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Former President Barack Obama and President Donald Trump offered each other harsh public criticism in the past week over their respective administration’s roles in the coronavirus pandemic and management of the Justice Department.
In a conversation with former members of his administration, Obama first called the Trump White House’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic an “absolute chaotic disaster,” according to audio obtained by Yahoo News.
Trump then shot back that his administration inherited “a broken system and a broken test” from Obama. In fact, Obama left his predecessor a detailed document on how to respond to a pandemic, according to CNN reporting on records first uncovered by Politico. The 69-page Playbook for Early Response to High-Consequence Emerging Infectious Disease Threats and Biological Incidents was left by Obama’s national security council.
The unprecedented public debate between the two presidents also extended to the Justice Department’s criminal case against Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russian officials as an incoming national security adviser for the Trump administration.
Obama said the country’s “basic understanding of rule of law is at risk” when the Justice Department dropped its criminal case against Flynn last week. Although Trump fired Flynn over his lies three years ago, he recently rebranded the outgoing Obama administration’s investigation of Flynn as a criminal act — Trump dubbed it #Obamagate on Twitter.
Judge Emmet Sullivan, the judge overseeing Flynn’s case, signaled this week that he would not immediately toss the case, CNN reported. Sullivan ruled that third-parties could file “friend of the court” briefs in the case five days after the Justice Department requested the case dismissal.
Even Senate Republicans broke with Trump’s attempt to spin the Obama-era Justice Department’s investigation as corrupt, Politico reported. Trump’s Justice Department, however, continues to investigate the origins of the FBI’s investigation of Flynn and the rest of the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia throughout 2016.
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