GOP congressman demands Trump apologize to Obama for wiretapping lie

Senators Richard Burr (R-NC) and Mark Warner (D-VA), who lead the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, previously issued a statement slapping down Trump’s lie about Obama wiretapping Trump Tower, noting, “Based on the information available to us, we see no indications that Trump Tower was the subject of surveillance by any element of the United States government either before or after Election Day 2016.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) also admitted that Trump’s conspiracy was without merit: “The intelligence committees in their continuing, widening, ongoing investigation of all things Russia, got to the bottom — at least so far — with respect to our intelligence community that — that no such wiretap existed.”

But in a press briefing, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer continued to prop up Trump’s fake story, telling journalists, “He stands by it.”

Now, Representative Tom Cole (R-OK) has spoken out publicly to tell Donald Trump that he should apologize to President Obama for this wild accusation.

In a gaggle with the press, Cole declared that “President Obama is owed an apology” after it had become clear that Trump’s reckless allegation that the former president spied on him is a complete fabrication.

COLE: I see no indication that that’s true. And so it’s not a charge I would have ever made. And frankly, unless you can produce some pretty compelling proof, I think the president, President Obama is owed an apology. Because, if he didn’t do it, we shouldn’t be reckless in accusations that he did it.

The wiretapping allegation is yet another conspiracy theory that Trump has used the presidency to amplify and spread around the world, behavior he has engaged in for years before becoming a political figure.

But Trump has now reached the point where even some of his fellow Republicans are calling out his lies about President Obama. Considering the harsh opposition Obama received from the GOP, it is telling how far beyond acceptable discourse Trump has gone.