President Donald Trump says he has spoken to the US attorney general about tracing the origins of the inquiry that cleared him of colluding with Russia.
Mr Trump described the investigation by former FBI director Robert Mueller as “an attempted coup”.
Attorney General William Barr meanwhile said he believes US authorities did spy on the Trump campaign.
US intelligence officials have previously said they were spying on the Russians, not the Trump campaign.
Speaking to reporters at the White House on Wednesday morning, the Republican president railed against the Department of Justice inquiry into whether the Trump campaign had conspired with the Kremlin to sway the 2016 election.
The investigation cleared him and his aides of collusion, making no determination on whether they had tried to obstruct justice.
Mr Trump said: “This was an attempted coup. This was an attempted take-down of a president. And we beat them. We beat them.
“So the Mueller report, when they talk about obstruction we fight back. And do you know why we fight back?
“Because I knew how illegal this whole thing was. It was a scam.
“What I’m most interested in is getting started, hopefully the attorney general, he mentioned it yesterday.
“He’s doing a great job, getting started on going back to the origins of exactly where this all started.
“Because this was an illegal witch hunt, and everybody knew it. And they knew it too. And they got caught. And what they did was treason.”
Donald Trump has long been calling for an investigation of the investigators who launched the probe of his presidential campaign. Now, with the help of his recently appointed attorney general, he will get his wish.
William Barr subsequently backed away from his assertion during Senate testimony that intelligence agencies had been “spying” on the Trump campaign, but that may end up beside the point. An inquiry has been started, and the ball is rolling.
Whether this is simply a move to placate an impetuous president or a substantive investigation remains to be seen.
There is no solid evidence, at least at this point, of misconduct in the opening of the Russia investigation or in the warrant targeting Carter Page, the low-level adviser with Russian ties who had left the Trump campaign before he became the subject of government surveillance.
The president, however, will surely cite his attorney general’s decision as part of his attempt to undermine any unpleasant information that could be revealed when the redacted Mueller report is finally released in the coming days.
Even an investigation that reaches no actionable conclusions can have a damaging effect – as the president knows all too well.
