On July 24, President Trump triumphantly announced that Robert Mueller found "no collusion." On July 25, he made a phone call to the Ukrainian president. Trump said that there was no quid pro quo during the call because there was no mention of withholding military aid of about $270 million. If Trump claimed that he had to prove that he had to establish lack of corruption in Ukraine before he would release the funding, than he shouldn't have praised the president for cleaning up the corruption.
Given that Ukraine wanted that aid as soon as possible, because it was being pressured by Russia, Trump was increasing Ukraine's peril by withholding funding. Ukraine knew as early as mid-July that the funding was not coming in. Rudy Giuliani or others could have linked the withholding of funding to Ukraine opening an investigation of Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.
Trump said that the aid to Ukraine was withheld because other countries did not offer to help: "I want other countries to put up money, they say 'oh, let it go, and I let it go." He specifically mentioned Germany and France. On Monday, September 23, he said the funding was withheld because he was concerned that the Ukrainian government was corrupt. "I want to make sure that county (sic) is honest." It's very important to talk about corruption. If you don't talk about corruption, why would you give money to a country that you think is corrupt." Of Biden, he said: "I did not make a statement 'you have to do this or I'm not going to give you aid.' I wouldn't do that, I wouldn't do that."
Rudy Giuliani said two Department of State officials were working with him on Ukraine. Both the IG and the DNI were preparing to refer a criminal complaint to the DoJ. A.G. Barr relied strictly on the White House notes on deciding not to release the whistleblower report to Congress. In his testimony to Congress DNI Joseph Maguire claimed the President is not part of the intelligence community. Rep. Adam Schiff and Maguire agree that the whistleblower is "credible," and his report is an "urgent concern." Maguire was vague about the word "shell." Maguire said several times in his testimony that he went to the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel first, but then finally admitted that he went to the White House first. Schiff pushed hard on why Maguire remained silent when Trump called the whistleblower a "political hack" and maybe even a traitor. Maguire couldn't answer who made the decision to defy a subpoena. He seemed to be saying that the President's executive privilege power, even when not claimed, trumps the whistleblower legal protection.
Maguire wouldn't answer if he spoke to Trump, even after Schiff advised him that he wasn't asking about substance, he wanted to know if Maguire spoke to Trump. Maguire seems to believe that even the question of whom he spoke to is covered by executive privilege.
The whistleblower said that the Ukrainian call transcript was put in a separate compartment designed for highly sensitive, politically damaging documents -- other calls may have been put in that compartment. Maguire said that he had no jurisdiction over that matter. He also said that whether or not Giuliani had a security clearance is not in his jurisdiction, and he couldn't answer questions about him, because of attorney-client privilege.
On September 27, Trump accused Rep. Adam Schiff of lying to Congress and called on him to resign based on fraud.
No comments:
Post a Comment