Former U.S. President Donald Trump has publicly lauded Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard after she released newly declassified documents alleging a deliberate plot by former President Barack Obama’s administration to undermine his 2016 election victory.
Gabbard’s revelations, released on Friday, have reignited debate over the long-standing controversy surrounding the Trump-Russia collusion narrative that dominated much of Trump’s presidency.
According to Gabbard, the more than 100 pages of documents outline what she described as a coordinated effort, directed by Obama and senior intelligence officials, to manipulate intelligence assessments.
The purpose, she claims, was to falsely implicate Trump in a conspiracy with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential election—allegations that later gave rise to the Mueller investigation and years of political turmoil.
“These documents clearly show that this was not simply a misunderstanding or bureaucratic overreach. This was a calculated move to weaponize intelligence for political gain,” Gabbard said.
She asserted that prior assessments which found no credible evidence of Russian interference on Trump’s behalf were intentionally disregarded. Instead, officials allegedly crafted a new narrative based on unverified sources and disseminated it through the media to legitimize a full-scale investigation into Trump’s campaign.
In response, Trump took to his Truth Social platform on Saturday to applaud Gabbard’s actions. “Fantastic work by Tulsi Gabbard and her incredible team for prosecuting Obama and the thugs who have just been unequivocally exposed,” he wrote, calling the findings proof of the “highest level Election Fraud.”
Trump, who has consistently rejected claims of Russian collusion as baseless, encouraged Gabbard to continue revealing what he described as corruption at the highest levels of government.
The documents, according to Gabbard, implicate a number of top Obama-era officials whom she alleges participated in this “conspiracy.” She confirmed plans to submit the evidence to the Department of Justice, warning that “every person involved, no matter how powerful, must be investigated and prosecuted.”
White House deputy press secretary Harrison Fields also weighed in during an interview with Fox News, calling the revelations the “predicate” for a decade-long campaign of political attacks on Trump.
He accused the Obama administration of orchestrating the most corrupt presidency in modern American history and slammed mainstream media for “amplifying a lie” that has deeply polarized the nation.
Fields pointed out that Gabbard’s announcement coincides with renewed investigations into the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, suggesting more accountability could be on the horizon, though he refrained from commenting on specific individuals.
The controversy over alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election first surfaced following Trump’s surprise victory over Hillary Clinton. It led to a two-year investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, which concluded that while Russia had attempted to influence the election, there was insufficient evidence to prove a criminal conspiracy between Trump’s campaign and Moscow.
Gabbard’s disclosures now aim to shift the spotlight to those who launched the probe, asserting that it was part of a long-running political operation to delegitimize Trump’s presidency.
