Remember when President Obama talked to the Russian President as President? Trump thinks he finally has the goods on President Obama!
Just hours after accusing President Obama of wiretapping him, even though as President himself Trump should know that Presidents can’t just order a FISA wiretap, Trump accused Obama of secretly communicating with Vladimir Putin while he was President.
“Who was it that secretly said to Russian President, “Tell Vladimir that after the election I’ll have more flexibility?” @foxandfriends,” the Republican President wrote on Twitter this morning.
Who was it that secretly said to Russian President, "Tell Vladimir that after the election I'll have more flexibility?" @foxandfriends
To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 5, 2017
Bingo, Obama was acting like a President when he was President! ZOMG, busted.
While Trump seems to pick things out from tinfoil land with no basis in fact most of the time, this time we have a winner because President Obama did get caught on camera telling outgoing Russian President Dmitry Medvedev that he would have “more flexibility” regarding talks over a proposed missile defense system after the 2012 election.
But the thing is, while that was awkward, President Obama was President at the time.
So see, Obama wasn’t undermining the U.S. President, that is to say, Obama wasn’t undermining himself.
Nor were the Russians trying to help President Obama get elected, like they did for Trump. That Trump doesn’t see these obvious problems with his theory is problematic.
Obama was simply stating a political truth that is none too savory but still a fact — and that is, politicians have to be careful during election season.
This wasn’t actually a secret communication because, again, it was caught on tape by reporters. But when you’re desperate to deflect and you tried to troll President Obama for 8 years, it’s a tough thing to get over.
Lastly this morning, Trump tweeted yet another conspiracy theory, just “asking questions” you know like he did with the birth certificate for 8 years:
Is it true the DNC would not allow the FBI access to check server or other equipment after learning it was hacked? Can that be possible?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 5, 2017
Yes, the DNC reportedly did cause a delay in the FBI’s investigation into the Russians hacking them for the purpose of helping Donald Trump get elected. Why Trump is bringing that up is anyone’s guess, since it’s only going to spur more talk about how he knew that the Russians were hacking the Democrats certainly after he was briefed on this fact, even though he lied about that in public.
But the investigation was done without the DNC’s server, and it found – and all U.S. intelligence entities agreed- that the Russians hacked the Democrats.
Looking at this now and realizing that at least the New York faction of the FBI had Trump/Putin rogue moles or activists who were assisted by Republican Representative Jason Chaffetz in dumping inaccurate and misrepresented “Clinton email” scandal news days before the 2016, the DNC’s alleged reticence to share their server with the FBI might make a little more sense.
The President will be heading back to D.C. after yet another weekend in Florida.
Trump’s obsession with President Obama is at this point uncomfortable. Trump is still playing like a child, pointing fingers at Obama when he gets caught doing something he shouldn’t be doing. This reflexive blaming of Obama for his own bad policies and decisions is way past the normal blame the other guy, and not for things where this would make sense — like the economy or a war the previous president got us into. New policies and decisions, like the botched Yemen raid, are not the fault of the previous President no matter how desperate Trump is.
And Trump is pretty desperate right now, because apparently he just realized he was wiretapped and he is very, very freaked out about what “they” know.
They know enough, sources tell me. Just a heads up.
Listen to Sarah on the PoliticusUSA Pod on The Daily newsletter podcast here.
Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Connect with Sarah on Post, Mastodon @PoliticusSarah@Journa.Host, & Twitter.
