Trump says Obama began Russia inquiry to help Clinton

WASHINGTON – President Trump accused predecessor Barack Obama and his team Monday of launching the Russia investigation to help elect Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. Trump said the scandal was bigger than Watergate.

“Why did the Obama Administration start an investigation into the Trump Campaign (with zero proof of wrongdoing) long before the Election in November?” Trump tweeted. “Wanted to discredit so Crooked H would win.”

He wrote: “Unprecedented. Bigger than Watergate! Plus, Obama did NOTHING about Russian meddling.”

Watergate was a political scandal that started in June 1972 when burglars affiliated with the re-election campaign of President Nixon were caught trying to break into the Demo-

“Unprecedented. Bigger than Watergate!”

cratic National Committee headquarters in Washington’s Watergate office complex. Nixon resigned in August 1974 after revelations that he tried to stop the FBI from investigating the ties to his campaign.

Government officials, including law enforcement authorities, have said there were reams of evidence in 2016 justifying an investigation into whether Russia tried to interfere in the presidential election — the subject of an ongoing inquiry by special counsel Robert Mueller. Mueller is also investigating whether there was collusion with the Trump campaign, which the president and his aides deny.

John Brennan, CIA director during the Obama administration, tweeted that Trump’s claim is “a great example of your paranoia, constant misrepresentation of the facts, and increased anxiety and panic (rightly so) about the Mueller investigation.”

Brennan wrote, “When will those in Congress and the 30 percent of Americans who still support you realize you are a charlatan?”

Trump tweet