Donald Trump has appeared to claim he should receive an additional two years as president in “reparations” for the Mueller investigation.
The US president shared on Sunday a tweet by Jerry Falwell Jr, president of evangelical Christian university Liberty University and a prominent supporter of Mr Trump.
“After the best week ever for @realDonaldTrump - no obstruction, no collusion, NYT admits @BarackObama did spy on his campaign, & the economy is soaring,” Mr Falwell falsely claimed.
In fact there is no evidence to suggest former president Barack Obama had any role in probing the Trump campaign, and special counsel Robert Mueller has provided multiple instances in which Mr Trump attempted to impede his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
“I now support reparations,” Mr Fallwell added in the tweet the president shared on his account. “Trump should have 2 yrs added to his 1st term as pay back for time stolen by this corrupt failed coup.”
Though Mr Trump did not explicitly endorse the message he shared, he regularly and almost exclusively retweets messages he agrees with.
He followed up the retweet with posts of his own bemoaning two years “stollen” (sic) by the special counsel’s probe, which was launched in May 2017 and concluded with Mr Mueller’s 448-page report, which was published last month.
“Despite the tremendous success that I have had as President, including perhaps the greatest ECONOMY and most successful first two years of any President in history, they have stollen two years of my (our) Presidency (Collusion Delusion) that we will never be able to get back,” he tweeted.
“The Witch Hunt is over but we will never forget. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
The allusion to an extended presidency came just hours after Nancy Pelosi suggested Mr Trump might not voluntarily leave the White House if Democrats fail to win “big” in 2020.
The Democratic house speaker said Mr Trump may contest the result and refuse to give up power if her party’s candidate won only by a narrow margin.
“We have to inoculate against that, we have to be prepared for that,” she told The New York Times.
Michael Cohen, Mr Trump’s former lawyer and personal fixer, raised the prospect of Mr Trump ignoring the results of the election during congressional testimony in February.
“Given my experience working for Mr Trump, I fear that if he loses the election in 2020, there will never be a peaceful transition of power,” Cohen, who will be jailed today for his role in Trump campaign finance violations, said during his closing remarks.
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