President Barack Obama actually spied on President Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign and transition has been tantalizing Washington since President Trump first made the allegation nearly two weeks ago. Since then, three investigations have been launched -- one by the FBI, one by the House of Representatives and one by the Senate. Are the investigators chasing a phantom, or did this actually happen?

Here is the back story.

Obama would not have needed a warrant to authorize surveillance on Trump. Obama was the president and as such enjoyed authority under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to order surveillance on any person in America, without suspicion, probable cause or a warrant.

FISA contemplates that the surveillance it authorizes will be for national security purposes, but this is an amorphous phrase and an ambiguous standard that has been the favorite excuse of most modern presidents for extraconstitutional behavior.

In the early 1970s, President Richard Nixon used national security as a pretext to deploying the FBI and CIA to spy on students and even to break in to the office of the psychiatrist of Daniel Ellsberg, one of his tormentors.

FISA was enacted in the late 1970s to force the federal government to focus its surveillance activities -- its domestic national security-based spying -- on only those people who were more likely than not agents of a foreign government. Because FISA authorizes judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to make rules and establish procedures for surveillance -- essentially lawmaking -- in secret, the public and the media have been largely kept in the dark about the nature and extent of the statute and the legal and moral rationale for the federal government's spying on everyone in the U.S.

The mass spying that these judges have ruled FISA authorizes is directly counter to the wording, meaning and purpose of FISA itself, which was enacted to prevent just what it has in fact now unleashed.

We now know indisputably that this secret FISA court -- whose judges cannot keep records of their own work and have their pockets and briefcases checked by guards as they enter and leave the courthouse -- has permitted all spying on everyone all the time.

The FISA court only hears lawyers for the government, and they have convinced it that it is more efficient to capture the digital versions of everyones phone calls, texts, emails and other digital traffic than it is to force the government -- as the Constitution requires -- to focus on only those who there is reason to believe are more likely than not engaging in unlawful acts.

When FISA was written, telephone surveillance was a matter of wiretapping -- installing a wire onto the targets telephone line, either inside or outside the home or business, and listening to or recording in real time the conversations that were audible on the tapped line.

Today the National Security Agency has 24/7 access to the mainframe computers of all telecom providers and all computer service providers and to all digital traffic carried by fiber optics in the U.S. The NSA has had this access pursuant to FISA court orders issued in 2005 and renewed every 90 days. The FISA court has based its rulings on its own essentially secret convoluted logic, never subjected to public scrutiny. That has resulted in the universal surveillance state in which we in America now live. The NSA has never denied this.

Thus, in 2016, when Trump says the surveillance of him took place, Obama needed only to ask the NSA for a transcript of Trumps telephone conversations to be prepared from the digital versions that the NSA already possessed. Because the NSA has the digital version of every telephone call made to, from and within the U.S. since 2005, if President Obama last year wanted transcripts of Trumps calls made at any time, the NSA would have been duty-bound to provide them, just as it would be required to provide transcripts of Obama's calls today if President Trump wanted them.

But if Obama did order the NSA to prepare transcripts of Trumps conversations last fall under the pretext of national security -- to find out whether Trump was communicating with the Russians would have been a good excuse -- there would exist somewhere a record of such an order. For that reason, if Obama did this, he no doubt used a source on which hed leave no fingerprints.

Enter James Bond.

Sources have told me that the British foreign surveillance service, the Government Communications Headquarters, known as GCHQ, most likely provided Obama with transcripts of Trumps calls. The NSA has given GCHQ full 24/7 access to its computers, so GCHQ -- a foreign intelligence agency that, like the NSA, operates outside our constitutional norms -- has the digital versions of all electronic communications made in America in 2016, including Trumps. So by bypassing all American intelligence services, Obama would have had access to what he wanted with no Obama administration fingerprints.

Thus, when senior American intelligence officials denied that their agencies knew about this, they were probably being truthful. Adding to this ominous scenario is the fact that three days after Trumps inauguration, the head of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, abruptly resigned, stating that he wished to spend more time with his family.

I hope the investigations of Trumps allegation discover and reveal the truth -- whatever it is. But the lesson here is terribly serious.

We face the gravest threat to personal liberty since the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 proscribed criticism of the government.

We have an unelected, unnamed, unaccountable elite group in the intelligence community manipulating the president at will and possessing intimate, detailed knowledge about all of us that it can reveal.

We have statutes that have given the president unconstitutional powers that have apparently been used. And we have judges on secret courts facilitating all this as if the Constitution didnt exist.

For how much longer will we have freedom?

Editor's Note:A spokesperson for Britain's GCHQ agency has responded to this column. Read the full statement here.

Andrew P. Napolitano, a former judge of the Superior Court of New Jersey, is the senior judicial analyst at Fox News Channel.

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Andrew Napolitano: Did Obama spy on Trump? | Fox News

Obama was a special guest on the mystery challenge portion of the child cooking reality television competition. The episode was taped prior to inauguration when her husband, President Barack Obama, was still in office.

As the episode began, a man dressed in a suit, sunglasses and American flag pin brought host and celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay, an official-looking red phone. Ramsay placed a call, asking to speak to "the boss of the house ... no, not him, I need the real boss of the house."

The suit-clad man whispered something into his sleeve, and a screen came down from the ceiling, complete with fog special effects.

Then, she appeared on the screen.

"I'm Michelle Obama, and tonight, I am thrilled to deliver your next mystery box challenge. Please head back to your stations," the then-first lady said.

The final 14 young cooks in the competition, aged 8 to 13, gasped and shrieked with surprise, racing to their kitchen stations.

"I'm like, about to die. R.I.P. me, oh my God. I mean, Michelle Obama is a wonder woman and I look up to her so much. She is my idol," contestant Jasmine, 11, said.

Contestants lifted the lids of their weekly mystery boxes to reveal ingredients inspired by the White House kitchen garden.

"For your mystery box challenge, I'm asking all of you to come up with an original recipe that's healthy and follows the 'my plate' symbol, filing half your plate with fruits and veggies, and the rest with whole grains, lean protein and dairy," Obama instructed.

The challenge wasn't met with enthusiasm by all the young chefs.

"Michelle Obama wants me to cook vegetables. Not happening. I don't like vegetables, they're evil," said Donovan, 9 (Donovan was eliminated later in the episode).

But there was an incentive to a well-cooked vegetable: The winner of the mystery box challenge, Obama said, would win a trip to the White House to attend the annual kids' state dinner.

Then, the heat was on: The contestants had one hour to get cooking, slicing, dicing and creatively using the ingredients in dishes like a lemon branzino, parmesan quinoa and strawberry kale salad.

After a thorough look and tasting by the judges, the verdict was in. Only one contestant was White House-bound; 11-year-old Justise's pan-seared shrimp with sauted bell peppers, carrots, eggplant and quinoa won the mystery box challenge.

Justise attended Obama's final Kids' State Dinner in July 2016, per Fox spokeswoman Annie Geffroy.

Obama frequently used television and social media to promote her "Let's Move" initiative to encourage exercise and healthy eating for children. She appeared on PBS' "Sesame Street," Funny or Die's "Billy on the Street," and showcased her best mom dancing on NBC's "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon."

And she went viral with a 2014 vine, saying, "Turnip? For what?" a play on the DJ Snake and Lil Jon song, "Turn Down for What."

Obama's healthy food legacy continues at the White House: First lady Melania Trump has promised to carry her garden torch.

"As a mother and as the first lady of this country, Mrs. Trump is committed to the preservation and continuation of the White House Gardens, specifically the first lady's Kitchen Garden and the Rose Garden," Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, senior adviser to the first lady, said in a statement to CNN last month.

The association's recommendations would roll back key provisions of the "Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act," legislation spearheaded by Obama, and her "Let's Move!" campaign.

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Michelle Obama kales it on 'MasterChef Junior'

President Obama gives a final press conference of 2016.

Last Updated Mar 14, 2017 8:06 AM EDT

WASHINGTON-- The Obama administration in its final year in office spent a record $36.2 million on legal costs defending its refusal to turn over federal records under the Freedom of Information Act, according to an Associated Press analysis of new U.S. data that also showed poor performance in other categories measuring transparency in government.

For a second consecutive year, the Obama administration set a record for times federal employees told citizens, journalists and others that despite searching they couldnt find a single page of files that were requested.

And it set records for outright denial of access to files, refusing to quickly consider requests described as especially newsworthy, and forcing people to pay for records who had asked the government to waive search and copy fees.

The government acknowledged when challenged that it had been wrong to initially refuse to turn over all or parts of records in more than one-third of such cases, the highest rate in at least six years.

In courtrooms, the number of lawsuits filed by news organizations under the Freedom of Information Act surged during the past four years, led by the New York Times, Center for Public Integrity and The Associated Press, according to a litigation study by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. The AP on Monday settled its 2015 lawsuit against the State Department for files about Hillary Clintons time as secretary of state, at APs request, and received $150,546 from the department to cover part of its legal fees.

The AP has pending lawsuits against the FBI for records about its decision to impersonate an AP journalist during a criminal investigation and about who helped the FBI hack into a mass shooting suspects iPhone and how much the government paid to do it.

Of the $36.2 million in legal costs fighting such lawsuits last year, the Justice Department accounted for $12 million, the Homeland Security Department for $6.3 million and the Pentagon for $4.8 million. The three departments accounted for more than half the governments total records requests last year.

The figures reflect the final struggles of the Obama administration during the 2016 election to meet President Barack Obamas pledge that it was the most transparent administration in history, despite wide recognition of serious problems coping with requests under the information law. It received a record 788,769 requests for files last year and spent a record $478 million answering them and employed 4,263 full-time FOIA employees across more than 100 federal departments and agencies. That was higher by 142 such employees the previous year.

A spokesman for former President Obama did not immediately respond to an email request for comment late Monday. The White House under Obama routinely defended its efforts under the information law in recent years and said federal employees worked diligently on such requests for records.

It remains unclear how President Donald Trumps administration will perform under the Freedom of Information Act or other measures of government transparency. Trump has not spoken extensively about transparency. In his private business and his presidential campaign, Trump required employees and advisers to sign non-disclosure agreements that barred them from discussing their work. His administration has barred some mainstream news organizations from campaign rallies and one White House press briefing. And Trump broke with tradition by refusing to disclose his tax returns.

Trumps secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, is traveling to Asia this week on a small plane without a contingent of journalists or a designated pool reporter who would send reports to the broader diplomatic press corps, departing from 50 years of practice.

Overall, in the final year of Obamas administration, people who asked for records last year under the law received censored files or nothing in 77 percent of requests, about the same as the previous year. In the first full year after Obamas election, that figure was only 65 percent of cases. The government released the new figures in the days ahead of Sunshine Week, which ends Sunday, when news organizations promote open government and freedom of information.

Under the records law, citizens and foreigners can compel the U.S. government to turn over copies of federal records for zero or little cost. Anyone who seeks information through the law is generally supposed to get it unless disclosure would hurt national security, violate personal privacy or expose business secrets or confidential decision-making in certain areas.

2017 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Obama admin spent $36M on lawsuits to keep info secret - CBS News

White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Monday that President Donald Trump doesnt really think that Barack Obama tapped his phone personally, seeming to walk back Trumps explosive and unsubstantiated claim that his predecessor ordered an illegal wiretap of Trump Tower.

He doesn't really think that President Obama went up and tapped his phone personally, Spicer told reporters at the afternoon press briefing.

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Spicer tried to argue that Trump had accused the Obama administration of general surveillance activities, and not a literal wiretap, even though Trump himself had use the term wire tapping in one of several tweets making the claim without evidence on March 4. Spicer claimed that the fact that Trump put quotation marks around the words wire tapping in one tweet was proof that he was not speaking literally.

I think there is no question that the Obama administration, that there were actions about surveillance and other activities that occurred in the 2016 election. That is a widely-reported activity that occurred back then, Spicer said. The president used the word wiretap in quotes to mean broadly surveillance and other activities during that.

He added: It is interesting how many news outlets reported that this activity was taking place during the 2016 election cycle, and now we're wondering where the proof is. It is many of the same outlets in this room that talked about the activities that were going on back then.

It is unclear what reports Spicer was referring to. News outlets have reported that intelligence officials have been investigating whether there were inappropriate ties between the Trump campaign and the Russian government. As part of the probe into the countrys suspected attempts to meddle in the election and regular surveillance on Russias ambassador, they have reportedly intercepted communications between some campaign aides and Russian officials.

But no credible mainstream American outlets have reported that the Obama administration conducted surveillance on Trump Tower or the Trump campaign, whether in the form of a court-ordered wiretap or something else.

Last week, Trumps tweets drew immediate criticism from Democrats and some Republicans who demanded that Trump provide proof to back up his claim, especially after both Obama and his former director of national intelligence, James Clapper, publicly denied that it was true. Trump still has not provided any evidence to support it, though the White House has instead called on the House and Senate intelligence agencies to investigate it.

The tweets had explicitly accused Obama of ordering a wiretap of Trumps phones.

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! Trump said in one.

I'd bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election! said another.

The third: How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!

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Spicer: Trump 'doesn't really think' Obama wiretapped him ...

Traffic flows past Trump Tower in New York in November 2016. The Trump administration wants more time to produce evidence that then-President Barack Obama ordered surveillance on Donald Trump during last year's election. Trump says his predecessor ordered his "wires tapped" in Trump Tower. Mark Lennihan/AP hide caption

Traffic flows past Trump Tower in New York in November 2016. The Trump administration wants more time to produce evidence that then-President Barack Obama ordered surveillance on Donald Trump during last year's election. Trump says his predecessor ordered his "wires tapped" in Trump Tower.

Updated 6:30 p.m. ET

The Justice Department has asked for more time to respond to a congressional committee about any evidence that President Barack Obama ordered surveillance of then-candidate Donald Trump last year, as Trump has claimed.

The House Intelligence Committee had set the deadline of Monday in a letter to Acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Boente last week in which it asked for proof of the claim, which Obama and others have said is baseless.

Committee Chairman Devin Nunes and ranking Democrat Adam Schiff requested any applications for surveillance of Trump or his associates that were made under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or any court orders supporting such surveillance made by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, NPR's David Welna reports.

David adds that a copy of the letter also was sent to FBI Director James Comey, who has asked the Justice Department to publicly deny President Trump's claims.

The Justice Department issued this statement Monday:

"This afternoon, the Department of Justice placed calls to representatives of the Chairman and Ranking Member of the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence to ask for additional time to review the request in compliance with the governing legal authorities and to determine what if any responsive documents may exist."

The wiretapping claims came as the House Intelligence Committee was already in the process of looking into U.S. allegations that Russia sought to influence last year's presidential election allegations that have also included ties between some in Trump's camp and Russian officials. Nunes has said the panel will also look at the president's accusation.

Sen. John McCain is among those who have asked for proof of Trump's claim, telling CNN on Sunday, "I think the president has one of two choices: either retract or ... provide the information that the American people deserve, because, if his predecessor violated the law, President Obama violated the law, we have got a serious issue here, to say the least."

Monday's deadline came more than a week after Trump said Obama "was tapping my phones in October," in a series of tweets that accused his predecessor of "McCarthyism" and called Obama a "Bad (or sick) guy!"

Trump did not provide any evidence to bolster his claim; instead, the White House released a statement calling for Congress to investigate the allegations made by one president against another.

As NPR's David Folkenflik has reported, Trump's claim is seen as having its origins in a March 2 broadcast by conservative talk radio host Mark Levin, who accused Obama "and his surrogates" of using "intelligence activities to surveil members of the Trump campaign" to help Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. After that, David said, the claim was repeated by the Breitbart website.

"That seems to have inspired, very directly, a series of tweets," Folkenflik said.

Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis says the Obama White House observed a policy against interfering with "any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice."

Lewis added, "As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false."

The morning after Trump made his claim, principal deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked about it on ABC's This Week; here's what she said: "Look, I think he is going off of information that he's saying that has led him to believe that this is a very real potential."

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Trump Administration Asks For More Time To Provide Proof That ...