Tag: Trump abuse of power

Devin Nunes pushes absurd conspiracy theories about Obama and ‘nude pictures of Trump’ at impeachment hearing

AlterNet logoRep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, used his time at Wednesday’s impeachment hearing to push conspiracy theories about President Donald Trump and Ukraine.

Nunes began with an opening statement which included a misleading claim that Democrats on the committee had tried to “obtain nude pictures of Trump from Russian pranksters who pretended to be Ukrainian officials,” when in fact Intel Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said he would refer the materials to the FBI.

Nunes went on to allege that the Ukraine whistleblower who reported Trump’s call to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was “acknowledged to have a bias against President Trump” and falsely claimed that the whistleblower’s “attorney touted a ‘coup’ against the president,” when the attorney was actually referring to former acting Attorney General Sally Yates being fired for standing up to Trump in 2017.

View the complete November 14 article by Igor Derysh from Salon on the AlterNet website here.

Hearing room bursts into laugher as Democrat calls Rep. Jim Jordan’s bluff on ‘hearsay’

AlterNet logoRepublicans at today’s impeachment hearing, featuring the testimony of George Kent, the State Department’s deputy assistant secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, and Bill Taylor, the senior U.S. envoy to Ukraine, have unveiled a plethora of odd defenses of Donald Trump. They range from “I’M YELLING SO YOU KNOW I’M SERIOUS” to slipping in unsupported conspiracy theories, and most importantly, calling the testimony of these two professional career diplomats nothing more than “hearsay.” Over and over again, we’ve heard them object to these two witnesses because they did not have direct conversations with Trump.

Rep. Peter Welch had quite enough of that nonsense, and as he took his turn at the microphone, he called their bluff, saying, “I say to my colleague, I would be glad to have the person who started it all come in and testify. President Trump is welcome to take a seat right there.”

It was an extraordinary moment that drew big laughter in the room.

View the complete November 13 article by Jen Hayden from Daily Kos  on the AlterNet website here.

GOP senators balk at lengthy impeachment trial

The Hill logoSenators are pushing for a speedy impeachment trial as the proceedings appear poised to spill into 2020. 

With House Democrats aiming to vote on articles of impeachment by Christmas, Republicans view a trial as all but guaranteed but are warning they don’t want to drag it out. 

How long a trial could last is a rolling point of debate. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) raised eyebrows by suggesting it could last six to eight weeks, longer than the proceedings against former President Clinton, which lasted just over a month.

View the complete November 14 article by Jordain Carney on The Hill website here.

Ousted ambassador gives deeply personal account of firing by Trump

Yovanovitch describes feeling ‘shocked and devastated’ reading transcript of Trump call with Ukrainian president

Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine who was removed from her post by President Donald Trump, spent much of her Friday morning before the House Intelligence Committee disputing allegations that she worked against the president while in her post in Kyiv.

Yovanovitch told the committee that she never told U.S. embassy employees to ignore Washington’s orders because Trump would soon be impeached, that she did not work on behalf of the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2016, and that she has never spoken with Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, whom Trump wanted Kyiv to investigate for his lucrative role at a Ukrainian gas company.

“Partisanship of this type is not compatible with the role of a career Foreign Service Officer,” Yovanovitch said during the second day of public impeachment hearings focusing on Trump’s dealings with Ukraine.

View the complete November 15 article by Patrick Kelley and Katherine Tully-McManus on The Roll Call website here.

Ambassador’s cellphone call to Trump from Kyiv restaurant was a stunning breach of security, former officials say

Washington Post logoA U.S. ambassador’s cellphone call to President Trump from a restaurant in the capital of Ukraine this summer was a stunning breach of security, exposing the conversation to surveillance by foreign intelligence services, including Russia’s, former U.S. officials said.

The call — in which Trump’s remarks were overheard by a U.S. Embassy staffer in Kyiv — was disclosed Wednesday by the acting U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, William B. Taylor Jr., on the dramatic opening day of public impeachment hearings into alleged abuse of power by the president.

“The member of my staff could hear President Trump on the phone” asking U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland about “the investigations,” Taylor testified, referring to the president’s desire for a probe of the son of Trump’s potential political opponent in 2020, Joe Biden, and the Ukrainian energy company on whose board Hunter Biden once served.

View the complete November 13 article by Ellen Nakashima on The Washington Post website here.

Fact-checking the opening day of the Trump impeachment hearings

Washington Post logoHere’s a roundup of misleading claims made during the opening day of House impeachment hearings.

“President [Volodymyr] Zelensky didn’t announce he was going to investigate [Ukrainian gas company] Burisma or the Bidens. He didn’t do a press conference and say: ‘I’m going to investigate the Bidens. We’re going to investigate Burisma.’ He didn’t tweet about it … and yet you said you have a clear understanding that those two things were going to happen — the money was going to get released but not until there was an investigation. And that in fact didn’t happen.”

“You have to ask yourself: What did President Zelensky actually do to get the aid? The answer is nothing. He did nothing. He didn’t open any investigations. He didn’t call Attorney General Bill Barr. He didn’t do any of the things that House Democrats say that he was being forced and coerced and threatened to do. He didn’t do anything because he didn’t have to.”

“For the millions of Americans viewing today, the two most important facts are the following. Number one, Ukraine received the aid. Number two, there was in fact no investigation into Biden.”

The “nothing to see here” defense was a recurring theme in the hearing. Republicans argued that Ukrainian officials never opened the investigations President Trump requested into the Bidens or supposed Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election, yet Trump released the nearly $400 million aid package for Ukraine anyway.

But this is a selective retelling of events. Missing is any mention of key developments between July 18, when the White House told agencies to freeze Ukraine’s aid package, and Sept. 11, when the White House released the funds.

View the complete November 14 article by Glenn Kessler and Salvador Rizzo on The Washington Post website here.

Here’s why Republican impeachment theatrics — as buffoonish as they are — serve a purpose for the GOP

The Hill logoLiberal and progressive pundits — and some Never Trump conservatives as well — have been highly critical of the silly, buffoonish theatrics that Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, Rep. Devin Nunes of California and other far-right House Republicans brought to the first public testimony in the impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump. But then, Jordan and Nunes weren’t trying to win over liberals, progressives or anti-Trump conservatives on Wednesday, November 13, when they aggressively attacked the testimony of two diplomats: Ambassador William B. Taylor (top U.S. ambassador to Ukraine) and the U.S. State Department’s George P. Kent (deputy assistant secretary for European and Eurasian affairs). They were playing to Trump’s hardcore MAGA base, pushing emotional buttons rather than relying on substance.

For that matter, Jordan and Nunes weren’t trying to win over independents either. They were preaching to the converted, determined to show pro-Trump voters that they still have their backs.

Rep. Adam Schiff, Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, knew what he was doing with Taylor and Kent’s testimony — and that testimony made a strong case for impeaching Trump. Schiff and other House Democrats showed exactly why Trump deserves impeachment: during a phone conversation on July 25, Trump tried to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into investigating a political rival — former Vice President Joe Biden — as well as his son, Hunter Biden. The testimony demonstrated that Trump withheld military aid to Ukraine and made an investigation of the Bidens a condition of that aid.

View the complete November 15 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Democrats say Trump tweet is ‘witness intimidation,’ fuels impeachment push

The Hill logoHouse Democrats wasted no time Friday saying President Trump’s real-time Twitter attack on a top U.S. diplomat — as she was testifying on Trump’s dealings with Ukraine — was more evidence of presidential misconduct as they charge ahead with their impeachment probe. 

“The president in real time is engaging in witness intimidation and witness tampering,” an exasperated Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), a member of the Intelligence Committee, told reporters during a break in the hearing with Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine who was removed abruptly in May.

“I don’t know how much more egregious it has to get before the American people are going to recognize we have someone in the White House who conducts himself in a criminal manner on a day-to-day basis.”

View the complete November 15 article by Mike Lillis and Scott Wong on The Hill website here.

Yovanovitch responds to Trump tweets at hearing, says he’s trying to intimidate

The Hill logoFormer U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch responded in real time to tweets from President Trump denigrating her as she testified in a House impeachment hearing, stating that they were meant to intimidate her.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) offered Yovanovitch the chance to respond to Trump after he paused her dramatic testimony to read Trump’s tweet.

“It’s very intimidating,” Yovanovitch said. “I can’t speak to what the president is trying to do, but I think the effect is to be intimidating.”

View the complete November 15 article by Maggie Miller on The Hill website here.

Diplomat ties Trump closer to Ukraine furor

The Hill logoThe top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine on Wednesday offered a long and intricate account of President Trump’s “highly irregular” foreign policy in Kyiv, providing new details of the episode — ones that appeared to boost Democrats’ case — in the first public hearing of their impeachment inquiry.

House Democrats left the open hearing buzzing about the new developments provided by William Taylor, U.S. chargé d’affaires for Ukraine, during his nearly five-hour appearance on Capitol Hill.

In measured and detailed testimony, Taylor more strongly tied Trump to the push for investigations meant to benefit the president, revealing that a member of his staff overheard a conversation between Trump and U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland the day after the president’s July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

View the complete November 13 article by Olivia Beavers, Morgan Chalfant and Mike Lillis on The Hill website here.