Questions about the whistleblower complaint

[struggle4progress]

... we now know that this whistleblower’s complaint involves Trump and alleges that he made some kind of a “promise” to a foreign leader. We then learned that the complaint involves Ukraine. By Friday afternoon, we learned Trump had pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in a July 25 call to launch an investigation involving the Bidens. (The Wall Street Journal first reported that and said Trump pressed Zelensky on the matter about eight times)

Intelligence community Inspector General Michael Atkinson has reviewed the complaint and determined that it was credible. Generally, that means there is corroboration beyond just the one source. Atkinson also determined that it was a matter of “urgent concern,” which is a legal threshold that requires notifying the relevant congressional committees. In this case, that would be the intelligence committees ...

... Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire has refused to share the complaint ...

... White House Counsel Pat Cipollone has been trying to set up legal obstacles, like claiming jurisdictional issues, to prevent Maguire from handing it over to Congress ...

... Schiff has said that if Maguire doesn’t comply, he will require him to testify in an open session, at which point lawmakers could pepper him with difficult questions. Maguire is now scheduled to testify Thursday ...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/09/20/questions-about-trump-whistleblower-answered/

[struggle4progress]

1. 'Urged' Ukraine's President to Investigate Biden's Son

BY JONATHAN LEMIRE / AP 6:19 PM EDT

... Two people familiar with the matter say the complaint was based on a series of events, one of which was a July 25 call between Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

One of the people says Trump urged Zelenskiy to probe the activities of potential rival Biden’s son Hunter, who worked for a Ukrainian gas company. The people were not authorized to discuss the issue by name ...

https://time.com/5683001/whistleblower-trump-ukraine-biden-investigation/

[struggle4progress]

2. Pressed Ukrainian leader to investigate Biden's son

By MATT ZAPOTOSKY, GREG MILLER, ELLEN NAKASHIMA, CAROL D. LEONNIG
WASHINGTON POST |
SEP 20, 2019 | 5:41 PM | WASHINGTON

President Donald Trump pressed the leader of Ukraine to investigate the son of former Vice President Joe Biden in a call between the two leaders that is at the center of an extraordinary whistleblower complaint, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Trump used the July 25 conversation with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to pressure the recently elected leader to more aggressively pursue an investigation that Trump believed would deliver potential political dirt against one of the president's political adversaries, the people said ...

The call is part of a broader set of facts included in the whistleblower complaint that is at the center of a showdown between the executive branch and Congress, with officials in the Trump administration refusing to divulge any information about the substance of an August 12 report to the inspector general of the U.S. intelligence community.

The revelation that Trump pushed Zelensky to pursue the Biden probe, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, represents the most detailed account so far of the president's conduct that prompted a U.S. intelligence official to file a whistleblower action against the president ...

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/nationworld/ct-nw-wp-trump-ukraine-biden-whistleblower-complaint-20190920-hp2e3xrm2rffndk5jh76ti5wlm-story.html

[struggle4progress]

3. Whistleblower timeline

~snip~

July 25: Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky talk by phone. In a readout, the Ukraine government readout references discussion of investigating corruption, but the White House version makes no mention — saying only that he was congratulating him on his recent election.

~snip~

August: Giuliani says he spoke to a representative for Zelensky by phone and in person.

~snip~

August 12: A whistleblower files a complaint with the intelligence inspector general.

~snip~

September 2: Deadline for DNI to send whistleblower complaint to Congress — he does not send it.

~ snip~

http://www.wbap.com/news/whistleblower-timeline-team-trump-contacts-and-ukraine/

[struggle4progress]

4. Tracking the Whistleblower, Trump, and Ukraine: Timeline

By Andrew Taylor and The Associated Press
September 20, 2019

... recent disclosures related to Trump and top advisers on Ukraine .. are drawing scrutiny. Leading Democratic investigators question whether Trump briefly withheld security aid to Ukraine to pressure the Ukrainian government and new Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to conduct investigations that might help him politically. Trump was asked about the matter Friday and did not deny discussing an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden with Zelenskiy ...

May 9, 2019: Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, acknowledges he plans to travel to Ukraine to urge the new government to investigate the role Biden's son Hunter had in a gas company owned by a Ukrainian businessman. Giuliani says he will also press for a review of allegations circulating in conservative circles that Ukraine may have helped Hillary Clinton's campaign. Giuliani cancels the trip amid criticism but continues his lobbying campaign over ensuing months ...

Sept. 9, 2019: <Inspector General Michael> Atkinson reveals the existence of the whistleblower's complaint to lawmakers and the refusal of the acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, to transmit it to the intelligence committees as directed by the law. Atkinson notes that Maguire disagreed with his conclusions and appeared to be treating the complaint differently than in similar past cases ...

Sept. 11-12, 2019: In advance of a Senate Appropriations Committee vote designed to force the release of the $250 million military aid package, the administration relents and frees up the military aid, along with $142 billion in State Department funds. The panel is laden with Republicans sympathetic to Ukraine ...

https://fortune.com/2019/09/20/trump-ukraine-whistleblower-timeline/

[struggle4progress]

5. Team Trump's response to the Ukraine whistleblower crisis

Molly Jong-Fast New York
2 hours ago

... Rudy Giuliani actually admitted to meddling in May in the New York Times when he told Ken Vogal, “We’re not meddling in an election; we’re meddling in an investigation, which we have a right to do.” So perhaps we shouldn’t have been surprised that the foreign government the whistleblower was whistleblowing about was Ukraine ...

... the president’s favorite breakfast show cheerfully explained to its viewers that what looked like potential treason was in fact merely “the art of the deal.” Yes, possible corruption was actually just deal-making! Geraldo Rivera chimed in to call out the whistleblower for being “annoying, this is a punk, a punk who's snitching out the president's phone calls to a foreign leader”. Newt Gingrich volunteered an “executive powers” defense. Gingrich has himself been plagued by ethics scandals, so perhaps he’s the perfect person to defend such an ethically challenged president ...

... The president’s defenders will die on all the hills for their leader, and the strategies are becoming wearingly obvious. First, they will start by denying or ignoring something, or by saying that the president was just joking and you’re not supposed to take him literally or figuratively or in whatever way you did. Then, sooner or later, they almost always get around to the defense that if a crime is committed by the president of the United States, it’s not really a crime at all ...

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/trump-ukraine-whistleblower-republicans-fox-news-meghan-mccain-a9114151.html

[struggle4progress]

6. Congressmembers ramp up impeachment calls

... Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) was one of the first to respond to the report, as he was on the phone with The Washington Post's Robert Costa when it broke. If Trump "requested that the president of Ukraine interfere in an American election, we are in really dangerous, brand new territory," Murphy said, later vaguely adding in a tweet that "Congress must act."

Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) was .. more explicit ... asking people to "flood" House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) with "pro-impeachment phone calls" ...

https://theweek.com/speedreads/866832/white-supremacy-now-homeland-securitys-list-terrorist-threats

[struggle4progress]

7. Ukraine Scandal Is Hiding in Plain Sight

by Jonathan Chait

... the whole plot has been sitting in plain sight, a gigantic scandal that has confounded the media and the opposition in part through its very nakedness.

... The Wall Street Journal reports that, in a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump repeatedly pressured his counterpart to work with Giuliani on an investigation of Biden. We are learning more details of a story whose broader contours have been clear more months.

We have known since last spring that Trump, working through Giuliani, is pressuring Ukraine to supply dirt on Joe Biden. The alleged misconduct by Biden concerns his work as vice-president under the Obama administration. The allegation is that Biden supposedly tried to sack a Ukrainian prosecutor who was propbing his son’s business in the country. The allegation against Biden is totally baseless. In fact, as Bloomberg News discovered, the prosecution was finished before Biden took a stance, the prosecutor was widely considered corrupt, his sacking was consistent with the administration’s pro-democracy agenda, and the Obama administration supported the investigation into Hunter Biden anyway.

... Last spring, Giuliani gave the New York Times a series of insanely incriminating quotes, such as, “We’re not meddling in an election; we’re meddling in an investigation, which we have a right to do,” and “There’s nothing illegal about it. Somebody could say it’s improper,” and “I’m going to give [Ukraine] reasons why they shouldn’t stop [the investigation] because that information will be very, very helpful to my client, and may turn out to be helpful to my government.” Note how the last line, Giuliani even concedes the interests of his client, Trump, differ from the interests of the U.S. government — while maintaining that he wants Ukraine to help both ...

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/09/trumps-ukraine-scandal-is-hiding-in-plain-sight.html

[struggle4progress]

8. Welcome to the Ukrainian swamp

by Anne Applebaum
Columnist
September 20 at 4:32 PM

He was an ordinary schoolteacher, living at home with his parents, disrespected by his pupils, ignored by an unjust society. But finally he had enough: Thinking nobody was watching, he began ranting about the corruption all around him. One of his students made a video of that rant and put it online. The video went viral, because it reflected the feelings of so many people. The schoolteacher, unexpectedly, became the president.

That, of course, is the plot of “Servant of the People,” the television comedy that launched the real political career of its star actor, Volodymyr Zelensky. Having played the president on TV, Zelensky is now the real president. A few months into his term, he is enjoying a honeymoon many other leaders would envy: 71 percent of Ukrainians say they approve of the president’s performance so far, a very high percentage in a country that is often cynical about politics and politicians. What the voters seem to like, above all, is Zelensky’s language about ending corruption. This was the issue that brought the fictional president to power, and this is the issue that brought the real president to power, too.

The popular support could give Zelensky license to make some really fundamental changes. Since attaining independence, Ukraine, a nation that excels at creating civic institutions, has been much less successful in its attempts to create neutral, nonpartisan state institutions. The country’s long history of totalitarian and authoritarian rule means that the public is wary of the state and its civil servants; civil servants, in turn, are poorly paid, and thus easily bribed, which compounds this mistrust ...

... not everybody believes that Zelensky will follow through. In the past, Zelensky has been closely connected with one of Ukraine’s wealthiest oligarchs, Ihor Kolomoisky, the owner of the television channel that broadcast the president’s comedy show. Kolomoisky also owned a bank that the previous government said was used to launder money and to illegally fund other businesses. To protect depositors, the government bailed it out, at vast expense, and nationalized it. Now Kolomoisky is back in the country, appearing in public, having his photograph taken with Zelensky — and talking about getting his bank back ...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/under-trump-weve-finally-become-part-of-the-ukrainian-swamp/2019/09/20/0c97574a-dbc1-11e9-bfb1-849887369476_story.html

[struggle4progress]

9. It's confusing . . . and it's not good, folks. Not good

By TESSA STUART

The whistle-blower complaint at the center of a dispute between the White House and Congress concerns a phone call President Trump had with new Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, according to reports published a minute apart in the Washington Post and New York Times. At the time of the phone call, there were reports that the White House was considering blocking $250 million in aid to Ukraine.

Those stories built on reporting from earlier this week that suggested President Trump had made a “promise” to an unnamed foreign leader, and that an intelligence official who’d heard that promise found it troubling enough to file a whistle-blower complaint. Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson, who received the complaint, deemed the situation an “urgent matter.”

Typically, such a report would, at that point, automatically be sent to Congress, where the committees charged with oversight of the intelligence community would investigate it. But that didn’t happen in this case. Instead, Congress’ efforts to secure the complaint have been blocked by Trump’s Department of Justice — a move so breathtakingly antithetical to the purpose of the whistle-blower statute it wasn’t even contemplated by legislators who wrote it.

Congress and the Trump White House are still at loggerheads over the issue. In the meantime, more details about the call in question are beginning to trickle out, and those details are prompting further questions ...

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-biden-ukraine-whistleblower-explainer-887570/

[struggle4progress]

10. If Trump extorted a foreign leader for political gain

By Max Boot
Columnist
September 20 at 1:36 PM

Until now, I have been willing to accede to the judgment of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to go slow on impeachment proceedings that are unpopular with voters and could imperil the Democratic majority. But if the new scandal involving President Trump and Ukraine is as bad as it seems — and that is, of course, a very big if at this early stage — the House will have no choice but to impeach, consequences be damned.

Already, since the release of the Mueller report and the waning of the impeachment threat (despite damning evidence of obstruction of justice), Trump has become more brazen in flouting the law. In August, he expressed interest in holding the Group of Seven summit at his own Doral resort in Florida — a violation of the Constitution’s emoluments clause — and he allegedly told aides that he would pardon them if they broke the law to build his border wall. Charles Fried, solicitor general in the Reagan administration, observes that promising a pardon to induce illegality “is the essence of tyranny and lawlessness.” In September, Trump invoked a bogus claim of executive privilege to limit the congressional testimony of former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, and he still refuses to comply with lawful requests for his financial records — most recently from the district attorney in Manhattan.

But all this is small change compared with what could be the next big scandal. On Wednesday, The Post reported that an intelligence community whistleblower had lodged a report alleging that Trump had made an improper “promise” to a foreign leader. This complaint was considered so troubling by a Trump-appointed inspector general that he asked that the acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, immediately forward the complaint to Congress, but Maguire refused to do so, reportedly on the advice of William Barr’s Justice Department. Then on Thursday night, The Post reported that the complaint centers on Ukraine ...

It is no secret that Trump and his attorney, Rudolph Giuliani, have been pressuring Ukraine to open a corruption investigation into Democratic front-runner Joe Biden. Their contention is that Biden, as vice president, encouraged the firing of Ukraine’s top prosecutor because he was probing a company that employed Biden’s son. Numerous journalists have shown that this accusation is bogus. The prosecutor was notoriously lax in pursuing corruption cases. So rather than fomenting corruption, Biden was fighting it. Trump and Giuliani have been acting in a highly improper fashion to induce a foreign government to lie on Trump’s behalf ...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/09/20/if-whistle-blows-trump-administration-does-it-make-sound/

[maxsolomon]

11. Pepper him with difficult questions? I'm sure he's terrified!

Is there no recourse in the Judicial Branch to force the Executive Branch to comply with clear, indisputable laws like this?

[rockfordfile]

12. it's a distraction

[struggle4progress]

13. Asked Ukraine president 8 times to investigate Biden's son

Lily Puckett
New York
38 minutes ago

... The Wall Street Journal said Mr Trump made the request to his Ukrainian counterpart eight times during the phone call in July. The Washington Post also said Mr Trump made the request during the call, which took place one day after former special counsel Robert Mueller testified before Congress about Russian interference in US elections ...

Earlier this month, Democrats on Capitol Hill announced they were launching investigations into efforts by Mr Trump to ask Ukraine to interfere in 2020. The Democratic chairs of the house intelligence, oversight and foreign affairs committees wrote to the White House and state department seeking records related to what they described as efforts to “manipulate the Ukrainian justice system” ...

On Thursday night Mr Giuliani insisted to CNN that he didn’t ask Ukrainian officials to investigate Mr Biden, but 30 seconds later said “of course” he did ...

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-whistleblower-dam-schiff-joseph-maguire-intelligence-ukraine-a9114011.html

[struggle4progress]

14. Complaint accuses Trump of using aid package to pressure Ukraine

By DAVE GOLDINER
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
SEP 20, 2019 | 9:39 AM

... “It doesn’t matter what I discussed,” Trump told reporters at a later photo op ...

https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-whistleblower-trump-ukraine-joe-biden-20190920-gss2uqhywzcf5elbg2zeyficpe-story.html

[struggle4progress]

15. Whistleblower flap will make life difficult for future presidents

By MICHAEL MCGOUGHSENIOR EDITORIAL WRITER
SEP. 20, 2019 10:10 AM

... On Thursday Trump tweeted: “Virtually anytime I speak on the phone to a foreign leader, I understand that there may be many people listening from various U.S. agencies, not to mention those from the other country itself. No problem. Knowing all of this, is anybody dumb enough to believe that I would say something inappropriate with a foreign leader while on such a potentially ‘heavily populated’ call. I would only do what is right anyway, and only do well for the USA!” ...

Actually it’s all too easy to imagine Trump saying something inappropriate in a conversation with a foreign leader. This is the president, after all, who tweeted out what seemed to be a classified reconnaissance photo of the site of an accident at an Iranian space facility. And remember the meeting in which Trump reportedly shared classified information about an Islamic State plot with visiting Russian diplomats? ...

... His trashing of norms of behavior that have been followed by past presidents means that future presidents may find it harder to do their job.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2019-09-20/opinion-trumps-ukraine-whistleblower-flap-future-presidents

[Sneederbunk]

16. Now the question is: What the hell are we waiting for? Proceed.