Trump demands VA Secretary’s five-year-old texts in bizarre statement repeating false spying allegation

None of the allegations raised by former president are remotely true

Former president Donald Trump is now accusing VA Secretary Denis McDonough of trying to “overturn the 2016 election” when he was then-president Barack Obama’s chief of staff in late 2016 and early 2017.

The twice-impeached ex-president made the bizarre allegations in a statement in which he repeated false allegations that the Obama administration “spied” on his campaign, transition team, and the White House — with the latter allegedly occurring after Mr Trump was occupying the White House as president.

“Unlike my Chief of Staff, which show patriotic Americans concerned about illegal and massive Election Fraud in 2020, I say bad things would be revealed,” he said

Mr Trump’s ex-chief of staff, Mark Meadows, is currently suing the House select committee investigating the 6 January attack on the Capitol to prevent release of phone records and text messages from the period leading up to the worst attack on the Capitol since 1814.

Mr Meadows has also been referred to the Justice Department for criminal contempt of congress charges, but the Justice Department has not taken any action on that referral.

The former North Carolina congressman was a key player in schemes devised by Mr Trump and his allies to keep him in office after he lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden.

A tranche of text messages he turned over to the panel late last year reveals he was regularly communicating with Republican members of Congress who hoped to reject electoral votes from swing states won by Mr Biden on various grounds alleging fraud, none of them supported by reality.

Despite Mr Trump’s insistence to the contrary, it’s unlikely that anything negative would be revealed because Mr Obama and his advisers did not actually attempt to overturn the 2016 election results and they did not use personal mobile phones for official government business.

Asked whether the former top White House aide had any response to Mr Trump’s outrageous claim, a Department of Veterans Affairs Press Secretary Terrence Haynes replied: “Secretary McDonough respectfully declines comment”.