Last night, Sean Hannity rewrote the words of Devin Nunes, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, in order to validate Donald Trump’s lie about having been wiretapped. Yet Nunes, who was on the air with Hannity at the time, never corrected him.

Hannity said in a teaser for his upcoming interview with Nunes (transcript excerpts via FoxNews.com, with my emphases added):

HANNITY: And up next, House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes—he will join us exclusively to talk about the briefing that he gave the president yesterday. Now, the chairman says he has seen reports that prove that President Trump himself, then president-elect, and his transition team were, in fact, surveilled.

Then with Nunes, Hannity’s opening question was:

HANNITY: Let’s go over what it is that you said the other day … and that is in fact, surveillance took place in November, December and January of the president-elect, his transition team. What else do you know?

But that is not what Nunes said. He repeatedly said in his Wednesday press conference that the intelligence he knows about was “incidentally collected”:

NUNES: I recently confirmed that on numerous occasions, the intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition.

[…]

From what I know right now, it looks like incidental collection. We don’t know exactly how that was picked up, umm, but we’re trying to get to the bottom of it.

Yet, in concert with Hannity, the lower-third banner read, "TRUMP SURVEILLANCE CONFIRMED."

Also, despite Hannity’s use of the Trump-excusing term “surveilled,” Trump specifically claimed he was wiretapped in October by Obama. In his presser, Nunes continued denying that wiretapping had happened:

Reporter: But the physical act of wiretapping, do you see anything in the information that—

Nunes: No, no. And I said that on day two.

But Nunes did not correct Hannity on any of his dissembling.

Let’s also note that in his zeal to acquit Trump, Hannity moved the goalpost by saying the “surveillance” occurred after the election. But Trump had accused Obama of wiretapping him during the campaign.

Here’s how Nunes responded to Hannity’s question about “what else” Nunes knew besides the so-called surveillance:

NUNES: Well, what bothers me is what I was able to review. It looks like it was in November, December and January. Those reports are concerning to me, and I briefed the speaker and then went to—I spoke to the news media publicly, and then went to brief the president on what I saw because I think it’s important that he sees it.

In other words, Nunes directly contradicted Trump’s claim of having been wiretapped in October but he didn’t have the stones to say so.

Hannity again argued Trump had been vindicated (without actually saying so). And Nunes again ducked the issue while deliberately suggesting Trump might have been telling the truth:

HANNITY: The president then said that he felt vindicated over his claims that he felt he was—well, he said wiretapping, but surveillance, wiretapping—in my view, we’re just really parsing words. But he was picked up at least in an incidental way. Can you give us more detail about it?

NUNES: Well, it’s tough for me to get into it, right, because I’ve only read the report, so I don’t know all the intelligence that went into it. But to me, I mean, it’s clear that I would be concerned if I was the president. And that’s why I wanted him to know, and I felt like I had a duty and obligation to tell him because, as you know, he’s been taking a lot of heat in the news media. And I think to some degree, there are some things that he should look at to see whether, in fact, he thinks the collection was proper or not.

The one thing that was completely missing from this discussion? The Russian elephant in the room.

Hannity had no interest in how Russia may have interfered in our election (despite Fox’s never-ending obsession with voter fraud) nor the mounting evidence of Trump-world collusion. Instead, Hannity tried to suggest that President Obama is the real traitor who should be investigated.

HANNITY: And that raises another question, because you talked about it being widely dispensed within the intelligence community, meaning many people saw the surveillance of the president-elect and his transition team and they were identified. Then it goes to the issue to how many people have access to it. Two weeks before President Obama left office he modified executive order 12333 which allowed in the sharing of this type of intelligence, which has never happened before, with 16 other agencies. Is there a possibility that was done so that leaks could be covered up, sir?

Finally, that was a bridge too far for Nunes. As Hannity pressed this issue, Nunes finally said, “I don’t want to get in the weeds here, Sean. I don’t believe that change impacted what I saw.”

Today, Nunes canceled an open hearing that had been scheduled with former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan and former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates.

The Democratic ranking member Adam Schiff slammed that move as “an attempt to choke off public info.”

.@RepAdamSchiff on Trump/Russia connection: "There is more than circumstantial evidence now...and is very much worthy of investigation." pic.twitter.com/qvw7drsqQX

— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) March 22, 2017

Choking off public information is exactly what Hannity did last night. And Nunes was either his stooge or his accomplice.

Watch it below, from the March 23, 2017 Hannity.

(H/T reader Eyes on Fox for pointing out the lower third lie)