Trump is mad online at Obama, Schwarzenegger, and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court

Evidently annoyed by the new series of questions and allegations regarding his ties to Russia swirling this weekend, President Donald Trump decided to tweet an angry conspiracy theory blaming his predecessor for his problems. The tweets are a bit difficult to follow because he interjected something largely unrelated between two of them. At first glance, Trump appears to be making a major new explosive allegation.

In reality, he is most likely summarizing a Breitbart article that is itself a summary of a highly speculative right-wing talk radio monologue that is based on facts that were originally reported long ago. Here are the tweets.

The phrasing that Trump “just found out” about this, combined with the fact that he is the president of the United States, superficially suggests that he received some kind of new classified briefing. That would be very interesting if it’s true, though also potentially inappropriate for the president to be receiving briefings about an ongoing investigation into his own close associates. But Trump almost certainly “found out” via Joel Pollack’s March 3 article on Breitbart, summarizing conservative talk radio pundit Mark Levin’s theory that Obama is orchestrating a “silent coup” against Trump.

Levin, however, does not bring any new facts to the table.

Julian Borger reported for the Guardian back on January 11 that FBI inquiries into ties between four Trump associates and Russian government figures had led to applications for two Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court warrants. One application was rejected, and then a second, narrower application was accepted. Contrary to Trump’s assertions, the president of the United States does not personally direct FBI investigations, and there’s no evidence that Obama had anything to do with this personally. Lurking beneath Trump’s conspiratorial web is simply the reality that he seems to be confirming that intelligence services and the FISA Court believe there is some kind of investigation-worthy evidence out there.

Trump then followed this up with a shot at Arnold Schwarzenegger’s ratings on The Apprentice, likely in response to Schwarzenegger’s recent statement that he will leave the show if it is renewed for another season, because it has too much “baggage.”

Further reading:

• Legal experts think Jeff Sessions is in a lot of trouble
• The three different Trump/Russia scandals, explained
• Arnold Schwarzenegger is leaving Celebrity Apprentice. And he blames Trump.

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