Is Obama Against Trump? Update On 'Budding Feud' Downplays Presidential Tension

It's no secret President Donald Trump and his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, haven't exactly been fans of one another since the business mogul took over the White House in January. A Wall Street Journal report Tuesday evening indicated the relationship had grown sparked outright anger, but a CNN follow-up Wednesday downplayed the tension between the two.

There was a "budding feud" between the two men after Trump thought Obama's former workers were behind the flood of leaks in the White House, the Journal reported. Obama, meanwhile, reportedly was angered by claims from Trump that the ex-president had illegally tapped his New York City tower but presented no evidence.

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"How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!" Trump tweeted this week.

Obama didn't directly respond to the claim, but privately he was "livid" that Trump would question his integrity as well as the office of the presidency as a whole, wrote Carol E. Lee and Peter Nicholas of the Journal, citing "people familiar with his thinking."

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Unnamed sources clarified to CNN Wednesday, however, that while Obama "was irked and exasperated in response to his successor's uncorroborated wiretapping accusation," the former president's mood stopped short of "outright fury."

The two men reportedly have not spoken since inauguration. Obama had campaigned for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and repeatedly declared Trump was "unfit to serve as president." After Trump won, Obama worked to help assure a smooth transition of power and said the two men had an "excellent conversation" after a meeting directly following the election. It was a move from Obama aimed at helping guide the man who long questioned his birthplace and had no governmental experience.

"I want to emphasize to you, Mr. President-elect, that we now are going to want to do everything we can to help you succeed, because if you succeed, then the country succeeds," Obama said at the time.