The Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee says his panel will probe President Donald Trump's allegations that Trump Tower was wire-tapped by President Obama's administration.

Rep. Devin Nunes, Rep for California, said his committee 'will make inquiries into whether the government was conducting surveillance activities on any political party's campaign officials or surrogates', the chair said in a statement Sunday afternoon.

The White House demanded Sunday morning that Congress investigate Trump's claims, which he tweeted out Saturday morning, suggesting Obama abused his executive powers in connection with the 2016 presidential election.

'Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!' the president wrote on Twitter. McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of subversion or treason without proper regard for evidence.

Trump offered no evidence supporting the tapping of telephones in Trump Tower, while a spokesman for Obama denied the allegation as 'simply false'.

Lawmakers in both parties have asked to see proof.

Earlier Sunday, Senate Intelligence Committee member, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., suggested his committee would look into the matter as well.

'We've already begun an inquiry on the intelligence committee into Russia's efforts to undermine confidence in our political system,' Cotton said on Fox News Sunday.

'That inquiry is going to be thorough, and we're going to follow the facts wherever they lead us. And I'm sure that this matter will be a part of that inquiry.'

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The Obama administration has denied President Donald Trump's claims that Barack Obama wire-tapped his phones at Trump Tower before the election. Trump was spotted waving to his supporters as his motorcade crossed the Bingham Island Bridge in Palm Beach on Saturday

Obama's (pictured during Trump's inauguration) spokesman Kevin Lewis released a statement Saturday afternoon refuting Trump's wire-tapping claims

Rep. Devin Nunes said his committee 'will make inquiries into whether the government was conducting surveillance activities on any political party's campaign officials or surrogates'. He is seen above on February 14

Cotton's committee chair, Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., made a broader statement.

'As I've said since the beginning and have repeated since, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence will follow the evidence where it leads, and we will continue to be guided by the intelligence and facts as we compile our findings,' Burr said Sunday.

It came after James Clapper, the former director of national intelligence in the Obama administration, 'absolutely' denied there was a secret court order for surveillance at Trump Tower.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer had said earlier in a statement on Sunday that reports 'concerning potentially politically motivated investigations immediately ahead of the 2016 election are very troubling'.

Trump accused Obama of tapping his phones at Trump Tower in a flurry of tweets Saturday morning

Another official echoed that of others saying Obama could not have ordered a wire-tap, adding that it would have been taken to a judge by investigators, but investigators never did that

REACTION TO TRUMP'S BUGGING ALLEGATIONS Ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Adam Schiff, called Trump's wire-tapping charge 'incendiary' and 'baseless,' and suggested the president got it from ' Breitbart or other conspiracy-based news'. 'For a president who similarly claimed that millions of undocumented immigrants voted illegally costing him the popular vote, and that his predecessor wasn't born in the United States, these new allegations follow a familiar if deeply disturbing pattern of distraction, distortion and downright fabrication,' Schiff charged. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi called the allegations 'ridiculous' and said 'it's the tool of an authoritarian to have them always be talking about what you want to be talking about'. She added: 'Rather than Russia, we're talking about President Obama.... When he's been not in favor of Congress investigating anything, including what the Russians have on Donald Trump politically, financially or personally. That's the truth we want to know.' South Carolina Sen Lindsey Graham said: 'I am very worried that our president is suggesting that the former president has done something illegally.' Sen Marco Rubio said: 'I have no insight into what exactly he's referring to. And I'd imagine the president and the White House in the days to come will outline further what was behind that accusation.' Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said: 'It's beneath the dignity of the presidency. It is something that really hurts people's view of government. And either way, the President's in trouble. If he falsely spread this kind of misinformation, that is so wrong.' Advertisement

'President Donald J. Trump is requesting that as part of their investigation into Russian activity, the congressional intelligence committees exercise their oversight authority to determine whether executive branch investigative powers were abused in 2016,' Spicer said.

It was unclear what reports Spicer was referring to, and what prompted Trump to make the allegation.

Spicer ended the statement by saying that neither the White House nor Trump will comment further 'until such oversight is conducted.'

The FBI has yet to release an official statement on the allegations.

However the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., released a statement asking the White House to join him in demanding that FBI Director James Comey answer more questions about the bureau's Russia probe.

'If the administration truly believes that President Obama illegally eavesdropped on the Trump campaign and wants our committee to investigate the matter, they should join my call on Director Comey to answer any question put to him that is pertinent to the Russia investigation,' Schiff said.

Schiff, and his Republican counterpart, Nunes, sat down with Comey on Thursday and afterward the Democrat criticized Comey for not being more open with the members.

Comey has reportedly said the claim is false and asked the Justice Department to publicly reject Trump’s assertion that Obama ordered the tapping, the New York Times reported.

Schiff also slapped President Trump around too.

He called Trump's wire-tapping charge 'incendiary' and 'baseless,' and suggested the president got it from ' Breitbart or other conspiracy-based news.'

'For a president who similarly claimed that millions of undocumented immigrants voted illegally costing him the popular vote, and that his predecessor wasn't born in the United States, these new allegations follow a familiar if deeply disturbing pattern of distraction, distortion and downright fabrication,' Schiff charged.

Trump actually first claimed that millions had voted 'illegally' and didn't specifically note the voters' immigration status. There's no evidence that any widespread voter fraud occurred.

Pointing to the White House's decision not to comment further on Trump's wire-tapping claims Schiff said of the press secretary, 'not even Spicer wishes to have to speak to such an unsubstantiated charge'.

Clapper said on on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday (seen above) that in the national intelligence activity he oversaw, 'there was no such wiretap activity mounted against the president, the president-elect at the time, as a candidate or against his campaign'

Clapper furthered Schiff's case by saying on 'Meet the Press' Sunday that 'there was no such wiretap activity mounted against the president, the president-elect at the time, as a candidate or against his campaign'.

Clapper says as intelligence director he would have known about a 'FISA court order on something like this.'

He added, 'Absolutely, I can deny it.'

He left the White House on January 20 when Trump took office.

Obama's spokesman Kevin Lewis had on Saturday released a statement refuting Trump's wire-tapping claims.

'A cardinal rule of the Obama administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice,' Lewis wrote.

'As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false.'

However, the statement did not deny that another federal agency may have sought authorization to listen in on Trump Towers and received it.

Lewis said 'neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen'

Trump had started tweeting shortly after 3.30am ET Saturday and posed the question: 'Is it legal for a sitting President to be 'wire tapping' a race for president prior to an election?'

In another tweet Trump said it was a 'new low' for the former president, compared it to 'Nixon/Watergate' and called Obama a 'bad (or sick) guy'.

Ben Rhodes, the former policy adviser for Obama, blasted Trump's accusations on Twitter: 'No President can order a wiretap. Those restrictions were put in place to protect citizens from people like you.'

Rhodes shot back at another Trump tweet saying: 'Dear Pundits who lauded his speech. Is it still 'presidential' to call your dignified predecessor 'Bad (or sick) guy!''

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox also slammed Trump following the Republican's Twitter tirade.

'A 'so-called' President is calling a real President and true leader: bad and sick guy. What a shame, America you need to do something now!' Fox tweeted.

'@realDonaldTrump is more aware of what happens in reality TV than his own country. He's a very bad apprentice of politics!' he added in reference to Trump's former television show.

Trump fired off his tweets shortly after 3.30am ET Saturday morning

Ben Rhodes, the former policy adviser for Obama, also blasted Trump's accusations on Twitter: 'No President can order a wiretap. Those restrictions were put in place to protect citizens from people like you'

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox also slammed Trump following his Twitter tirade

Fox said Trump was a 'so-called president' for calling Obama a 'bad and sick guy'

Trump also linked Obama to Attorney General Jeff Sessions' meetings last year with Russia's US ambassador, Sergey Kislyak.

'The first meeting Jeff Sessions had with the Russian Amb was set up by the Obama Administration under education program for 100 Ambs,' he tweeted.

Trump's team has sought to push back over its connections to Russian officials by pointing out instances of Democrats meeting with Kislyak.

But on these latest allegations a former senior intelligence official told The Washington Post that 'it's highly unlikely there was a wiretap'.

'It seems unthinkable. If that were the case by some chance, that means that a federal judge would have found that there was either probable cause that he had committed a crime or was an agent of a foreign power,' the official said.

According to the official, a wiretap cannot be directed at a US facility, without finding probable cause that the phone lines or internet addresses were being used by agents of a foreign power.

'You can't just go around and tap buildings,' the official told the Post.

Another former senior US official, who worked under the Obama administration, told CNN there was no such investigation of Trump, nor were his phones tapped.

'This did not happen. It is false. Wrong,' the former official said.

The official echoed that of others saying Obama could not have ordered this and adding that it would have been taken to a judge by investigators, but investigators never did that.

The president, who is currently vacationing at his private Mar-a-Lago estate, did not provide any additional evidence to back up his claims.

Trump's claims seem to have stemmed from a Thursday evening radio show hosted by Mark Levin that claimed Obama executed a 'silent coup' of Trump via 'police state' tactics

Trump's claims seem to have stemmed from a Thursday evening radio show hosted by Mark Levin that claimed Obama executed a 'silent coup' of Trump via 'police state' tactics, according to far-right Breitbart News.

Through a timeline, Levin suggested the former president should be the target of congressional investigation.

During the summer last year, the Obama administration filed a request with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) to monitor communications involving Trump and several advisers but the request was denied, according to Heat Street former editor, Louise Mensch.

Just a day before the 2016 election, Mensch reported that 'sources with links to the counter-intelligence community' confirmed that a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) had granted a FISA court warrant in October to monitor activities in Trump tower.

On Wednesday, a New York Times report said White House officials took efforts in the closing days of the Obama administration to analyze and spread information about Russian election interference, driven by a concern that the material might get buried by Trump.

Trump's claims seem to have stemmed from a Thursday evening radio show hosted by Mark Levin that claimed Obama executed a 'silent coup' of Trump via 'police state' tactics

The president, who is currently vacationing at his private Mar-a-Lago estate (pictured), did not provide any additional evidence to back up his claims. Obama has not responded to the accusations

Intelligence agencies rushed to analyze raw intelligence material about Russia connections, going over months-old material as the extent and possible motives of what the agencies say is Russian election hacking emerged.

Officials made efforts to ask specific questions at intelligence briefings as a way to get the information into the record and be archived for examination later.

In January, American law enforcement and intelligence agencies examined intercepted communications and financial transactions as part of a broad investigation into possible links between Russian officials and associates of Trump, according to the Times.

The FBI led the investigations, aided by the National Security Agency, and the Treasury Department's financial crimes unit.

Trump also linked Obama to Attorney General Jeff Sessions's meetings last year with Russia's US ambassador

Investigators found no conclusive evidence of wrongdoing, the officials said.

One official said intelligence reports based on some of the wiretapped communications had been provided to the White House.

As the news spread about Trump's allegations, many government officials took to social media to respond.

South Carolina Sen Lindsey Graham, spoke on Trump's accusations at a Town Hall on Saturday.

'I am very worried that our president is suggesting that the former president has done something illegally,' Graham told his audience.

'I would be very worried if in fact the Obama administration was able to obtain a warrant lawfully about Trump campaign activity with foreign governments.

In other words, the he Obama administration would have only been able to lawfully obtain a warrant for a wire tap, if a judge found probably cause that Trump was engaging in criminal activity.

Democrats have also responded to Trump's claims, including House minority leader Nancy Pelosi, who Trump recently demanded by investigated after she said she hadn't met the current Russian ambassador, only to be revealed to have met him in a 2010 photo.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif. listens at left, as the committee's ranking member Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., talk to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, March 2, following their meeting with FBI Director Jim Comey about Russian influence on the American presidential election

Pelosi hit back at Trump's demands of an 'immediate' investigation by tweeting: 'The Deflector-in-Chief is at it again. An investigation by an independent commission is the only answer.'

She added in an interview with CNN's State of the Union that the allegations were 'ridiculous; and 'it's the tool of an authoritarian to have them always be talking about what you want to be talking about'.

She added: 'Rather than Russia, we're talking about President Obama.... When he's been not in favor of Congress investigating anything, including what the Russians have on Donald Trump politically, financially or personally. That's the truth we want to know.'

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) also said on Meet the Press that he was not aware of the claims.

Rubio said: 'I have no insight into what exactly he's referring to. And I'd imagine the president and the White House in the days to come will outline further what was behind that accusation.

'I've never heard that before. And I have no evidence, or no one's ever presented anything to me, that indicates anything like that.'

Meanwhile Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said: 'It's beneath the dignity of the presidency. It is something that really hurts people's view of government.

'And either way, the President's in trouble. If he falsely spread this kind of misinformation, that is so wrong.'

Nancy Pelosi, who Trump recently demanded by investigated after she said she hadn't met the current Russian ambassador, also responded to Trump's claims

Others have also responded to Trump's claims, including Ted Lieu, a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives, representing California's 33rd congressional district

Former Vermont Gov Howard Dean also tweeted shortly after Trump's accusation made headlines

The Trump administration has come under increasing pressure over its connections to Russian officials.

Earlier this week, Sessions recused himself from any investigations involving the presidential election after it was revealed he twice met with Kislyak during the campaign.

On Thursday, Jeff Sessions recused himself from investigations involving the presidential election after it was revealed he twice met with Russia's ambassador to Washington

When Trump was asked if he knew Sessions had met Kislyak before the election, he said: 'I wasn't aware at all.'

The president's extraordinary intervention came as Sessions faced a firestorm over whether he lied to the Senate during confirmation hearings by failing to disclose his two meetings last summer.

But the president also said he has 'total' confidence in his attorney general and does not think he should recuse himself from Justice Department investigations involving Russia.

'I don't think so,' he told reporters asking about recusal on Thursday as he visited the USS Gerard R. Ford in Newport News, Virginia.

Despite saying he did not know of the meetings with Kislyak, he stood by Sessions as he took fire from Democrats for failing to disclose the conversations during his confirmation hearing.

Asked if Sessions told a Senate panel the truth about the communications, Trump gave only a half-hearted endorsement, however.

'I think he probably did,' Trump said.

A White House spokesperson didn't immediately respond to DailyMail.com's request for comment.