Trump Says Obama Should Testify on ‘Political Crime and Scandal’
Trump Says Obama Should Testify on ‘Political Crime and Scandal’
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump said that if he were a lawmaker, the first person he would call to testify about the “biggest political crime and scandal” in U.S. history would be former President Barack Obama.
“He knew EVERYTHING,” Trump wrote in a tweet on Thursday, referring to Obama.
Trump didn’t elaborate on what alleged crime he was talking about, though he has previously accused Obama and his administration of various types of wrongdoing, including spying on Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016.
He also prodded Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham to summon Obama, saying, “Nice guy. No more talk!”
Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, said in a statement that he will conduct oversight hearings into Crossfire Hurricane, the code name for the FBI counterintelligence investigation into links between Trump’s associates, including one-time National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, and Russian officials. Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to investigators, but the Justice Department this week moved to dismiss the case against him.
Graham, however, indicated he wouldn’t call Obama to testify.
“I am greatly concerned about the precedent that would be set by calling a former president for oversight. No president is above the law. However, the presidency has executive privilege claims against other branches of government,” he said.
“Both presidents are welcome to come before the committee and share their concerns about each other,” Graham said. “If nothing else it would make for great television. However, I have great doubts about whether it would be wise for the country.”
The comments by Trump and Graham came a day after Republican senators shared a list of officials in the Obama administration who may have seen intelligence reports from late 2016 and learned that Flynn was an unidentified person mentioned in them. The list was provided by Ric Grenell, Trump’s acting director of national intelligence.
The officials, including then-Vice President Joe Biden, or their representatives asked intelligence agencies to “unmask” the names of Americans, which are regularly redacted from intelligence reports. While Trump told reporters Wednesday that “the unmasking is a massive thing,” it’s done routinely.
The National Security Agency unmasked an American’s identity about 17,000 times in 2018 and 10,000 times in 2019 under Trump, according to statistics kept by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
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