In the wake of Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s assertion that former President Barack Obama was part of a group that created an intelligence community assessment to vilify President Donald Trump, House Speaker Mike Johnson stated that he had “no concern” about bringing Obama in for a deposition before the House.

Gabbard had said Obama, former FBI Director James Comey, former CIA Director John Brennan, and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper were all involved in the conspiracy to allege that Trump had colluded with Russia in the 2016 election. That conspiracy allegedly collaborated to create the assessment released in early 2017. Gabbard has referred the issue to the Department of Justice.

“There’s no question in my mind that this intelligence community assessment that President Obama ordered be published which contained a manufactured intelligence document — it’s worse than even politicization of intelligence,” Gabbard told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. “It was manufactured intelligence that sought to achieve President Obama and his team’s objective, which was undermining President Trump’s presidency and subverting the will of the American people.”

CBN host David Brody asked Johnson, “I’ve heard Stephen Miller call this a ‘seditious conspiracy.’ I’ve heard Tulsi Gabbard call it a ‘treasonous conspiracy.’ You’re a constitutional guy; what do you see in this exactly? How do you term it?”

“Well, I don’t know how to summarize it in — by way of description — in a snappy phrase, but I will tell you it is deeply problematic,” Johnson replied. “Before I became Speaker of the House I served on the House Judiciary Committee, which had jurisdiction over a lot of this, and we knew what was happening. We knew intuitively and we were gathering the evidence as we were investigating all of this ourselves. We knew the Russia collusion thing was a hoax. They used it as a basis to attack the president mercilessly.”

Noting that he had served on Trump’s impeachment defense teams twice, Johnson recalled, “As we were preparing for those defenses, as we were investigating with our oversight responsibility in the Judiciary, we recognized that the people who are being called out now were involved in a scheme. We knew that it was a shameless, false, set of accusations, and yet, they perpetuated the lie on the American people. And they looked right under the camera and just lied, clearly. And they knew what they were up to the whole time so there must be accountability for that.”

Pointing out the most significant threat was the diminution of the American people’s people’s faith in our system of justice itself, Johnson continued,  “We’re in the process of restoring trust and rebuilding the people’s belief in our system of justice itself, and it’s an extraordinary challenge. It was brought about because people were involved in a sinister plot. So there must be accountability.”

“People want to see subpoenas; they want to see depositions,” Brody posited. “They want to see, whether it be Brennan, Clapper, potentially the former President of the United States. Are you willing to go down that route? Cause a lot of people want to see some of these folks questioned under oath.”

“Of course,” Johnson answered immediately. “I think we have a responsibility to follow the truth where it leads and to do it in an unbiased fashion, to do effectively the opposite of what that other team did.”

“Does it get tricky at all with the former president, President Obama, looking at what his role in this is and bringing him in for some sort of deposition, potential subpoena?” Brody asked.

“Well, listen, we have no concern about that,” Johnson said bluntly. “If it’s uncomfortable for him, he shouldn’t have been involved in overseeing this, which is what it appears to us has happened. There’s a lot of allegations on the table. Our job is to go and follow each of those trails and to find out the truth. And so those are very serious allegations with very serious implications, but we’re gonna have very serious people working on it and we will get the answers.”

JUST IN: Speaker Johnson tells me says he has no concern at all about bringing Former President Barack Obama in for a congressional deposition or subpoena over the newly declassified documents bombshell. “If it’s uncomfortable for him, he shouldn’t have been involved in… pic.twitter.com/hAeVHdYt4m

— David Brody (@DBrodyReports) July 22, 2025