The Mueller Report
Like it or not, Donald Trump won the Presidency with the help of the Russian government. The Mueller Report was unable to determine whether his campaign intentionally sought out and accepted the help, but was clear that they definitely got it.
The Report listed over one hundred contacts between the campaign and Russians. It’s hard to imagine they didn’t seek it out, despite the protestations of Trump, Lewandowski and the rest. Mueller could prove those contacts happened, but somehow was unable to prove Trump Campaign “intent”. In at least one case, he gave them a “pass” because they might have been “ignorant” of the law.
In an election determined in the Electoral College on a razor’s edge (77,744 votes over three states) there was no room for error. The Trump campaign lost the popular vote by over three million votes. They needed all the help they could get.
They got it.
2020 – A Razor’s Edge
With the 2020 election looming on the horizon, there doesn’t seem to be much difference. The polls today show almost exactly what they showed in 2016. The Democrat, really any Democrat, would surely defeat the current President. The Trump Campaign sees former Vice President Joe Biden as their greatest threat. The biggest difference today: the President now has the authority and power of the United States government behind him.
Wednesday night, it was revealed that there was a “whistleblower” report being withheld from the Congressional Intelligence Committees. Subsequent reporting suggests that if the report was revealed, it would show that the President is engaging in a pattern of putting pressure on the President of Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden. The President may be using access to US funding to “convince” him. Trump knows he needs to “level the table” and he’s already stated he would take help from anywhere (ABC.) And now he’s got the leverage he needs for that help: US government money.
Giuliani’s Tale
Rudy Giuliani, the “crazy like a fox” private attorney to the President, has spent years trying to sow the seed of a story of Biden corruption. He has travelled the world, especially to Ukraine, to find “dirt” about the person Trump sees as his 2020 opponent. Giuliani is stoking a “Biden corruption” fire.
In 2016, the United States, the World Bank, and many European countries were very concerned about corruption in Ukraine. Viktor Shokin, the State Prosecutor, seemed uninterested in investigating potential crimes, particularly left over from the former Russian supported President, Viktor Yanukovych.
At that time, Vice President Joe Biden was the “point man” for US policy towards Ukraine. With widespread support from allies, he pressured the Ukrainian government to fire Shokin. The US threatened to withhold funds from Ukraine if Shokin wasn’t removed.
According to Giuliani, Shokin was investigating Burisma Holdings, the largest natural gas company in Ukraine, for laundering money. Hunter Biden, Joe’s son, was on the Board of Directors of Burisma. So was Chris Heinz, nephew of former Secretary of State John Kerry. Giuliani claims that Biden intervened, not to remove a prosecutor protecting Russian backed corruption, but to protect his son.
More recent Ukrainian investigations have shown that Shokin wasn’t actually investigating Burisma (or much of anything else). His removal had no effect on who was investigated (Newsweek.) But that hasn’t stopped Giuliani and the right-wing media from echoing the “Biden corruption” claim. And, of course, the Trump Campaign had close connections to factual corruption in Ukraine. The former Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort is now serving seven years in Federal prison in part for his actions in the country.
What We Know
The Trump Administration withheld $250 million in aid from Ukraine, in addition to advanced weaponry needed to counter Russian aggression. The President had a phone conversation with the new President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky. Vice President Pence met with Zelensky in Poland (on the trip while Trump stayed in New Jersey and played golf waiting on Hurricane Dorian.)
After those contacts, the funds and arms were released. Today, an advisor to Zelensky announced that they were willing to open an investigation of Burisma, if the US officially asks (The Daily Beast.)
The Whistleblower’s Tale
We don’t know whether the President and Vice President used US money, our money, to try to get “dirt” to use in a potential political campaign against Joe Biden. But we do know that the Administration is making every move possible to keep Congress from knowing what the “whistleblower” knows.
It seems that the “whistleblower” had access to either Trump’s phone call to Zelensky, or a summary of the conversation. The complaint is more than just the result of that single phone call; it involves a pattern of Presidential action. And finally, we know that the complaint is not about “Presidential declassification” of secrets (something the President can unilaterally do) or a policy issue (not contained under the “whistleblower” statute.)
The Department of Justice, under Attorney General Barr, weighed in to “re-interpret” the Whistleblower Statute to NOT include acts of the President. So if the President commits an action that could be considered illegal, a “whistleblower” revealing it wouldn’t be protected by the law, and Congress wouldn’t be given a report.
Wrong or Right
IF, as Mr. Giuliani seems to indicate, it would be OK for the President to use US aid money to leverage an investigation in Ukraine, then the President should simply let everyone know. Certainly it shouldn’t be a secret: the President is just trying to stop corruption in another country. That is, if the President thinks that using US aid monies as leverage to find information on a US political opponent is OK.
But if the President sees pressuring Zelensky for what it is, extortion, then of course he, the Vice President, and the Attorney General would do exactly what they’re doing now: hide it and keep covering up. It certainly could be interpreted as using US funds for private gain, aid to the Trump 2020 Campaign. The President gets an investigation of Biden, Ukraine gets US aid: a quid pro quo.
And that’s got to be impeachable.
Your omments about Trump’s sordid misbehavior are right on.
But I shed no tears about problems that Joe and Hunter Biden bring to themselves over their incredibly poor judgment. Why do we suppose the Russian oligarch owner of Burisma asked Hunter Biden, of all people, to be a director of his company? Why on earth did Hunter accept, while his dad was the US point man dealing with Ukraine?
To be an effective government official requires not only the absence of impropriety, but the absence of the appearance of it. Joe fails this test. The Bidens have created fodder analogous to Hillary Clinton’s placing an email server in her basement. This will haunt Biden should he become the nominee, and could result in a replay of 2016.
Great post as usual. It feels like Dems have been struggling, in view of perhaps dozens if not more than 100 impeachable offenses, to pick one. This one feels like the most plausible. Or maybe I am suffering from recency bias.
I agree – this feels more like a more serious act – even than Russia in 2016
could not agree more. I hope the Dems settle on this as their impeachable offense; that articles of impeachment are approved, and that he is impeached; & that he is in fact impeached. but sadly, Senate will still not vote out articles of impeachment. He literally could shoot a man dead in Times Sqaure & not be impeached.
So the political question becomes – is Trump weaker being impeached, or does a Senate acquittal actually make him stronger. Note thats the political consideration – because I see impeachment as a Constitutional imperative – or Trump version 2 will arise in the future