The Associated Press purports to give us the latest news on FISAgate. There is one item of actual hard news: the House Intelligence Committee will investigate.

House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes says President Donald Trump’s allegations that the Obama administration wiretapped Trump Tower last year will become part of his panel’s investigation.

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The California Republican says in a statement his committee “will make inquiries into whether the government was conducting surveillance activities on any political party’s campaign officials or surrogates.”

Every time the AP mentions FISAgate, it includes this ritual defense of the Obama administration:

Trump has offered no evidence or details to support his claim, and Obama’s spokesman has denied it.

The AP’s statement is false. It is a classic instance of fake news. Barack Obama’s spokesman has not denied that “the Obama administration wiretapped Trump Tower last year.” He only denied that Barack Obama personally ordered such surveillance. But that isn’t the question. Presumably, the order to conduct surveillance came from Loretta Lynch’s Department of Justice. But no one thinks that Lynch would have ordered the opposing presidential candidate’s telephones tapped, or his computers hacked, without her boss’s approval.

These days, you can’t trust anything you read in an Associated Press news story, if that story has anything to do with political controversies.