Tag: Trump White House

Key Trump aide gets massive promotion after refusing to testify in impeachment probe

AlterNet logoPresident Donald Trump gave a promotion to Robert Blair, a top aide to acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, just weeks after Blair refused to testify before the House of Representatives in its impeachment inquiry.

Trump appointed Blair as the special representative for international telecommunications policy, an office that will give him the responsibility to “promote a secure and reliable global telecommunications system,” according to Politico. According to a White House statement, Blair “will support the Administration’s 5G efforts led by the Assistant to the President for Economy Policy, Larry Kudlow. Mr. Blair will continue to serve as Assistant to the President and the Senior Advisor to the Chief of Staff.”

Blair refused to appear at a Nov. 4 deposition intended to explore what he may have known Trump’s order to withhold military aid from Ukraine, which was apparently linked to Trump’s effort to force the Ukrainian government to open an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden and alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign. House Democrats had subpoenaed Blair on Nov. 3. Continue reading

Bannon’s Work With Wanted Chinese Billionaire Began Shortly After He Left White House

New York Times logoStephen K. Bannon, once President Trump’s top political adviser, struck up a business relationship with a mysterious and wanted Chinese billionaire just after his White House job ended.

Almost immediately after ending his White House employment, Stephen K. Bannon, the former chief strategist to President Trump, forged a lucrative financial relationship with a mysterious Chinese billionaire who was sought by Beijing for extradition from the United States.

China’s government had already accused Guo Wengui, a real estate magnate also known as Miles Kwok, of money laundering, bribery and rape when he and Mr. Bannon developed a mutually beneficial relationship that began with a $150,000 loan to Mr. Trump’s onetime confidant, according to a memo written in May 2019 and obtained by The New York Times.

It escalated to a yearlong million-dollar contract, for which Mr. Bannon promised to introduce executives of Guo Media to “media personalities,” according to the news outlet Axios. Continue reading

Saudi sentencing in Khashoggi killing draws criticism — except from White House

The Hill logoSaudi Arabia’s death sentence Monday for five people connected to journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s killing after a trial shrouded in secrecy has prompted widespread criticism — except from the White House.

The White House has not issued an official statement as of Monday afternoon, but a senior administration called the sentencing an “important step.”

“This is an important step in holding those responsible for this terrible crime accountable, and we encourage Saudi Arabia to continue with a fair and transparent judicial process,” the official said.

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Democrats aren’t ruling out more articles of impeachment against Trump: ‘McGahn’s testimony is critical’

AlterNet logoSome critics of President Donald Trump — Democrats as well as Never Trump conservatives — have argued that the U.S. House of Representatives should have brought more than two articles of impeachment against Trump. But there is nothing in the U.S. Constitution saying that House Democrats cannot pursue additional articles if they decide to, and according to a House Judiciary Committee court filing on Monday,  they aren’t ruling out that possibility.

Politico reported on Monday (12/31/19) that the House Judiciary Committee was trying to enforce a subpoena of former White House Counsel Don McGahn to determine “whether to recommend additional articles of impeachment.”

According to House of Representatives Counsel Douglas Letter in the court filing, testimony from McGahn “remains central to” the House Judiciary Committee’s “ongoing inquiry into the president’s obstructive conduct. If McGahn’s testimony produces new evidence supporting the conclusion that President Trump committed impeachable offenses that are not covered by the articles approved by the House, the Committee will proceed accordingly — including, if necessary, by considering whether to recommend new articles of impeachment.”

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White House official directed hold on Ukraine aid shortly after Trump’s July 25 call with Zelensky

Washington Post logoAn official from the White House budget office directed the Defense Department to “hold off” on sending military aid to Ukraine less than two hours after President Trump’s controversial phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, according to internal emails.

Michael Duffey, a senior budget official, told Pentagon officials that Trump had become personally interested in the Ukraine aid and had ordered the hold, according to the heavily redacted emails, obtained by the Center for Public Integrity on Friday in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. He also asked the Pentagon not to discuss the hold widely.

“Given the sensitive nature of the request, I appreciate your keeping that information closely held to those who need to know to execute the direction,” Duffey wrote in a July 25 email to Pentagon Comptroller Elaine McCusker and others.

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White House hiding documents that show officials waved red flags over reasons for withholding Ukraine aid: report

AlterNet logoOn Saturday (December 21), The Daily Beast reported that the White House is blacking out documents that could reveal more about whether low-level officials at the Office of Management and Budget were concerned that President Donald Trump’s scheme to withhold military aid from Ukraine was illegal.

“The administration so far has declined to release copies of its internal communications about this vital issue — the legality of what Trump had ordered,” reported The Beast. “On Friday, in 146 pages of new documents provided to the Center for Public Integrity under a court order, the Justice Department blacked out — for the second time — many of the substantive passages reflecting what key officials at the Pentagon and the Office of Management and Budget said to one another.”

At issue is a federal law known as the Impoundment Control Act. Under this law, the White House must release funds appropriated by Congress, and cannot withhold them without a clear reason under law communicated to Congress. There was a September 30 deadline past which point failure to release any of the funds would be illegal — and while the delay ultimately did not hit that deadline, OMB officials worried that the longer they waited, the more difficult it would be to follow the law. At least two resigned rather than carry out the suspension.

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Trump administration demanded Democrats strip Ukraine aid language from spending package

Washington Post logoThe language would have required the White House to release Ukraine defense aid quickly.

Senior Trump administration officials in recent days threatened a presidential veto that could have led to a government shutdown if House Democrats refused to drop language requiring prompt release of future military aid for Ukraine, according to five administration and congressional officials.

The language was ultimately left out of mammoth year-end spending legislation that passed the House and Senate this week ahead of a Saturday shutdown deadline. The White House said President Trump signed the $1.4 trillion package Friday night.

The Ukraine provision was one of several items the White House drew a hard line on during negotiations to finalize the spending legislation, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the developments. It would have required the White House to swiftly release $250 million in defense money for Ukraine that was part of the spending package.

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Former White House officials say they feared Putin influenced the president’s views on Ukraine and 2016 campaign

Washington Post logoAlmost from the moment he took office, President Trump seized on a theory that troubled his senior aides: Ukraine, he told them on many occasions, had tried to stop him from winning the White House.

After meeting privately in July 2017 with Russian President Vladi­mir Putin at the Group of 20 summit in Hamburg, Trump grew more insistent that Ukraine worked to defeat him, according to multiple former officials familiar with his assertions.

The president’s intense resistance to the assessment of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia systematically interfered in the 2016 campaign — and the blame he cast instead on a rival country — led many of his advisers to think that Putin himself helped spur the idea of Ukraine’s culpability, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions.

Trump’s top economic aide just made a stunning admission about the president’s dealings with China

AlterNet logoWhite House Director of Economic Policy Larry Kudlow made a stunning admission on Wednesday as he was discussing President Donald Trump’s trade negotiations with China.

Eamon Javers, a CNBC journalist covering the economy, reported on the remarks Kudlow made to a group of reporters. Kudlow said that Henry Kissinger, President Richard Nixon’s former secretary of State, had recently been to the White House — and he has also recently met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping twice.

“I asked if Kissinger is playing a back channel role in trade talks,” Javers said. Continue reading

Schiff Suggests Pence ‘Purposefully’ Misled Intelligence Committee about His Call with Zelensky

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff accused Vice President Mike Pence of refusing to declassify information “directly relevant” to the impeachment inquiry in order to conceal his role in the quid pro quo scheme for which President Trump is being impeached.

Pence’s Russia adviser Jennifer Williams testified last month about the vice president’s September 18 phone call with Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Schiff requested ten days later that Pence declassify her testimony, contained in a November 26 letter from her lawyer, but Pence last week declined to do so in a letter to Schiff.

The testimony “raises profound questions about your knowledge of the President’s scheme to solicit Ukraine’s interference in the 2020 U.S. presidential election,” Schiff wrote in a Tuesday letter to Pence, adding that Pence’s letter refusing to classify Williams’s testimony is “deeply troubling.” Continue reading