Pence: ‘We need to find out’ if I was spied on during campaign

Vice President Pence said Friday that the possibility he might have been spied on by U.S. intelligence officials in 2016 is “offensive.”

Pence is doubling down on President Trump’s calls for a probe into the origins of special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, saying that the public “has a right to know” how the investigation began. Trump has suggested bias was involved.

“We’ve got to get to the bottom of how all this started,” Pence said in an interview with Fox News’s Sandra Smith. “The American people have a right to know how this investigation even began.”

{mosads}“And as the attorney general said when he testified before Congress, there was spying. We need to understand why there was [and] whether there was a sufficient predicate,” he continued.

When asked by Smith whether he believed he had also been spied on, Pence replied: “Well, I think we need to find out.”

“We really need to get to the bottom of how this all began and if there was a violation of the rules. If the law was broken, the people that were responsible need to be held accountable,” he continued.

“But I have to tell you, it’s very offensive to me,” he added.

WATCH: @SandraSmithFox spoke with @VP on claims of Trump campaign spying #nine2noon pic.twitter.com/aiiAF70JS9

— America’s Newsroom (@AmericaNewsroom) May 3, 2019

His comments come as Trump continues to ramp up claims of “unprecedented” spying on his 2016 campaign. 

“There was absolutely spying into my campaign,” Trump said last month. “I’ll go a step further. In my opinion it was illegal spying, unprecedented spying, and something that should never be allowed to happen in our country again.” 

Attorney General William Barr has said he is looking into efforts made by the FBI to investigate members of the president’s campaign prior to the 2016 election. 

“I think spying did occur,” Barr said last month. “But the question is whether it was adequately predicated — and I’m not suggesting it wasn’t adequately predicated, but I need to explore that.”

When pressed to clarify what he meant by the word “spying,” Barr said he meant looking into whether “improper surveillance” occurred in the months leading up to the election.