Ukraine Phone Call Is the Russian Trump Tower Meeting on Steroids

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

If the emerging details are accurate, Donald Trump’s efforts to get Ukraine to interfere in the 2020 election are not just a repeat of his overtures toward Russia in 2016 — they’re worse.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that, on a late-July call with Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump pressured the Eastern European leader “about eight times” to support Rudy Giuliani’s efforts to dig up dirt that could damage the presidential campaign of Joe Biden.

(A bit of context is helpful here: Biden’s son Hunter was involved in an energy deal in Ukraine. Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, has made unsubstantiated claims that Joe Biden pressured the Ukrainian government, during his term as Vice President, to benefit his son. “Not one single credible outlet has given credibility to these assertions,” candidate Biden told reporters Friday. Ukrainian officials have previously said they have no evidence of wrongdoing by the Bidens.)

At the time of the phone call between Trump and the Ukrainian leader, $250 million in U.S. military aid to Ukraine had been authorized by Congress, but not yet delivered by the Trump administration. The aid was vitally needed: Ukraine is menaced by Russia, which annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. According to the Wall Street Journal report, the status of this funding was not directly mentioned by Trump on the phone call. But it was, inescapably, hanging in the balance.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/ukraine-russia-trump-tower-meeting-888003/

[dalton99a]

1. Kick

Its as if, instead of merely pleading, as he did on live TV during the campaign, “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Trump had actually phoned Vladimir Putin and directly asked him to work with Michael Cohen on unearthing Clinton’s emails, while dangling a lucrative reward to encourage the Kremlin’s participation.

The alleged abuse of power is staggering. This incident appears to have prompted a whistle-blower complaint from a member of the intelligence community that the Trump executive branch is now, unaccountably, refusing to release to Congress.

Given that this Ukraine phone call took place immediately following Mueller’s testimony to Congress, Trump seems to have taken the Special Counsel’s refusal to recommend prosecution for the 2016 campaign’s dirty dancing with Russia — and Congress’ refusal to pursue impeachment over evidence of obstruction of justice — as carte blanche to seek foreign-government interference in the 2020 campaign.

For his part, Biden released a statement on Friday calling out Trump’s “abhorrent” behavior. “If these reports are true, then there is truly no bottom to President Trump’s willingness to abuse his power and abase our country,” Biden said. “Such clear cut corruption damages and diminishes our institutions of government by making them tools of a personal political vendetta.”

Link to tweet

[triron]

2. No not worse; just done more openly. Trump got away with treason to get the Presidency.

Why not do it again?