A longtime friend of Donald Trump says he hasn’t seen the President as angry as he was when he talked to him about Trump’s unsubstantiated and widely disputed allegations that former President Barack Obama wiretapped him during the 2016 election.
“I spoke with the President twice yesterday about the wiretap story. I haven’t seen him this pissed off in a long time,” Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy wrote Sunday on the conservative website. “When I mentioned Obama ‘denials’ about the wiretaps, he shot back: ‘This will be investigated, it will all come out. I will be proven right.'”
Obama and former Obama Administration officials have denied that any such surveillance on Trump took place. Trump’s allegations, for which he offered no evidence, came in the form of Saturday morning tweets. Some have suggested the president was reacting to conservative news reports that said the Obama Administration had conducted surveillance on Trump. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer called the reports “troubling” in a statement on Sunday, saying the President wants the Congressional investigation into Russia’s interference in the election to also include a probe into his claims.
“President Trump is requesting that as part of their investigation into Russian activity, the Congressional intelligence committees exercise their oversight authority to determine whether executive branch investigative powers were abused in 2016,” Spicer said.
Democrats have dismissed the President’s allegations as an attempt to deflect from negative attention over growing reports of contact between Trump allies and Russian officials during the campaign.