Tag: John Bolton

John Bolton and John Kelly finally turn on the boss — and Trump loyalists respond with fury

AlterNet logoMany people wondered what exactly House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was thinking when she decided to delay delivery of the articles of impeachment against President Trump until after the holiday recess. That question has never been adequately answered, but if it was because Pelosi had a feeling — or perhaps knew for sure — that more evidence of Trump’s abuse of power would trickle out almost daily, she was absolutely right.

From White House emails revealed through the Freedom of Information Act to Rudy Giuliani’s “associate” Lev Parnas passing on documents and tapes it’s been a steady drip, drip, drip ever since the middle of December. But none of it is as important or as incriminating as the potential testimony of former national security adviser John Bolton. Keeping him from testifying in the impeachment trial has been Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s singular focus from the very beginning. This week we found out why.

As I wrote on Monday, the New York Times’ reporting about Bolton’s book has upended what was to be an open-and-shut trial with no testimony or evidence. The plan was to feature some dull arguments by the House managers and the president’s lawyers, followed by a few questions from senators and a quick vote before the Super Bowl, where Trump is slated to have a “yuge” victory interview with Sean Hannity. Basically, it was to be a constitutional wham, bam, thank you ma’am. Continue reading.

White House says Bolton book contains top secret information

Axios logoThe White House says that former national security adviser John Bolton’s book contains top secret information in a letter addressed to his attorney that was publicly released Wednesday.

The state of play: The development, first reported by CNN’s Jake Tapper, sets up a potential legal battle between Bolton and the White House over the book’s publication, which is currently scheduled for March 17.

  • The letter, dated Jan. 23, claims the book contains “significant amounts of classified information” that could “cause exceptionally grave harm” to U.S. national security.
  • It was signed by Ellen Knight, the National Security Council’s senior director for records, access and information security management.
  • The letter says, “the manuscript may not be published or otherwise disclosed without the deletion of this classified information” and that the White House will be in touch with “additional, more detailed guidance regarding next steps” on how to move forward.

GOP Senators Propose ‘Classified’ Look At Bolton Book

As pressure mounts to have former national security adviser John Bolton testify in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, a pair of Republican senators is proposing an idea to stall and possibly block Bolton from speaking publicly about his knowledge of the Ukraine scandal.

In The Room Where It Happened, his forthcoming memoir about his time in the Trump White House, Bolton says Trump told him that he was withholding congressionally appropriated military aid to Ukraine until the country’s leadership announced an investigation into his political rivals. That is exactly what Democrats charge Trump with doing, calling that quid pro quo an abuse of power.

Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and James Lankford (R-OK) suggested a deal that would allow senators to review Bolton’s book in a classified setting before deciding on whether to have him testify. Continue reading.

Anatomy of a ‘smear’: How John Bolton became a target of the pro-Trump Internet

Washington Post logoThe headline drew little notice when it appeared last spring on a blog called “Disobedient Media.”

“John Bolton Took Money From Banks Tied To Cartels, Terrorists, Iran,” it read.

On Monday, the blog entry gained sudden popularity. That’s because its central claim — based only on innuendo and half-truths — proved useful to President Trump’s most fervent online supporters, who rushed to discredit the former United Nations ambassador and national security adviser as news broke that his forthcoming book would corroborate accounts that the president held up aid to Ukraine to advance investigations into his domestic political rivals. Continue reading.

Bolton told Republican donors Trump is ‘mentally unstable’ and will pull the US out of NATO if reelected: report

AlterNet logoIn his book, “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,” former National Security Adviser John Bolton — according to the New York Times — tears apart one of President Donald Trump’s main defenses against impeachment. Trump and his defenders have maintained that the president never tied military aid to Ukraine with an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, but a leaked manuscript of his book shows Bolton asserting that Trump did, in fact, tie the two together. And Vanity Fair’s Gabriel Sherman, in a January 28 article, sheds some more light on Bolton’s reasons for speaking out against Trump: the president’s mental state.

Sherman reports that according to his sources, Bolton has told Republican donors that he considers Trump “mentally unstable” and fears that the president would completely pull the U.S. out of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) if he wins a second term in November. Certainly, Trump has been a vehement critic of NATO and fails to see its value. And Joe Biden has warned that Trump’s reelection could mean the end of NATO, which the former vice president believes would be disastrous for both the U.S. and Europe.

“The Room Where It Happened” isn’t due out until March 17. And Sherman reports in his Vanity Fair article that pro-Trump Republicans are going to great lengths to discredit Bolton and his book. An anonymous source close to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Vanity Fair, “Pompeo and Bolton were at war with each other during the administration. Pompeo thought that Bolton was constantly trying to undercut him and the president.” Continue reading.

Schumer slams ‘absurd’ GOP proposal to read Bolton manuscript in classified setting

The Hill logoSenate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday slammed a proposal floated by GOP senators to review former national security adviser John Bolton’s unpublished book manuscript in a classified setting, calling the idea “absurd.”

Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) on Monday night said the White House should give senators access to Bolton’s draft book, which claims President Trumplinked security assistance for Ukraine with an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden. Lankford said the manuscript could be viewed in the Senate’s sensitive compartmented information facility (SCIF).

The highly secure room located in the basement level of the Capitol Visitor Center is usually used for classified briefings or to review sensitive intelligence and national security documents. Continue reading.

Fox News Personalities Who Promoted Bolton Now Scorn Him

Fox News host Brian Kilmeade offered up a novel and deeply ironic retort to The New York Times’ Sunday night bombshell that President Donald Trump told then-national security adviser John Bolton military aid to Ukraine was conditioned on officials there aiding “investigations into Democrats including the Bidens,” which the paper reported based on descriptions by multiple sources of an unpublished manuscript of a forthcoming Bolton book.

“The one thing the president should take from this,” he said on Monday morning’s Fox & Friends, is that “he’s got to do a better job vetting his staff to find out if they actually want to work for him or not, or they actually want to leak out information about him.”

But if anyone could be said to have vetted Bolton for a top position in Trump’s administration, it was Fox. Continue reading.

McConnell struggles to maintain GOP unity post-Bolton

The Hill logoSenate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is struggling to maintain control of President Trump’s impeachment trial following news of former national security adviser John Bolton’s bombshell manuscript. 

McConnell on Monday deflected growing calls, including from fellow GOP senators, to allow testimony from Bolton and other potential witnesses, which could prolong the trial and deal a massive blow to Trump and Republicans.

Senate debate over whether to call additional witnesses was upended Sunday following a New York Times report revealing that Bolton claims in a draft of his forthcoming book that Trump told him directly he wanted to freeze U.S. assistance to Ukraine to spur an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden. Continue reading.

Trump team doubles down despite Bolton bombshell

The Hill logoPresident Trump’s lawyers did not change their tactics Monday despite bombshell new revelations related to former national security adviser John Bolton’s alleged knowledge about the Ukraine affair at the center of the president’s impeachment trial.

In hours of arguments on the Senate floor, Trump’s attorneys did not address or seek to knock down Bolton’s account as Trump himself has done.

Instead, they doubled down on their argument that House Democrats did not uncover evidence showing Trump tied military assistance or a White House meeting to Ukraine launching investigations. Continue reading.

Here’s why Trump can’t use ‘executive privilege’ to block Bolton testimony: legal experts

AlterNet logoIt remains to be seen whether or not Republicans in the U.S. Senate will vote to include testimony from witnesses in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, including former National Security Adviser John Bolton — who has said that he would testify if subpoenaed. Trump has asserted that he will invoke executive privilege if Bolton or any other national security officials are called to testify. But according to an article for Just Security written by six contributors (Harold Hongju Koh, Rosa Hayes, Annie Himes, Dana Khabbaz, Michael Loughlin and Mark Stevens), U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts “should reject any such executive privilege claim” and “require Bolton’s testimony.”

“First, judicial precedent does not condone the extension of executive privilege to former officials like Bolton in the context of a Senate impeachment trial,” the reporters explain. “Second, Trump may not invoke national security privilege with respect to Bolton’s and others’ information regarding the president’s conversations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Third, even if Trump could, any such claim of privilege has now likely been waived by the actions of the president, Bolton and others.” Continue reading.