When Donald Trump calls his friends, China and Russia are listening in.

Why am I not surprised?

Courtesy of NYT:

When President Trump calls old friends on one of his iPhones to gossip, gripe or solicit their latest take on how he is doing, American intelligence reports indicate that Chinese spies are often listening — and putting to use invaluable insights into how to best work the president and affect administration policy, current and former American officials said.

Mr. Trump’s aides have repeatedly warned him that his cellphone calls are not secure, and they have told him that Russian spies are routinely eavesdropping on the calls, as well. But aides say the voluble president, who has been pressured into using his secure White House landline more often these days, has still refused to give up his iPhones. White House officials say they can only hope he refrains from discussing classified information when he is on them.

Mr. Trump’s use of his iPhones was detailed by several current and former officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity so they could discuss classified intelligence and sensitive security arrangements. The officials said they were doing so not to undermine Mr. Trump, but out of frustration with what they considered the president’s casual approach to electronic security.

American spy agencies, the officials said, had learned that China and Russia were eavesdropping on the president’s cellphone calls from human sources inside foreign governments and intercepting communications between foreign officials.

The New York Times has a new Fake Story that now the Russians and Chinese (glad they finally added China) are listening to all of my calls on cellphones. Except that I rarely use a cellphone, & when I do it’s government authorized. I like Hard Lines. Just more made up Fake News!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 25, 2018

Of course, Trump called this story “fake news” but as we know that typically means it is dead on. (Update: I would also like to point out that this is a tweet that was clearly sent on a cell phone.)

My question is why would Russia even bother since I am pretty sure that every single time that Trump does anything he immediately calls Putin to get his attaboys. 

However, it does not surprise me in the least that Trump simply cannot understand the concept of keeping government secrets to himself.