The White House sought to clarify on Monday President Donald Trump's wiretapping allegations against former President Barack Obama — an attempt at course correction that comes roughly after a week of media headlines about the claims.

"He doesn't really think that president went up and tapped his phones personally," White House press Sean Spicer told reporters during the daily press briefing. 

"The president used the word wiretap in quotes, to mean broadly, surveillance, and other activities." Spicer said.  

Spicer's comments mark the first time the White House has sought to broaden the definition of the unsubstantiated surveillance that Trump alleged over a week ago on Twitter. President Trump posited that Obama wiretapped his phones at Trump Tower in the weeks before the November election, using quotation marks around the words "wire tapping" and likening the situation to "Nixon/Watergate."

Prior to Monday, the White House did not directly answer reporters' questions on what informed the president's tweets.

"The president was very clear in his Tweet, that it was you know 'wiretapping.' That spans a whole host of surveillance types of options," Spicer said.

Asked if when the president says something Americans and the media can trust it to be real, Spicer shot back: "If he’s not joking, of course."

The comments come on the same day as a House intelligence committee deadline requesting information regarding the president's wiretapping allegations. President Trump ignored questions Monday about if the Department of Justice would comply with intelligence committees' requests to provide relevant wiretap claim evidence.