US President Donald Trump has recently developed the growing sense that he is being "besieged by snitches", and even suspects that his latest woes were triggered by leaks made by his very own former national security adviser, John Bolton, Yahoo News reported, citing anonymous sources.
"[Trump] was clearly implying [it, saying] something to the effect of, 'Oh, gee, I wonder who the source on that could be'", one of the sources recalled.
The POTUS namely suspects "spiteful" Bolton of being one of the officials "disturbed by the Ukraine-related efforts" of the president, which were mentioned in the whistleblower complaint that led to the impeachment proceedings against Trump.
The former national security adviser had previously dismissed similar speculations, stating in an interview with The Daily Beast that such claims were "flatly incorrect". He hasn't commented on Yahoo's report, however, and neither has the White House.
The impeachment proceedings against Trump were started by Democrats in the light of reports about a whistleblower complaint alleging that Trump abused his powers to enlist Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden, one of the candidates mostly likely to face Trump in the 2020 election.
Following the reports of the complaint, the White House released a full transcript of the conversation in question, which showed no signs of Trump pressuring Zelensky by freezing financial aid to force him to start the probe. However, Trump did express interest in Zelensky starting such an investigation, citing allegations of Biden's misconduct.
A redacted version of the whistleblower complaint itself was released later, revealing that the whistleblower was not a direct witness to the conversation between the two leaders and instead relied on the accounts of other White House officials, who expressed concern in regards to Trump's conversation with Zelensky.
President Trump has dismissed all allegations of misconduct, insisting that his talks with his Ukrainian counterpart were "pitch perfect". He has also slammed the continuing impeachment investigation led by Democrats, claiming it is yet another "witch hunt" against him.