President Donald Trump said he has “lots of info” on top Democrats and could use it if lawmakers impeach him again, according to a Newsmax interview reported Oct. 15, 2026.
Trump said he holds potentially damaging information about Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and he suggested he could use it.
The president made a similar point to reporters during an Oval Office appearance on Wednesday, Oct. 7, where he said he chose not to go after three of the most prominent Democrats in American public life — and that nothing is stopping him from reconsidering.
“I could have done very bad things to Hillary Clinton. I could have done very, very bad things to Joe Biden. I could have done very bad things to Barack Hussein Obama,” Trump said. Clinton, the former secretary of state, was his opponent in the 2016 presidential election. Biden and Obama are his two Democratic predecessors in the White House.
Trump told reporters he held back out of respect for the job. “I thought it was inappropriate to do so because you have to treat the office of the presidency with respect,” he said. He also called the presidency “sacred” in the same remarks.
He then described what changed his thinking. “Then I found out that they impeached me twice. I certainly, even to this moment, I can do whatever I want, if I want,” Trump said.
Asked What the Grounds Would Be
Trump started the exchange himself, claiming Democrats would move to impeach him if they take the chamber. A reporter then asked him what Democrats would impeach him for “if the party wins back the House and the Senate in November.”
Trump answered that Democrats did not know. He then listed the three names and said the Democrats he singled out had done very bad things themselves.
The president spoke at an event announcing automatic enrollment for “Trump Accounts,” the tax-advantaged investment accounts for children created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Trump put his signature on that law in July 2025. Washington seeds each account with $1,000 for children born between 2025 and 2028.
Impeached Twice, Acquitted Twice
House Speaker Mike Johnson has made the same warning Republicans are making to their own voters. Johnson has warned that a Democratic majority would impeach Trump again, calling it “guaranteed, probably on the first day” in an interview with Scott Jennings.
The House impeached Trump twice during his first term, and the Senate acquitted him both times. A phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy set off the first impeachment. On that call, Trump pressed for an investigation of Biden, who was then his opponent in the 2020 presidential election.
Rioters attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and the second impeachment followed, on a charge of incitement of insurrection. Trump joked to reporters in a separate exchange Oct. 2 that he is “getting good at” being impeached.
Prosecutions of Comey and James
Trump’s picture of himself as a leader who stayed his hand runs against the public record of his second term. White House lawyers got an order from him in June 2025 to work with the attorney general and launch a sweeping probe of Biden’s administration. The order rested on conspiracy theories about the former president’s mental acuity, and some outlets described it as a historic first.
Reporters heard from Trump a day later that he had turned up no evidence of documents being signed without Biden’s approval. On May 11, he amplified a social media post demanding Obama’s arrest and prosecution for treason, alongside others.
Since his return to office in 2025, the Justice Department has brought cases against longtime adversaries, among them New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey. A federal judge threw out both indictments in November 2025. The prosecutor who brought them, the judge ruled, had been unlawfully appointed.
Prosecutors took that ruling to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where the Justice Department heard arguments Sept. 15. The court has not ruled. A grand jury in North Carolina indicted Comey again in April 2026, on charges tied to an Instagram post. Grand juries twice declined to re-indict James in December 2025.
Critics in both parties have faulted the department for a loss of independence under the Trump administration. They have also objected to the administration’s involvement in investigations of the president’s political opponents.
A Columnist Disputes Trump’s Restraint
Steve Benen, who writes MS NOW’s MaddowBlog, pushed back in a column published Oct. 8. “The president might be eager to brag about his perceived magnanimity, but he’s asking us to forget what we all saw with our own eyes,” Benen wrote.
Benen argued that Trump’s declaration that he can do whatever he wants is an unsettling distillation of his views on presidential power. He also argued that Trump’s claim of restraint does not survive contact with the recent past.
Voters decide control of the House in November. The reporter had asked what Trump might do first, not whether Democrats would move against him, and the president’s Oval Office answer never settled it.
