WASHINGTON — President Trump called for criminal charges Tuesday against Barack Obama for allegedly ordering an assessment that Russia meddled to help Trump with the 2016 election — an idea the former president’s office blasted as “outrageous.”
“After what they did to me, whether it’s right or wrong, it’s time to go after people. Obama has been caught directly,” Trump, 79, said in the Oval Office.
“If you look at those papers, they have them stone cold, and it was President Obama… the leader of the gang was President Obama, Barack Hussein Obama. Have you heard of him?”
Trump was referring to a document declassified last week indicating that Obama, now 63, ordered an intelligence report damaging to Trump after his surprise election win.
“It’s criminal at the highest level. It would be President Obama, he started it. And [Joe] Biden was there with him, and [then-FBI Director James] Comey was there, and [then-Director of National Intelligence] James] Clapper — the whole group was there, and [then-CIA Director John] Brennan.”
Trump added: “He’s guilty … This was treason, this was every word you could think of. They tried to steal the election. They tried to obfuscate the election.”
Current DNI Tulsi Gabbard sent a criminal referral to Attorney General Pam Bondi Friday raising the possibility the 44th president broke the law by undermining Trump’s victory in 2016.
An email released by Gabbard showed that Obama ordered an intelligence assessment that eventually found Russia intervened to help Trump defeat Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton — with that assessment fueling theories of unlawful collusion between the 45th president and the Kremlin.
After a White House meeting on Dec. 9, 2016, Clapper’s assistant emailed spy agency leaders asking for an assessment “per the President’s request” to describe “tools Moscow used and actions it took to influence the 2016 election.”
Trump spent more than half of his first term fending off FBI and congressional investigations of whether he was in cahoots with Moscow — a theory ultimately dashed by special counsel Robert Mueller’s report in April 2019.
“Look, he’s guilty. It’s not a question,” Trump said of Obama.
“This is like proof, irrefutable proof that Obama was seditious, that Obama led, was trying to lead a coup — and it was with Hillary Clinton, with all these other people, but Obama headed it up.”
The president then repeated: “This was treason. This was every word you can think of.”
Trump was hosting Philippine President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. and turning to his guest added: “This man has seen some pretty rough countries, but you’ve never seen anything like it.”
Marcos’ father, also named Ferdinand, ruled the Philippines as a dictator from 1965 to 1986.
Trump railed against Obama and senior figures from his predecessor’s administration as he addressed more questions about the late sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein, whose co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell is being sought by the Justice Department for an interview after Bondi attempted to slam the door on further transparency this month.
Trump, who has fumed about focus on his past ties with Epstein and continued bipartisan interest in the case, told the press: “You ought to take a look at that [Obama allegation] and stop talking about nonsense.”
Patrick Rodenbush, a spokesman for Obama, 63, returned fire in a statement Tuesday afternoon.
“Out of respect for the office of the presidency, our office does not normally dignify the constant nonsense and misinformation flowing out of this White House with a response. But these claims are outrageous enough to merit one. These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction,” Rodenbush said.
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“Nothing in the document issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes. These findings were affirmed in a 2020 report by the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee, led by then-Chairman Marco Rubio.”
Trump historically has referred to his leading political adversaries as alleged criminals, but during his first term no leading adversaries were indicted and the taunts were widely viewed as base-revving political commentary. It’s unclear if the four criminal charges that Trump faced before winning a second term in last November’s election make pursuit of prominent Democrats any more likely.
Trump said in his extended attack on Obama that more documents may be unveiled further detailing actions that undermined his first administration.
“From what Tulsi told me, she’s got thousands of additional documents coming. So President Obama, it was his concept, his idea, but he also got it from crooked Hillary Clinton — crooked as a $3 bill,” Trump said.
“Hillary Clinton and her group, the Democrats, spent $12 million to [ex-MI-6 spy] Christopher Steele to write up a report that was a total fake report. Took two years to figure that out, but it came out that it was a total fake report. It was made-up fiction.
“Probably the only thing I respect about the press,” Trump went on, “is the press refused to write it before the election.”
The president added that he was “very happy” that he let Clinton “off the hook” during his first term for alleged crimes involving storing classified documents on a private email server, but that he’s not inclined to give another pass.
“We caught Hillary Clinton. We caught Barack Hussein Obama. They’re the ones, and then you have many, many people under them, [former national security adviser] Susan Rice, they’re all there. The names are all there. And I guess they figured they’re going to put this in ‘classified information’ and nobody will ever see it again. But it doesn’t work that way,” he said.
“Obama is the ringleader. Hillary Clinton was right there with him, and so was sleepy Joe Biden, and so with the rest of them. Comey, Clapper, the whole group, and they tried to rig an election, and they got caught.”
