President Donald Trump accused former President Barack Obama of treason this week, a crime punishable by death in the U.S. A spokesperson for Obama has called the allegations “bizarre” and “ridiculous.”
Trump has taken aim at Obama since the latter was in the White House, when he claimed that the Hawaii-born politician might not have been born in the U.S. Obama once joked about it during a White House Correspondents dinner, playing a clip of “The Lion King”.
This time, Trump has claimed that Obama and others in his administration manufactured intelligence linking Trump’s first presidential campaign to possible Russian interference. Tulsi Gabbard, director of the National Security Agency, recently released documents that the Trump administration claims the Obama administration manufactured intelligence.
“New evidence has emerged of the most egregious weaponization and politicization of intelligence in American history. Per President @realDonaldTrump’s directive, I have declassified a House Intelligence oversight majority staff report that exposes how the Obama Administration manufactured the January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment that they knew was false, promoting the LIE that Vladimir Putin and the Russian government helped President Trump win the 2016 election,” said Gabbard. “In doing so, they conspired to subvert the will of the American people, working with their partners in the media to promote the lie, in order to undermine the legitimacy of President Trump, essentially enacting a years-long coup against him.”
Trump was asked about the release Tuesday while meeting with Philippine President Bongbong Marcos Jr.
in the Oval Office.
“It’s time to go after people,” he told reporters. “Obama’s been caught directly… what they did in 2016 and in 2020, it’s very criminal,” he said.
The president also said: “It’s there, 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.”
In a Truth Social post from Monday, Trump claimed that: “Obama himself manufactured the Russia, Russia, Russia HOAX. Crooked Hillary, Sleepy Joe, and numerous others participated in this, THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY!. Irrefutable EVIDENCE. A major threat to our Country!!!”
According to CNN, claims from the Trump administration “confuse the allegation that Russia interfered in the 2016 election with the idea that Russia actively tried to change results by hacking into voting systems.” Jeremy Herb and Katie Bo Lillis of the outlet “went through them and talked to people who worked on a bipartisan Senate review of the 2016 election,” it added.
One of their sources called the new claims “wildly misleading.”
CNN’s report also noted that even Trump – who was charged with a variety of crimes during former President Joe Biden’s term – wasn’t accused of treason by the former administration. Both the Trump and Biden administrations have accused each other of interference regarding the 2020 election, which Biden won by both the popular vote and in the Electoral College. Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton but won via the Electoral College.
Trump said Tuesday that his administration intends to release more documents related to his claims against Obama. While CNN said it expects to see more documents, it noted that “previously promised document dumps have failed to live up to expectations.”
Indeed, the Trump administration has been dealing with the fallout from a memo regarding the release of files related to disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Although Trump has publicly called for documents to be released and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche announced this week that he plans to speak with Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell, the scandal continues – including reports like this one from The Wall Street Journal that dive into the alleged relationship Trump had with Epstein.
NBC News said that Trump avoided questions about Epstein Tuesday and instead talked about Obama.
Per CNN, this is what Obama’s office said in a “rare” statement:
“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,” said spokesman Patrick Rodenbush. “These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction. 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,” who is now leading the State Department under Trump.