This 2020 election has had a change in narratives the past few weeks, from the president’s health to talks of the 25th amendment and now President Donald Trump calling for the Democratic Nominee Joe Biden to be indicted.
What We Know:
- In a Fox Business interview this past week, Trump spoke about documents released by the Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, related to FBI misconduct and the previous Russian investigation. The president is now blasting Hillary Clinton for her email scandal and is calling out both Joe Biden and Barack Obama to be charged for allegedly spying on his campaign.
- Trump told host Maria Bartiromo, “Unless Bill Barr indicts these people for crimes — the greatest political crime in history of our country — then we’re going to get little satisfaction”. He reiterated that that includes both Biden and Obama.
“This was the greatest political crime in the history of our country and that includes Obama and it includes Biden. These are people that spied on my campaign and we have everything,” Trump stated on Fox Business.
- According to Ratcliffe, the documents demonstrated how Clinton approved of an attempt to construct a scandal against President Trump by linking him to “Putin and the Russians” for hacking the Democratic National Committee. Biden would, of course, be involved and Obama was accused of being aware. It’s worthy to note that both Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Intelligence Committee have previously rejected these claims due to a lack of factual information.
- Ratcliffe wrote a letter to Senator Lindsey Graham explaining how the Intelligence Committee wasn’t aware of the “accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication”. This prompted the president to quickly target his rivals and call for their indictment.
- “Look, we have all the evidence in the world, in addition to that I released everything, every document, I don’t care what it pertains to, I released everything. I’ve declassified, I’m the only one in the country that has the power to do that. I’ve declassified everything. I did it a year ago, actually, for Bill Barr. I declassified everything so they would have no — so there’s not a document they can’t have,” he explained.
Moreover, Trump later questioned William “Bill” Barr’s reputation. “To be honest, Bill Barr’s gonna go down either as the greatest attorney general in the history of the country or he’s gonna go down as a very sad, sad situation,” he said. This comes as president and Barr are at odds over another investigation. Trump went on to say that Barr has all the information he needs and it would look bad on his part should he not pursue the president’s claims.