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President Donald Trump accused President Barack Obama of being "guilty" of "treason" and called on the U.S. Department of Justice to order an assessment that Russia helped him meddle with the 2016 presidential election.
“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 told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday (July 22) via the New York Post. “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 made the claim while hosting Philippine President Ferdinand 'Bongbong' Marcos Jr., at which point the president said the Justice Department should prioritize accountability for Obama.
“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 said.
“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," he added.
Trump's successful 2016 presidential campaign was launched after he served as a leading figure in the "birther" movement questioning whether Obama, a native of Hawaii, was secretly born in Kenya, which resulted in the 44th president releasing a long-form version of his Hawaiian birth certificate in 2011. The president had previously accused Obama of ordering feds to "spy" on his campaign amid accusations of ties to Russia following the 2016 election.
Obama has also taken shots at Trump in the past, which included targeting his "weird obsession with crowd sizes" while holding his hands about four inches apart, mocking the 45th president's manhood. Obama also critiqued Trump's lenghty speeches as being "like Fidel Castro -- just on and on" and referenced his "constant attempts to sell you stuff," which included his golden sneakers and branded Bibles.