Tag: leningradlindsey

Week 145 in Trump – Impeachment News

Posted on November 15, 2019 in Impeachment, Trump

From The Economist, “Testimony from Alexander Vindman, a decorated veteran, is hard to trash as partisan sniping.” And yet Republicans find a way to do just that. The smears against Vindman are shameful, accusing a decorated war veteran (and actual Ukraine expert, not the fake one) of being unable to be loyal to the U.S. because he’s Ukrainian. BTW, he came here when he was 3. When your only defense is to question the loyalty of the witness, you don’t have a good defense.

After the testimony we’ve heard so far, it seems that while hardly anybody actually approved of withholding aid from Ukraine, much less withholding it until they “did us a favor though,” nobody wanted to say anything about it. Nobody wanted to rock the boat and tell Trump it was wrong, and they all thought they could manipulate a way to get the aid released without the quid pro quo (or with it, if they had to). They all had the same goal, which was different from Trump’s, but were afraid to say it to his face.

Here’s what happened on the impeachment front for the week ending November 3…

General Happenings:

  1. Can’t keep all the moving pieces in the Ukraine investigation straight? Here’s a helpful and thorough timeline of Ukraine events, starting with the Russia invasion in 2014.
    • And here’s a little more history. Ukraine’s former President Petro Poroshenko tried in January 2017 to meet with Trump, hiring a lobbying firm, BGR Group, to make that happen. On June 7, 2017, Giuliani visited Kyiv and met with Poroshenko and Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko (Viktor Shokin’s successor). Just after that meeting, the investigation into the “black ledger” was shelved. That ledger listed allegedly illicit payments to Manafort. In May of 2018, Ukraine halted cooperation with Mueller’s investigation to “avoid irritating the top American officials.”
  1. Not only are U.S. intelligence officials alarmed by Trump’s actions involving Ukraine and counter-investigations, but U.K. intelligence officials are also expressing alarm by Trump’s requests for assistance with Barr’s investigations into the origins of the Russia investigation. They say “it is like nothing we have come across before, they are basically asking, in quite robust terms, for help in doing a hatchet job on their own intelligence services.”
  2. National Security Council officials knew as early as May that Rudy Giuliani and Gordon Sondland had Ukraine officials rattled by their pressure campaign to open specific investigations in order to obtain military aid from the U.S.
    • Giuliani was pushing the incoming Ukrainian administration to change the leadership of Naftogaz, a state-owned energy company.
    • Giuliani’s associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman also helped with the pressure campaign, both on Naftogaz and finding dirt on Hunter Biden. Parnas and Fruman were trying to sell natural gas to Naftogaz.
    • At this point, Joe Biden had only been in the presidential primary race for about three weeks.
    • Sondland advised then-new President Zelensky on who to place in influential posts in his administration.
    • Meanwhile, other ambassadors advised Zelensky on how not to get dragged into our domestic politics.
    • <rant>So our National SECURITY Council knew about this for almost five months and did nothing? The only reason this is coming out is because of one lone whistleblower? This is not only a disgrace; it’s alarming that we can’t count on these folks to watch out for our safety.</rant>
  1. House committees want to depose John Bolton, but it isn’t likely he’ll appear without a judge’s approval to override Trump’s claim of executive privilege.
  2. Matt Gaetz files an ethics complaint against Adam Schiff for what he says are two violations of House rules:
    • Schiff’s recap of Trump’s conversation with Zelensky wasn’t read word for word.
    • Schiff won’t allow Members of Congress who aren’t on the Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, or Oversight Committees to attend the private depositions.
  1. Attorneys for the whistleblower have been receiving death threats.
  2. The State Department agrees to release documents relevant to Trump’s dealings with Ukraine. The release is the result of a lawsuit brought shortly after Trump dismissed U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch.
  3. In a case about whether former White House Counsel Don McGahn can be compelled to testify in the impeachment hearings, the judge is incredulous at the argument made by DOJ lawyers. They say former presidential aids can never be compelled to testify by Congress. For that matter, former presidents themselves can’t be compelled to testify. The judge calls it a peculiar argument that threatens the Constitution’s system of checks and balances.
    • At the same time, another federal judge is hearing a case brought by Charles Kupperman, a former top deputy to John Bolton. Kupperman defies his congressional subpoena to appear. Instead, he awaits guidance from the judge about whether he should listen to the executive branch, which invoked constitutional immunity in his case, or if he should heed Congress’s subpoena. Constitutional immunity is essentially a higher level of executive privilege.
  1. Now that impeachment proceedings are official, Trump says he’d rather go into the details of the situation than the process of impeachment. In other words, he doesn’t want Republicans out there attacking House Democrats’ process anymore. They aren’t listening to him.
  2. In fact, Trump tells a half dozen Senate Republicans to start saying that the summary of the phone call released by the White House exonerates Trump.
  3. The whistleblower whose complaint started this whole thing agrees to answer written questions from House Republicans under oath. This comes after Trump urges news organizations to out the identity of the whistleblower. The agreement is conditioned on the questions not being designed to determine the whistleblower’s identity.
    • House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy suggests that written answers aren’t enough.
    • And this is rich. Trump, who refused to be interviewed by Robert Mueller and instead turned in written “answers,” also says written answers aren’t enough.
  1. The White House is debating whether to release a transcript of a call between Vice President Mike Pence and Zelensky.
  2. Derek Harvey, a top aide to Representative Devin Nunes (R-CA), has been releasing information about the whistleblower to conservative journalists and politicians.

Impeachment Vote:

  1. At the beginning of the week, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the House will hold a vote on the impeachment process. Just what Republicans wanted, right? Public hearings? Wrong. They all vote against it, but it still passes.
  2. To reiterate, after weeks of complaining about how the hearings were being held in private and against the rules, Republicans in the House all vote against holding public hearings.
  3. Also, after weeks of saying the inquiry was invalid because the House hadn’t voted on it, Republicans refuse to validate it. (Democrats argue that the House vote isn’t necessary to validate the impeachment inquiries, and a court recently agreed.)
  4. The resolution:
    • Establishes procedures for hearings.
    • Opens up hearings to the public (but depositions are still private).
    • Defines how transcripts of the existing depositions will be handled (they’ll be released publicly).
    • Gives Representative Adam Schiff broad authority to call witnesses for testimony, which will be public. Republicans can call their own witnesses, too; but Democrats can vote them down (I’m not sure what the precedent for that is).
    • Allows Trump’s attorneys to participate in Judiciary Committee hearings.
    • Directs House committees to continue their ongoing investigations into Trump.
    • Provides a record of whether each Representative supports this inquiry. This puts Republicans in a bind. They’ve been complaining about the secrecy of the hearings, but if they approve this resolution, it’ll look like they approve of impeachment. On the other hand, if they reject it, they’ll look hypocritical for complaining about private hearings. After it passes, though, I don’t see anyone making a big deal about this.
  1. The committees on the impeachment panel will release a report and the transcripts of all the depositions held so far.
  2. The hope is that an “official” impeachment process will break through the obstruction from the White House.
  3. Pelosi says they’re taking the step to eliminate any doubt as to whether federal employees need to comply with subpoenas and requests to appear.
  4. Adam Schiff says they won’t ask federal courts to compel testimony from witnesses who refuse to cooperate or who are ordered not to cooperate by the White House.
  5. Both sides whipped up votes earlier this week, with Republicans saying that a solid party vote would show that this is a partisan crusade. I’m not sure how the same couldn’t be said of what they’re doing.
  6. Democrats say the rules are similar to those used to impeach Clinton and Nixon. Republicans say the rules are skewed against Trump.
    • The rules allow for very similar protections for the office of president as with Nixon. The presidential protections are much greater than they were for President Clinton.

More Trouble for Parnas, Fruman, and Giuliani:

  1. In response to a question about why Giuliani and Trump were so eager to get rid of Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, she says: “Individuals who have been named in the press as contacts of Mr. Giuliani may well have believed that their personal financial ambitions were stymied by our anti-corruption policy in Ukraine.”
    • Could be she was referring to Giuliani’s pals Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas, who were working on a gas deal with Ukraine gas company Naftogaz. Yovanovitch, on the other hand, was working to help Ukraine’s anti-corruption office,
  1. Igor Fruman is trying to get his house arrest and electronic GPS monitoring removed, saying the restrictions are onerous. Just a reminder, Fruman was arrested at the airport, about to board a one-way flight to Europe. His lawyer is prepared to argue he’s not a flight risk.

Alexander Vindman Deposition:

  1. Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, the senior expert on Ukraine at the National Security Council, appears before the impeachment panel in defiance of a White House order not to cooperate. He says:
    • He listened in on the phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky, so his is firsthand information.
    • Crucial words and phrases were omitted from the transcript of the call, including:
      • Trump claiming that there were tapes of Joe Biden discussing Ukraine corruption.
      • Zelensky explicitly mentioning Business Holdings, where Hunter Biden served on the board.
    • He was so appalled by Trump’s demands that Zelensky investigate the Bidens that he reported it to a National Security Council lawyer. Not just once, but twice.
    • Vindman was worried that if Zelensky complied, he’d risk losing bipartisan support for Ukraine.
    • At a July 10 meeting with Ukrainian officials, Gordon Sondland “started to speak about Ukraine delivering specific investigations in order to secure the meeting with the president.” Bolton cut the meeting short (this is corroborated by previous testimony).
    • When Sondland later “emphasized the importance that Ukraine deliver the investigations into the 2016 election, the Bidens, and Burisma,” Vindman told him that it was inappropriate, had nothing to do with national security, and that the NSC wasn’t going to get involved in something like that.
  1. Vindman was born in what is now Ukraine. He’s a decorated veteran with a purple heart. Still, commentators on Fox News suggest he’s a Ukrainian spy. Trump calls him a “Never Trumper.” Liz Cheney finally steps up and blasts those who question his patriotism and dedication to country. Mitt Romney and Roy Blunt defend Vindman as well.
    • Cheney says we need to show that we’re better than that. I couldn’t agree more.
  1. Of note, people who are accustomed to reading call transcripts have questioned the use of ellipses in the readout and have also questioned the lack of [inaudible] notations. These all led people to believe words were omitted.
  2. White House lawyer John Eisenberg is the guy who placed the summary of the call in the top-secret server after Vindman went to Eisenberg with his concerns. To be clear, the White House lawyer’s first reaction upon hearing that Trump did something wrong was to try to hide it so deep no one would find it.
    • Fun fact: That top-secret server is called N.I.C.E. (N.S.C. Intelligence Collaboration Environment).
  1. National security officials say this is a new thing, to store presidential conversations on the N.I.C.E. system; and this isn’t the first time they’ve done it for Trump.
  2. Vindman and Fiona Hill had already gone to Eisenberg after a meeting where Sondland pushed Ukrainian officials to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden.
  3. Vindman’s identical twin is also on the National Security Council as an ethics lawyer. He might be called in as a witness.
  4. Vindman’s testimony contradicts Gordon Sondland’s testimony. Sondland said no one raised any concerns about Trump’s actions. It also contradicts Rick Perry’s denials that he heard anything about the Bidens in relation to Ukraine.
  5. Remember that Trump didn’t know who the NSC’s Ukraine expert was (it was Vindman), and was instead getting his info on Ukraine from one of Devine Nunes’s former staffers (Kashyap Patel) who misrepresented himself to Trump as the Ukraine expert. Vindman was told not to attend a meeting because that would just confuse Trump. Patel has no Ukraine experience or expertise.

Tim Morrison Deposition:

  1. The Top Russia official on the National Security Council, Tim Morrison, resigns the day before his testimony is to begin. He’ll be replaced by Andrew Peek, currently a Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the Mideast.
    • Kurt Volker and Mike McKinley also resigned before giving their testimonies.
  1. Morrison was appointed to the NSC in 2018, but just took over Fiona Hill’s position this past July.
  2. Morrison is another official who alerted NSC lawyers about pressure from the Trump administration on Ukraine officials to open an investigation into Burisma Holdings.
  3. Like Bolton, Morrison is (by all accounts) a Republican hawk who sticks to the rules.
  4. Here are a few highlights of his testimony:
    • Morrison confirms parts of Bill Taylor’s testimony from the previous week, and says that the substance of conversations recalled by Taylor was accurate.
    • He says he was told explicitly that hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to Ukraine were conditioned upon whether the Ukraine government agreed to investigate the 2016 election and the Bidens, corroborating previous testimony.
    • He believes Trump’s actions were legal but problematic.
    • According to his recollection, the summary of the call released by the White House is correct.
    • He asked the NSC legal advisor to review the summary of the call.
    • He was concerned about the call becoming public because it could affect Ukraine’s perception of our relationship with them.
    • He warned Taylor about Trump’s attempts to block aid to Ukraine and to stop Zelensky from visiting the White House.
    • His recollection of a meeting differed from Taylor’s in that he thought Sondland told a Ukrainian official that aid was contingent upon the new Ukrainian prosecutor general committing to opening the investigations instead of Zelensky doing it.
    • However, he does verify that Gordon Sondland told a Ukrainian official that the military aid to Ukraine would be released if Ukraine opened an investigation into Burisma Holdings, where Biden Hunter served on the board. This again negates Sondland’s testimony.

Christopher Anderson Deposition:

  1. Long-time Foreign Service Officer Christopher Anderson gives his deposition to the impeachment panel. Anderson has worked in Ukraine for five years, but has spent nearly 15 years working near there. He says:
    • Trump had agreed to a meeting with Zelensky in May and wrote Zelensky a letter to that effect. But the letter didn’t mention a date.
    • John Bolton warned him that Giuliani would be an obstacle to the State Department’s mission in Ukraine, and that could be an obstacle to White House engagement with Ukraine.
    • The State Department had an optimistic view of Ukraine and the new government headed by Zelensky. That wasn’t mirrored by Trump, who was getting his information from Giuliani.
    • The State Department’s efforts to demonstrate support for Ukraine were batted down by the White House.

Catherine Croft Deposition:

  1. Catherine Croft worked on Ukraine issues at both the White House and State Department, eventually taking Christopher Anderson’s position when he left this summer. She testifies before the impeachment panel in defiance of the White House and the State Department, and she says:
    • Just like Christopher Anderson said, Trump and the State Department have differing views on Ukraine.
    • Trump constantly calls Ukraine corrupt.
    • Washington lobbyist (and former Republican Member of Congress) Robert Livingston called Croft several times to tell her Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch should be fired. Livingston told her that Yovanovitch was an “Obama holdover” and was associated with George Soros. Oh. The. Horror. Also, what do you suppose his interest in this is?
    • Bolton was concerned about our stance on Ukraine.

Week 144 in Trump

Posted on October 29, 2019 in Politics, Trump

My fellow Americans. We have just broken into the SCIF that we already had access to...wait, what? We could already come in here? Put those cell phones down!

It was a no good, very bad week for Trump on the impeachment front. The big news should’ve been that we killed the leader of ISIS. But Republican Representatives storm the SCIF where the depositions are taking place to protest that they aren’t allowed in the room. Except that about half of the people protesting actually are allowed in the room. And then William Taylor provides the most damning and wide-reaching testimony so far. And then to top his week off, he gets booed at a Nationals World Series game. It’s lonely at the top.

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending October 27…

Missed From Last Week:

  1. Miami Beach passes a resolution declaring a climate emergency, thanks to local youth climate strikes. This is the second bit of good climate news from a state where the phrase “climate change” is still forbidden in official documents.

Shootings This Week:

  1. There were five mass shootings in the U.S. this week (defined as killing or injuring four or more people):
    • A shooter injures four people in Sumter, SC. The shootings are random.
    • A shooter (or possibly multiple shooters) kills one person and injures three more at an apartment complex in Midwest City, OK.
    • In a separate shooting in Oklahoma City, OK, a shooter kills two people and injures two people.
    • A shooter at a crowded college homecoming party for Texas A&M University-Commerce kills two people and injures six more. Additionally, six people suffered injuries trying to get away.
    • A shooter kills one person and injures four more at a party in Lansing, MI.
  1. A court awards the father of a boy killed in the Sandy Hook school $450,000 in a lawsuit against conspiracy theorist James Fetzer, who wrote the book “Nobody Died at Sandy Hook” with co-author Mike Palacek.
    • Palacek settled for an undisclosed sum last month.
    • Despite the loss, Fetzer still claims his book to be true. Are these folks delusional or just assholes? It’s hard to tell.

Russia:

  1. The Turla group is a group of Russian cyber actors who disguise themselves as Iranian spies to orchestrate attacks on countries around the world. They attacked military organizations, government departments, scientific agencies, and universities in 35 countries, including the U.S. and U.K.
  2. Attorney General Andrew Barr kicks his investigations into the origins of the Russia investigation up a notch. He opens a criminal inquiry into how the investigation began.
  3. This gives John Durham, the U.S. prosecutor handling the investigation, subpoena power, the ability to convene a grand jury, and the power to file criminal charges.
    • To be clear, the DoJ has launched a criminal investigation into itself.
    • Durham only needs a reasonable indication that a crime was committed to open the criminal inquiry, which is a lower standard than the probable cause requirement for a typical criminal case.
    • The FISA warrant for surveilling Carter Page is a big part of this investigation, though several judges found the evidence sufficient to continue reissuing the FISA warrant.
    • The DOJ inspector general, Michael Horowitz, is conducting his own investigation into the origins of the Russia investigation. His report should be complete long before Durham concludes his investigation.
  1. Russian agent Maria Butina completes her sentence and is deported back to Russia.

Legal Fallout:

  1. A federal judge holds Education Secretary Betsy DeVos in contempt because she continued to collect student debt for loans for Corinthian College in violation of a previous court order. Corinthian is a defunct for-profit college that was found to be defrauding students. The judge fines the Department of Education $100,000.
  2. Trump’s lawyers take their “you can’t investigate a sitting president” a step too far when a judge gets them to argue that this is the case even if Trump does shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue. The judge asks, “Local authorities… couldn’t do anything about it?” To which Trump’s lawyer replies, “That is correct.”
  3. The National Archives opens an investigation into Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross’s use of private email for official business.
  4. Trump once again files an appeal to prevent the release of his financial statements and taxes by Mazars USA, his accounting firm.

Impeachment:

Including all this info just makes this too long, so I moved it out into its own post. You can skip right over to it if that’s your focus.

Healthcare:

  1. Just in time for World Polio Day, the World Health Organization (WHO) says another strain of the poliovirus is eradicated worldwide. This leaves one more strain to go and is thanks to a global vaccination effort. Polio was once a leading killer of children.
  2. Since the Trump administration stopped funding medical facilities that refer patients for abortion services, nearly 900 clinics have lost Title X family planning funding. Five states don’t have any Title X clinics.
  3. A judge in Oklahoma temporarily blocks a new law that would require medical practitioners to let their patients who are receiving medical abortions know that the procedure is reversible. Except that it isn’t reversible, so they’re forcing doctors to lie. Oklahoma isn’t the only state that passed this law.
  4. Northern Ireland decriminalizes abortion.
  5. Between December 2017 and June 2019, more than 1 million children were dropped from Medicaid and CHIP (the Children’s Health Insurance Program).

International:

Syria/Kurds:

  1. As the cease-fire brokered by the U.S. in Syria comes to an end, Putin meets with Turkish President Erdogan to discuss how Russia, Turkey, and other Mideast players will divide control of Syria.
    • The two countries will take over northeastern Syria, which was previously held by Kurds.
    • Erdogan opposes Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but Putin supports Assad.
    • Russia is filling the vacuum we left behind, and Putin is solidifying Russia’s power in the Mideast.
  1. Russia deploys military police in Syria’s northeast border to help Turkey drive out Kurdish fighters. Assad’s military forces will be allowed back to the area for the first time in years.
  2. Trump ends the economic sanctions against Turkey that were just placed on the country a week ago for their attacks on Kurdish Syrians. He declares success in the region and says the cease-fire is permanent (though it was a five-day cease-fire). Foreign policy experts and even Republican lawmakers say it’s a success for Turkey and Russia.
  3. Erdogan says Trump’s recent letter to him departed from “diplomatic and political courtesy.” He won’t forget Trump’s “lack of respect.”
  4. U.S. forces report seeing evidence of war crimes during Turkey’s attacks on Syrian Kurds, though they didn’t see evidence of ethnic cleansing. Turkey allegedly used white phosphorus against civilians in northern Syria. Images surface of civilians, including children, with gruesome burns like those caused by the chemical.
    • The UN, the U.S., and WHO are all looking into whether Turkey actually did air-drop white phosphorus on civilians.
  1. Iraq says U.S. troops who crossed the border into Iraq as they retreated from northern Syria cannot stay there longterm.
  2. Trump says a small number of troops will stay in Syria “to protect the oilfields.”
  3. Trump announces that a U.S. military operation led to the death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. According to Trump, Baghdadi used a suicide vest, resulting in his death as well as the death of three of his children.
    • Trump says he went out whimpering and screaming, though Trump’s generals say they didn’t see any evidence of that. Trump also says al-Baghdadi is “dead as a doornail.”
    • Trump says that he didn’t give Democratic House leaders forewarning of the attack because he was afraid they would leak it.
    • He did, however, tell their corresponding Republican Senate leaders.
    • He also notified Russia in advance.
    • Typically, the Gang of Eight gets notified of national security and intelligence operations.
    • Multiple countries claim to have assisted with this raid, mostly through intelligence gathering.
    • Trump knew that we were zeroing in on al-Baghdadi’s location when he decided to withdraw U.S. troops from the region. Trump’s withdrawal of troops from Syria forced us to move this operation up. It also started dismantling the infrastructure that made the raid possible.
    • U.S. officials say Trump gave away classified information during his briefing on al-Baghdadi’s death and that he gave inaccurate information. There’s a reason presidents usually keep their statements on these matters short.
    • State officials say that the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) played a key role in carrying out this mission.
    • As with Osama bin Laden, al-Baghdadi’s remains are buried at sea.
    • U.S. and Kurdish forces kill al-Baghdadi’s righthand man hours later.
  1. Mitch McConnell says he’ll come up with his own resolution to urge Trump to end the troop withdrawal from Syria.

Other International:

  1. Israeli President Rueven Rivlin gives Benny Gantz a shot at forming a governing coalition after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is unable to do so. If Gantz is successful at getting 61 supporters in the Knesset to support him, he’ll become the new prime minister.
    • Netanyahu continues his racist warnings that Arab lawmakers might back Gantz.
  1. Justin Trudeau barely wins re-election in Canada’s elections, illustrating another country with a rural vs. urban split. Politicians there also adopted some of our less savory political ploys in a fairly ugly race.
  2. The European Union agrees to delay Brexit by three months after the British Parliament fails to approve Boris Johnson’s negotiated deal. Johnson calls for a December 12 election, which he thinks will bolster his position.
  3. The Treasury designates Iran as a “jurisdiction of primary money laundering concern” and places additional restrictions on foreign banks where Iranian financial institutions maintain their accounts. At the same time, the Treasury says they’re trying to make it easier to get humanitarian aid into the country.
  4. Iraq’s pro-American President Barham Salih says he’s not sure Iraq can still rely on the U.S. and is open to resetting relations with other countries, including Russia and Iran. He says Trump‘s policies are making it hard to honor our alliance. Salih is Kurdish, so Trump’s abandonment of the Syrian Kurds makes him concerned.
  5. Trump says he’s trying to get us out of wars, but that we might have to get into wars, too.
  6. After millions of Chileans take to the streets to protest inequality, Chile’s President Sebastion Piñera dismisses his entire cabinet in order to form a new government. Over the week, 17 people are killed in marches and 100s more are injured.
    • The unrest started over an increase in metro fares, which is now suspended.
    • Santiago is still under a state of emergency.
  1. Amid an economic crisis, Argentina elects a new, center-left president, Alberto Fernandez. 80.0% of voters turn out (that’s a WAY higher turnout rate than we ever have in the U.S.).
  2. It’s week 21 of the protests in Hong Kong, and they don’t seem to be abating at all. Protestors continue to set fire to shops, throw Molotov cocktails, and vandalize property. Police continue to use tear gas, rubber bullets, and water cannons to disperse the crowds.
    • Now the activists are protesting police brutality during the past four months of demonstrations.
  1. Not wanting to be caught off guard again like they were with Syria, the Pentagon starts coming up with plans for an abrupt withdrawal from Afghanistan just in case Trump impulsively decides to order one there, too.
  2. Trump bans all flights to Cuba except to Havana.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. President Obama, President Clinton, Speaker Pelosi, and Hillary Clinton are among the speakers at Elijah Cummings’ funeral, held at the church he attended in Baltimore, MD. Everyone speaks of Cummings’ kindness and his fight for the oppressed. Trump does not attend.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. Trump says he’s building a wall in Colorado. Everyone else in the country is wondering what he’s trying to protect Colorado from. Nebraskans? Utahns? Those pesky Wyomingites?

Family Separation:

  1. An ACLU lawsuit finds that Trump’s zero tolerance policy separated 1,556 more migrant families than were previously known. 207 of the children are under five years old, and five are under one year old.
    • This means we have to spend time and resources investigating across the globe to locate parents and find out whether they are reunited yet.
    • We could’ve saved all of this money if the government had either not separated families in the first place or, at the very least, kept track of the families they split up.
    • Trump’s cruelty is costing billions just on reunification alone. So much winning.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Here’s why even undocumented immigrants need legal protection. A lawsuit brought by a Honduran woman living in Connecticut alleges that an ICE agent threatened her with deportation unless she had sex with him.
    • He then raped her several times a week for seven years, even getting her pregnant three times.
    • She aborted all three pregnancies, and the ICE agent paid for one of those abortions.
    • The woman had previously cooperated with law enforcement to help indict three undocumented immigrants who had stabbed her husband.
  1. The U.S. deports a Marine Corps combat veteran to El Salvador without notifying him so he could put everything in order. He hasn’t lived there since he was a toddler.
    • The veteran came back from his last tour in Iraq with a brain injury and PTSD, which landed him in legal trouble.
    • So not only did we not give him the support he needs here, but now he’s in a country where he’ll never get the help he needs.
  1. Northern Ireland legalizes same-sex marriage.
  2. Tanzania’s Supreme Court of Appeal upholds a law banning child marriage. Before you judge, remember several areas of the U.S. still allow child marriage.
  3. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services modifies how they determine whether to waive filing fees for immigrants who can’t afford the fees. They previously considered certain benefits, like Medicaid and SNAP, as income when considering their poverty level.
  4. Trump has to fill the now-open Secretary of Homeland Security position, but his top-two picks aren’t eligible under federal law. That’s because he hasn’t had any confirmed appointments in so long, and both his picks are already in an acting (and unconfirmed) capacity.
  5. Kris Kobach enters a diversion agreement over complaints about his conduct during federal court proceedings over the past few years. The court cases were about his signature legislation making it harder for Kansas residents to register to vote.
    • He was disciplined and fined throughout the hearings, and was even ordered to take online classes in civil court proceedings (he is a lawyer).
    • The terms of the diversion agreement are undisclosed.

Climate:

  1. New data show that air pollution in the U.S., measured as fine particulate air pollution, started increasing in 2016 after years of national decline.
    • Likely contributors are thought to be increases in driving and burning more natural gas. Wildfires are also to blame in certain areas.
    • The greatest increases are in the West and Midwest, with the Northeast and Southeast slightly decreasing.

Budget/Economy:

  1. A. Wayne Johnson, a senior official in the Education Department appointed by Betsy DeVos, resigns and calls the student loan system broken. He calls for billions of dollars of debt forgiveness. Johnson says the majority of student debt will never be repaid in the current system.
  2. Trump’s tax reform of 2017 included a 1.4% tax on schools with more than $500,000 in endowments per student. This affects some of our most well-known private schools, like Harvard, MIT, Yale, and Princeton, and will cost them millions to tens of millions in annual taxes.
    • It’s interesting that big business and the wealthy got a huge tax break, but that private universities got dinged with a surtax.
  1. According to James Mattis’s new book, Trump ordered him to screw Amazon in a Pentagon contract. That contract was awarded to Microsoft this week, much to the confusion of anyone who knows anything about cloud computing.

Elections:

  1. The Republican Speaker of the Texas House announces he’ll step down after his term is up. Earlier this summer he was caught on tape disparaging fellow Republicans and Democrats alike and making plans to target them in coming elections.
  2. Students across the country are becoming more and more politically active, leading several states to put up roadblocks to college-age voters. Roadblocks include outlawing pop-up voting booths, preventing students from outside of the district from voting (even if they currently live in the district for school), creating laws about parking spaces that schools can’t accommodate, creating hard-to-implement voter ID rules, and more.
    • New Hampshire has set up enormous hurdles for out-of-state students to vote. The words of the state’s Republican House speaker explains it all. He calls them “kids voting liberal, voting their feelings, with no life experience.”
  1. Once again, Republican Senators block a vote on three election security bills passed by the House. This time, Marsha Blackburn steps up to block it.
  2. Trump says he’ll veto a bill that would require federal election campaigns to report any offers from foreign governments or agents for campaign assistance.
  3. The FEC only has three sitting members, not enough for a quorum, heading into the 2020 elections. Trump could still appoint members, but it doesn’t look promising.

Miscellaneous:

  1. White House computer security Chief Dimitrios Vistakis resigns, calling White House policies absurd and claiming that officials put Trump‘s comfort over actual computer security. Here’s a quote from his resignation letter:

“Unfortunately given all of the changes I’ve seen in the past three months, I foresee the White House is posturing itself to be electronically compromised once again. Allowing for a large portion of institutional knowledge to concurrently walk right out the front door seems contrary to the best of interests of the mission and organization as a whole.”

  1. Trump holds a meeting of his Cabinet where he lectures reporters with a series of falsehoods.
    • He says Obama tried to call Kim Jong Un 11 times, but Kim didn’t respect him enough to take the call.
    • Trump says he made a deal between Turkey and the Syrian Kurds that people have been trying to make for years. I guess, if you call giving Turkey what they want and letting them attack the Kurds a deal. I’m pretty sure no one else was trying to make that deal.
    • He takes credit for a drug buyback program that was implemented in 2010.
    • He claims most of the people testifying in the impeachment hearings were put in their positions by past administrations. Seven of the nine were appointed by his own administration.
    • He suggests that Rep. Adam Schiff was the whistleblower’s informant. I’m not sure how Schiff would’ve even known about a call between Trump and the Ukraine president.
    • He claims Obama getting a book deal was like running a business while he was in office. Obama got the deal after he left office.
  1. Trump cancels his subscription to The New York Times, and the White House urges all federal agencies to cancel subscriptions to the Washington Post and The New York Times. You know, from what I hear from people who’ve visited The Hill, Republican lawmakers have Fox News on 24/7. So this seems meaningless; they’re already getting their news from one source.
    • Ironically, while having a political discussion on Facebook this week, I was told to get my news from more sources than just ABC, CBS, NBC, AP, NYT, WaPo, Reuters, and CNN (for the record, I don’t watch CNN). I guess she was saying I should get my news from Fox News (I do read Fox News daily).
    • All this is to say that if you support Trump’s request here, you might need to expand your news bubble.
  1. An inspector general report into Trump’s VA Office of Accountability and Whistleblower Protection finds the office to have significant deficiencies. Instead of protecting whistleblowers, they stifled claims and retaliated against employees.
  2. The Trump Organization is looking into selling its lease on the Trump International Hotel in DC.
  3. Trump is surprised to be overwhelmingly booed when he attends the fifth game of the world series. Not surprising when you consider his public outings are largely to places he owns and crowds he controls.

Week 144 in Trump – Impeachment News

Posted on October 29, 2019 in Impeachment, Trump

Storming the SCIF. Matt Gaetz is such a bonehead that he doesn't even realize he's already allowed in these hearings.

Testimony in the impeachment hearings this week shows how bizarre and far-reaching the operations are to pressure Ukraine and to prove that it was Ukraine, and not Russia, that meddled in our 2016 elections. From Greg Sargent at The Washington Post:

“Two senior U.S. officials seriously discussed a plan in which the attorney general of the United States would publicly coordinate with a foreign government to help Trump absolve Russia of culpability for an attack on our political system, by helping to repudiate our intelligence services’ conclusion about that culpability.”

Here’s what happened on the impeachment front for the week ending October 27…

General Happenings:

  1. House Republicans force a floor vote to rebuke Rep. Adam Schiff, Chair of the House Intelligence Committee and leader of the impeachment panel. The resolution is tabled along party lines. Basically, the rebuke accuses Schiff of being a liar.
  2. Trump compares impeachment to a lynching. Oyvay… where do I even start with that one?
  3. White House budget documents show that Trump repeatedly tried to cut aid to programs that fight corruption abroad, including in Ukraine.
  4. The impeachment panel continues to issue subpoenas to the Office of Management and Budget, though they know no one will cooperate.
  5. In the middle of Giuliani’s pressure campaign on Ukraine officials, both Putin and Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban were pushing Trump to adopt a hostile stance against Ukraine.
    • Trump met with Orban last May against the advice of National Security Advisor John Bolton.
    • Bolton and Fiona Hill both tried to prevent the meeting, but Mick Mulvaney orchestrated it anyway.
    • Orban, like Russia, is looking to grab a corner of Ukraine.
    • This information, which came up in House testimony last week, implicates both Russia and Hungary with foreign interference. Is it OK for a sitting president to be influenced by known dictators and autocrats?
  1. The New York City Bar Association says Attorney General William Barr needs to recuse himself from any Ukraine-related issues, and if he can’t do that, he should resign.
  2. In a FOIA case, a federal judge says he’ll order the State Department to start releasing their Ukraine records in 30 days.
  3. One line of defense used by the Trump team is that there couldn’t have been any quid pro quo since Ukrainian officials didn’t know their aid was blocked.
    • However, documented communications show that they knew by the first week of August (further corroborating the whistleblower’s report). They were told to reach out to Mick Mulvaney, and that it wasn’t just a bureaucratic snag.
    • Still, they weren’t told explicitly that the aid was contingent upon them publicly opening Trump’s requested investigations until September 1.
  1. By the end of the week, we learn that Zelensky met with advisors on May 7 to talk about energy issues. Instead, they spent three hours talking about how to handle requests from Trump and Giuliani to open investigations into the 2016 elections and Burisma/Biden.
    • This means Zelensky was feeling the pressure months before his phone conversation with Trump.
  1. In August, the White House delayed a Ukraine trade decision, leading to speculation that the quid pro quo was about more than just withholding aid and that it also extended into other government programs.
  2. A federal judge orders the DOJ to release some of Mueller’s grand jury materials to the House Judiciary Committee for the impeachment inquiry. They have until Wednesday to comply.
    • The same federal judge says that the House doesn’t have to hold a vote in order to formalize the impeachment inquiry.
    • In his ruling, the judge says that impeachment factored into Mueller’s report and that Congress is the appropriate entity to take over where Mueller left off.
  1. Lindsey Graham says he has 50 co-sponsors for a resolution condemning the House impeachment inquiry.
  2. John Bolton’s lawyers are in talks with the House committees handling the impeachment depositions about whether Bolton himself will testify.
  3. Last week I mentioned a story about Turkey’s state-run Halkbank helping Iran evade sanctions. One of their officials was convicted in the case. Bloomberg reports that Trump told Turkish President Erdogan last spring that Steve Mnuchin and Attorney General William Barr would take care of the Halkbank issue.
  4. Italy’s Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte acknowledges that Barr has met twice with Italian intelligence. Conte says his intelligence services have told Barr that they had nothing to do with the events leading up to the 2016 elections, stymying Barr’s efforts to investigate Trump’s conspiracy theories around Ukraine. Italian officials say that this request from the Trump administration has complicated our relationship with Italy.
    • Australian officials refuse to take part in the investigation as well, despite requests from both Barr and Trump.
  1. According to Fiona Hill’s testimony last week, Kashyap Patel, a National Security Council aide tasked with counterterrorism issues, started sending Trump information about Ukraine that could influence U.S. policy in Ukraine.
    • Trump refers to Patel as one of his top experts in Ukraine policy, though Patel lacks experience there.
    • Patel became a hero to Trump and his allies when he was a House staffer and wrote memos aiming to discredit our intelligence communities’ findings in the Russia investigations. And go figure, Patel worked for Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) at the time.
    • This brings to light that Trump ignores the tradition of prepared policy briefings, which are approved by several agencies to verify their content. Instead, Trump obtains unverified information from both inside and outside the administration. To be clear, he’s basing policy and risking lives on unverified information.

More Trouble for Parnas, Fruman, and Giuliani:

  1. Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman both plead not guilty to charges of campaign finance law violations.
  2. David Correia and Andrey Kukushkin, who were arrested in the same case, also plead not guilty.
  3. A lawyer for Parnas says that some of the evidence collected in their case might be protected by attorney-client privilege or executive privilege. Wait, what? I thought Trump said he didn’t know them.
    • This could almost make sense, though, since Giuliani was working both for Trump and for businesses run by Parnas and Fruman. But Giuliani, Parnas, and Fruman never worked for the government.
    • Giuliani has said that Parnas and Fruman helped him with the work Giuliani was doing in Ukraine on Trump’s behalf.
  1. Giuliani accidentally butt-dials a reporter and leaves a three-minute voicemail of a conversation he’s having with someone in the room. He talks about needing cash and about overseas dealings, specifically in Bahrain.
  2. This is the second time Giuliani has done this to the same reporter.
    • The first time, on September 28, Giuliani can be heard railing against the Bidens and complaining about how Democratsn are attacking him.
    • He repeats his unfounded allegations about the Bidens and Burisma.
    • He talks about how Hunter Biden used Joe’s position in government to earn $1.5 billion from Chinese investors (which he didn’t). 
He accuses John Kerry’s son of working with Biden at the same foreign businesses (which he didn’t).
  1. After saying last week that he doesn’t need a lawyer, Giuliani is looking for a defense attorney.

Bill Taylor Deposition:

  1. Bill Taylor testifies before the impeachment panel. Taylor is the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, he’s the one who spelled out the quid pro quo in the text messages (I’m guessing to make sure it was on record), and he’s ignoring a State Department order not to comply. He says:
    • Trump conditioned the release of military aid for Ukraine on their willingness to investigation Burisma (where Hunter Biden worked) and Ukraine interference in the 2016 election. It was also predicated on Zelensky making a public statement that they were opening investigations into those things.
    • He was concerned that there were two US. policy channels with Ukraine—one formal and public channel, and one informal backchannel run by Giuliani, Kurt Volker, Gordon Sondland, and Rick Perry. (Volker, Sondland, and Perry called themselves the three amigos… so funny/not funny.)
    • Sondland told him that both military assistance to Ukraine and a White House visit between the two presidents were contingent upon Ukraine publicly announcing investigations into Burisma and alleged interference in the 2016 elections. Trump wanted to box Zelensky in.
    • John Bolton was alarmed by what was going on in Ukraine and tried to prevent the bypassing of official policies and procedures. Bolton called the whole thing a drug deal. Bolton also opposed the phone call between Trump and Zelensky, concerned that it would be a disaster.
    • Sondland didn’t include the standard group in the phone call because he wanted to make sure no one was monitoring or transcribing it.
    • The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) said that the president directed the OMB not to release any funds for Ukraine.
  1. A series of security meetings up to the Cabinet level showed nearly unanimous support for releasing the funds.
  2. Just a quick reminder, Congress approved those funds with no conditions in a bipartisan vote. The funds are to be used to counter Russian aggression.
  3. Following Taylor’s testimony, some Democrats on the panel suggest Gordon Sondland might want to return to correct his statements. Sondland told the panel that he didn’t understand that when Trump talked about “Burisma,” that was code for “Biden.”
  4. The White House refuses to release Taylor’s detailed records to Congress.

Laura Cooper Deposition:

  1. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Laura Cooper’s testimony unexpectedly becomes the highlight of the week when Republican Members of Congress storm the castle in protest of private depositions. They stream into the SCIF with their cell phones in hand, taking photos and tweeting. All against security regulations regarding SCIFs.
    • When Schiff notifies them that they’re compromising the SCIF with their phones, one Republican Intelligence Committee member starts collecting everyone’s phones. He wasn’t the only one on the Intelligence Committee, and they all should’ve known better.
    • They’re lucky they didn’t all get arrested. They asked to be arrested, but Democrats declined to push it.
    • The room will need to be sanitized to make sure House Republicans didn’t bring in any security breaches with them.
    • The dumbest part of this is that they were protesting nothing. Half the members who were there to protest are already allowed into the impeachment depositions because they serve on the committees. They’re allowed to participate.
      • 47 Republicans on three committees (Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, and Oversight) are allowed into the depositions, along with the 57 Democrats from those committees.
    • They do all this as the Pentagon official overseeing Ukraine policy, Laura Cooper, is about to testify. They delay her testimony by five hours.
    • Steve Scalise says that when they entered the SCIF, Adam Schiff left with the witness (Cooper). Other accounts say Schiff left to consult with the Sergeant at Arms. Either way, Cooper was waiting in a private room when all this went down.
    • At first, even Lindsey Graham criticizes the move, but then he backpedals.
    • It turns out that Trump knew about and approved of the plan to storm the SCIF beforehand.
  1. After Cooper is finally allowed to testify, Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) says there were no groundbreaking revelations in her testimony and that some things she said conflict with Bill Taylor’s testimony.
    • It seems she mostly gave a technical testimony on how aid is supposed to occur, though, and it’s not clear (to the public anyway) what the conflicts are if any.
    • Other reports are that her testimony showed that the administration deviated from the normal process with their handling of Ukraine aid.

Philip Reeker Deposition:

  1. Acting Assistant Secretary of State Philip Reeker testifies before the impeachment panel. He says:
    • He didn’t know about the Trump administration’s efforts to push Zelensky to publicly announce investigations into Biden and the 2016 elections until the whistleblower complaint was published.
    • When Reeker took his position in March, it was obvious to him that Kurt Volker and Gordon Sondland were the leads on Ukraine.
    • It was around the end of July when he learned that aid to Ukraine was being withheld.
    • The DoD wanted the funds for Ukraine released.
    • He had wanted to issue a defense of former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch when he saw the smear campaign against her, but he was overruled at the State Department.

Week 143 in Trump

Posted on October 25, 2019 in Politics, Trump

Representative Elijah Cummings passed away this week after along illiness. He was an icon and he will be missed.

This was a sad week in Congress, with Representative Elijah Cummings passing away. I was hoping the House could put aside the acrimony between the parties for a little while to mourn his passing, but really it just continues to intensify. Even if the House can’t do it, maybe we can all take a little time to remember that some things are more important than politics.

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending October 20…

Shootings This Week:

  1. How sad is it that it’s a good sign that there were only four mass shootings in the U.S. this week (defined as killing or injuring four or more people)? Condensed version: Shooters kill two people and injure 18.

Russia:

  1. The Justice Department confirms that neither Donald Trump Jr. nor former White House Counsel Don McGahn were even called to testify before Robert Mueller’s grand jury. The federal judge who revealed the information as part of an ongoing case finds it perplexing because both men were significant to the investigation.
    • Lawyers involved in the probe say that Trump Jr. likely said he’d claim the Fifth anyway, and Mueller elected not to grant him immunity to force his testimony.
  1. Russia is already working on influencing the 2020 elections by creating a network of social media accounts designed to look like political groups in swing states. Seriously folks. Don’t fall for this again. If you don’t recognize a group, either learn about it or ignore it.

Legal Fallout:

  1. Oh so quietly, the State Department closes its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server without delivering any criminal charges.
    • They found 38 current or former employees might have violated security procedures with possible instances of classified information being inappropriately transmitted.
    • They also found that these employees did their best to implement security policies.
    • Even though none of these employees were sanctioned, each can appeal and provide explanations for what they did.
    • Much of the information in question was classified after the fact, which makes the job of determining violations that much more difficult.
    • The report concludes that “there was no persuasive evidence of systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information.”
  1. New York State passes a law that allows state prosecutors to bring charges against people who receive presidential pardons for related crimes.
  2. Trump’s lawyers argue once against that he can’t be investigated by any prosecutor because he is president.
  3. Trump’s reluctance to release his taxes goes back to his 2013 presidential bid, where he was ready to release his taxes until an advisor warned him against it.
  4. Deutsche Bank tells a court that they don’t have any of Trump’s personal tax returns.
  5. ProPublica obtains additional financial documents for Trump’s businesses that bolster accusations that the organization reported expenses, profits, and occupancy differently depending on the purpose of the documents. For example, they inflated profit and occupancy on things like loan documents, but deflated them for New York tax purposes. They manipulated expenses in the reverse.
  6. In the middle of accusing the Bidens of benefiting from foreign governments, Trump announces next year’s G-7 Summit will be at his Doral resort in Miami. After leaders on both sides criticize this for being self dealing, Trump reverses that plan. But he blames the media and Democrats.
  7. Remember when it came out two years ago (though it seems like a decade) that the National Enquirer had a vault of stories about Trump that they didn’t publish but held on to just in case? Ronan Farrow says that the Editor in Chief at the time shredded a bunch of that information.

Impeachment:

Including all this info just makes this too long, so I moved it out into its own post. You can skip right over to it if that’s your focus.

International:

Syria/Kurds:

  1. Trump announces sanctions against Turkey in response to their attacks on Syria. He’ll also end negotiations on a trade deal and double tariffs on Turkish steel imports.
  2. The negative consequences of Trump’s decision to withdraw troops from Syria were immediate. Within a week:
    • Turkey started bombing the Kurds.
    • Tens of thousands of Kurdish families were forced to flee.
    • The Kurds switched sides to work with Assad.
    • Hundreds of ISIS prisoners detained in Kurdish camps escaped.
    • American troops were not only fired at by Turkish forces, they were also trapped by Turkey’s roadblocks.
    • Turkey has control of around 50 U.S. nuclear weapons at an airbase in Turkey. If we remove them, we pretty much end our alliance with Turkey; if we leave them, Turkey could use them. Erdogan recently said it’s unacceptable that Turkey isn’t allowed to have nuclear weapons.
    • Turkey pushed more than 20 miles into Syria, and Russia moved in to fill the void left by our troops.
  1. The move handed a win to four of our adversaries—Russia, Iran, Assad’s government, and ISIS. Both Russia and Iran support the Assad regime.
  2. Erdogan asks for international support in fighting the Kurds.
  3. The House votes 354 to 60 for a resolution opposing Trump’s decision to withdraw troops from Syria.
  4. Trump says he was right to let Turkey attack the Kurdish fighters, because sometimes like two kids you have to let them fight and pull them apart. Tell that to the families mourning their dead children. Tell that to the tens of thousands who’ve been forced to flee their homes.
  5. As U.S. troops pull out of Syria, the Air Force conducts an airstrike on a U.S. munitions bunker to prevent the munitions from falling into the hands of combatants.
  6. Kurdish forces likewise destroyed their facilities and equipment before vacating the area.
  7. The U.S. and Turkey agree to a cease-fire at the Syrian border. The Turkish military is allowed to remain there, basically giving Turkey’s President Erdogan what he wants.
    • Even so, just hours later, there were gunfire and shelling at the border.
    • A condition of the cease-fire is that the U.S. withdraw the threat to impose sanctions on Turkey.
    • The agreement gives Erdogan things he hasn’t been able to get during years of negotiations with the U.S., including the removal of Kurdish forces from the border and a buffer zone at the border of Turkey and Syria.
    • A Turkish official says they were surprised by how easy the negotiations were. “We got everything we wanted,” he said, also indicating that the U.S. just wanted to save face.
    • Trump brags about Mike Pence getting the cease-fire… which we wouldn’t have had to get if Trump wouldn’t have abandoned he Kurds in the first place.
  1. Trump sends a childish letter to Erdogan, warning him against slaughtering the Kurds. He ends with, “Don’t be a tough guy. Don’t be a fool! I will call you later.”
  1. Here’s the kicker. Sources in Turkey say that Erdogan was bluffing—asking for much more than he wanted while expecting to get only a small piece of it. But he got it all, and now he might be in over his head with a 20-mile buffer zone, international condemnation, and potential sanctions.

Other International:

  1. Chinese President Xi Jinping says those seeking to divide China (referring to Hong Kong protestors, I would guess) will be smashed to pieces. Protestors hold U.S.-themed protests after a violent series of weekend rallies.
    • Police again use tear gas and water cannons filled with a blue dye that stings, but also hit innocent bystanders with it. Protestors continue to vandalize businesses and public property.
    • Protestors attend a rally in support of the U.S. Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, which is awaiting congressional approval in the U.S. The act would require the State Department to provide an annual assessment of whether “China has eroded Hong Kong’s civil liberties and rule of law.”
    • The U.S. is looking at legislation that would restrict certain exports, such as the tear gas officers use on protestors in Hong Kong.
  1. U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson secures a withdrawal agreement with the EU, which he now has to sell to Parliament.
    • And then Parliament delays the vote for three months, and requires Parliament to pass legislation implementing Johnson’s plan before the vote to approve. I’m confused about that one.
    • Johnson sends the EU an unsigned letter requesting an extension, but he also sends a second signed letter disapproving of an extension.
    • Brexit is still scheduled for Halloween.
    • Meanwhile, protestors have been marching in London in support of a second Brexit referendum.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. After the House votes to rebuke Trump’s Syria decision, Democratic leadership meets with Trump and some Cabinet members. The meeting is at Trump’s behest, but then he says Democrats wanted the meeting.
    • Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer push Trump to reveal his strategy for Syria. At one point, Trump says that we don’t need to worry about terrorists 7,000 miles away.
    • As things get heated, Trump says to Pelosi, “You’re just a politician. A third-grade politician.”
    • Pelosi asks Trump why he withdrew troops from Syria, which gave Putin a toehold in northern Syria. She ends by asking, “why do all roads lead to Putin?” And then she walks out, and Schumer follows.
    • Both Trump and Pelosi assert the other one had a meltdown, though he looks pretty melty in the picture.
  1. INSERT PHOTO HERE
  2. Rand Paul blocks a vote in the Senate on the House-passed resolution condemning Trump’s abandonment of our Kurdish allies in Syria. Mitch McConnell says he wants the Senate to pass an even stronger resolution than the one passed in the House.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. For the second time, Trump vetos a bill that passed both houses of Congress that would put an end to his declaration of national emergency to build the wall at the border. He vetoed a similar bill seven months ago. Seven months. Some emergency.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A British family traveling through Canada accidentally entered the U.S. on an unmarked road a few months ago. ICE detains them for more than a week in “frigid” and “filthy” conditions according to a complaint they filed with DHS. DHS says the family entered the U.S. on purpose.
  2. Two HUD officials say they knowingly delayed hurricane relief funds for Puerto Rico despite missing a legally mandated deadline. Of the 18 states hit by natural disasters whose funding deadline was the same, only Puerto Rico’s was delayed.
    • The officials (and Trump) defend the delay saying there were financial irregularities and corruption in Puerto Rico. In other words, the same old trope that they can’t manage their money.

Climate:

  1. For the first time in 10 years, a Florida Senate committee is scheduled to meet to talk about climate change and its impact on the state. They conclude that they lost a decade where they could’ve prepared for climate change.
    • One Republican attendee says he understands why there haven’t been a lot of conversations around this, but doesn’t mention that for most of Governor Rick Scott’s term, the words “climate change” were banned.
    • Sea level rise has been and continues to be a major issue for Florida, with sunny-day flooding a regular occurrence.
  1. 2019 is the second hottest year on record through September. It will likely end up being the second hottest year right behind 2016.
  2. The Trump administration proposes opening up more than half of Alaska’s Tongass National Forest to logging. This would require a reversal or waiver of Bill Clinton’s roadless rule.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Last week, we heard that the U.S. and China had come to an interim trade agreement, but now China wants to hold more negotiations before they’ll sign on to it.
  2. U.S. and European trade negotiators fail to reach a deal, so the Trump administration imposes new tariffs on $7.5 billion worth of EU products.
  3. The numbers are in, and U.S. manufacturing has shrunk over two consecutive quarters. September’s contraction was the sharpest since the Great Recession.

Elections:

  1. A judge issues an emergency injunction to restore 165,000 Kentucky residents to the active voter rolls. They were placed on the inactive rolls after fewer than two cycles of federal elections. This comes just in time for next month’s elections!
  2. A Florida judge rules that the state cannot force ex-felons to pay all their fines and fees before being able to vote if they are too poor to pay.
    • Last year, Florida residents overwhelmingly passed Amendment 4, giving felons who have served their time automatic voting privileges. The Florida legislature tried to weaken the amendment by passing a law saying they have to pay their fines and fees before they can vote.
  1. A pro-Trump group called American Priority holds an event at Trump’s Doral resort in Miami. At the event, they play a video on a loop of a fake Trump killing journalists and Trump’s political opponents. If you’re wondering why people are wary of Trump supporters, look no further.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Retired four-star admiral Bill McRaven writes an op-ed, the gist of which is that Trump is attacking and destroying our republic from within. Here’s a quote:
    • “We are not the most powerful nation in the world because of our aircraft carriers, our economy, or our seat at the United Nations Security Council. We are the most powerful nation in the world because we try to be the good guys. … But, if we don’t care about our values, if we don’t care about duty and honor, if we don’t help the weak and stand up against oppression and injustice — what will happen to the Kurds, the Iraqis, the Afghans, the Syrians, the Rohingyas, the South Sudanese and the millions of people under the boot of tyranny or left abandoned by their failing states?”
    • He says another four-star general told him last week, “I don’t like the Democrats, but Trump is destroying the Republic!”
    • Here’s the full op-ed.
  1. Trump’s former Secretary of Defense James Mattis jokes that he’s the Meryl Streep of generals after Trump called him the “world’s most overrated general.” As we know, Trump says Meryl Streep is the world’s most overrated actor.
    • Mattis also pokes fun at Trump’s bone spurs and his love for fast food.
    • He also laments the tone of politics today, saying, “We have scorched our opponents with language that precludes compromise and we have brushed aside the possibility that the person with whom we disagree might actually sometimes be right.”
    • He also refers to our Kurdish allies and the U.S. troops working by their sides.
  1. Retired four-star Marine general John Allen says Trump has blood on his hands “for abandoning our Kurdish allies.” He also says that the crisis at the Syrian border was completely foreseeable. Allen is the one who warned there would be blood if Trump were elected.
  2. Retired four-star Army general Joseph Votel says the decision to abandon the Kurds threatens our other partnerships around the globe when we need them the most because our enemies are more sophisticated and determined than ever.
  3. Following yet another sting video by Project Veritas (I thought these guys were in jail?), Trump threatens to sue CNN.
    • CNN says none of the people in the video are CNN journalists, and the guy who took the video and says he’s a CNN insider, Cary Poarch, was actually a freelance satellite truck operator who was contracted by CNN.
    • Some of the people in the video were media coordinators, which is a very junior position. Cary had drinks with them, they didn’t always know they were being filmed, and they thought they were just talking with a work friend. And that could ruin their careers. Super shady.
  1. Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan resigns after just six months on the job. He’s the fourth DHS secretary to serve under Trump. McAleenan complained about the tone, message, and approach of Trump’s immigration policies.
  2. One out of every 14 political appointments made by Trump is a lobbyist. There are four times as many lobbyists working for Trump than worked for Obama.

Week 143 in Trump – Impeachment News

Posted on October 25, 2019 in Impeachment, Trump

There are lots of private depositions this week in the secured room where the impeachment committees are meeting. While their testimony is private, their opening statements are not necessarily private, and some have been published in the media and commented on by politicians and pundits. So if you’re worried that anyone is leaking secret information to the press, they don’t seem to be. They’re pretty much sticking to public information.

Here’s what happened on the impeachment front for the week ending October 20…

General Happenings:

  1. Trump says that Speaker Nancy Pelosi read the transcript Trump released and said, “this is not what the whistleblower said.” Pelosi says she never said that.
  2. Trump says that Ukraine President Zelensky told him “out of the blue” that he didn’t like former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. In the transcript, Trump was the one who brought her up.
  3. Democrats shoot down the idea of taking the impeachment inquiry to a full House vote because they think it would be playing right into Republicans’ hands. They’ll likely hold a full House vote when the depositions are over.
  4. Rep. Adam Schiff says that the whistleblower might not testify because of concerns for his safety. With the release of the rough transcript of the call, though, that testimony might not be needed.
  5. After this week’s testimony, impeachment investigators are looking into whether they need to question John Bolton.
  6. Rick Perry says that Trump directed him to talk to Giuliani earlier this year. When they did talk, Giuliani blamed Ukraine for the Steele Dossier, said Ukraine has Hillary’s server, and accused Ukraine of helping put Paul Manafort in prison.
    • Can we just clear this up? The DNC doesn’t have a missing server. What we’re calling a server is actually an image on a cloud server that is hosted by some tech company. So it’s not missing, the FBI took an image of it, and there is no physical computer that someone could pick up and abscond with. There just isn’t.
    • Also, Rick Perry confirms he’ll resign. Trump will nominate Deputy Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette to take his place.
  1. The White House opens an internal review into the call between Trump and Ukraine President Zelensky. We don’t know who called for the review or why.
  2. Contradicting the administration’s stance that there was no quid pro quo with Ukraine, acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney says that we were withholding aid for Ukraine until they granted Trump’s request for investigations into the 2016 election (i.e., quid pro quo).
    • Mulvaney doesn’t mention Biden in his statement.
    • He does say it’s nothing unusual to pressure foreign government and it’s how politics gets done. He tells journalists to “get over it.”
    • Mulvaney later tries to walk his quid pro quo statement back and says the media misconstrued his statements, even though it’s all right there on video.
    • At the same time Mulvaney says there was quid pro quo, he also announces that the G-7 Summit next year will be held at Trump’s Doral resort in Miami. Critics start accusing Trump of self-dealing.
    • Mulvaney’s position is seen as extremely tenuous at this point, and Trump’s allies are looking at potential replacements, including Matt Whitaker and Chris Christie.
  1. Mike Pence, Rick Perry, and the Office of Management and Budget refuse to cooperate with congressional requests for documents.
  2. Representative Francis Rooney (FL) is the first House Republican to say he’d consider voting to impeach Trump. And then he announces he’s retiring.
  3. State Department Counselor Ulrich Brechbuhl is scheduled to testify, but is later removed from the schedule.

More Trouble for Parnas, Fruman, and Giuliani:

  1. Two more men involved with Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman are arrested in the campaign finance fraud case. David Correia and Andrey Kukushkin are accused of conspiring with Parnas and Fruman to funnel funds to state and federal politicians.
  2. Lev Parnas is one of Florida’s top supporters of Trump. Florida Senator Rick Scott was also a recipient of their illicit donations.
  3. A grand jury subpoenas Representative Pete Sessions (R-TX) over his dealings with Giuliani, Parnas, and Fruman.
  4. Here are a few of Parnas and Fruman’s businesses:
    • Mafia Rave
    • Fraud Guarantee
    • Global Energy Producers (this appears to be the shell company funneling the political donations)
  1. Russian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, whom the U.S. is trying to extradite and for whom Parnas has worked, tried to dig up dirt on Biden for Giuliani, hoping that it would help him avoid extradition.
  2. Trump hasn’t been paying Giuliani for his services as personal attorney (and shadow foreign policy leader); however, Fraud Guarantee paid Giuliani $500,000.
  3. Giuliani drops his lawyer because it’d be “silly to have a lawyer when I don’t need one.”
  4. It turns out, though, that the investigation into Giuliani’s dealings with Parnas and Fruman also includes counterintelligence issues. Maybe he should rethink that lawyer thing.
  5. Trump says he doesn’t know if Giuliani is still his attorney.

Fiona Hill Deposition:

  1. Fiona Hill, a former senior official for Russia and Europe on the National Security Council, comes before the impeachment panel. She says:
    • Rudy Giuliani was running a shadow foreign policy in Ukraine to personally benefit Trump while sidestepping U.S. officials and diplomats. Giuliani wasn’t coordinating with the officials whose job it was to carry out U.S. foreign policy.
    • Hill confronted Gordon Sondland about what Giuliani was doing.
    • Former National Security Adviser John Bolton was furious over Giuliani’s activities, which were seen as politically motivated.
    • Bolton compared Giuliani to a “hand grenade who’s going to blow everybody up.”
    • Bolton met with Gordon Sondland, Kurt Volker, and Rick Perry in early July. At that point, Sondland let slip the conditions of releasing Ukraine’s military aid. Bolton told Hill he didn’t want to be part of any “drug deal” being cooked up on Ukraine. He encouraged Hill to take this to an NSC lawyer, which she did.
    • Giuliani says he wasn’t working a shadow policy and that Hill was just not in the loop, even though she worked very closely with Marie Yovanovitch and Gordon Sondland.
    • Hill was opposed to the removal of Yovanovitch.
    • Hill considered Sondland as a potential national security risk because he was so unprepared to take on his new job, which could easily be exploited. He also used his personal cellphone for official diplomatic business.
  1. Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL), apparently not understanding how closed committee hearings work after all his time in Congress, tries to sit in on her deposition “as a member of Congress.” The parliamentarian forces Gaetz to leave the room, and now he gets to tell the story about how he got excluded from the deposition.
  2. Republican push for the public release of transcripts of all depositions, which Schiff says they will eventually do. Schiff also says that some of the people who are deposed will return for open hearings.

George Kent Deposition:

  1. The deputy assistant secretary of state responsible for Ukraine, George Kent, testifies before the impeachment panel despite being told by the State Department not to. He says:
    • In May, acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney held a meeting to facilitate removing control of our relationship with Ukraine from people who had the most experience at the NSC and State Departments. He then handed over that control to the “three amigos”—Gordon Sondland, Kurt Volker, and Energy Secretary Rick Perry.
      • Mulvaney is the one who placed the aid to Ukraine on hold in the weeks before the phone call between the presidents.
      • Kent was told to lay low and focus on the other countries he was charged with, leaving Ukraine dealings to the three amigos.
      • This meeting occurred a few days after Marie Yovanovitch was recalled from her post.
    • Kent started to get suspicious last March that Yovanovitch was the target of a “classic disinformation campaign.” This is backed up by documents turned over to Congress by the State Department’s inspector general.
      • Giuliani got some of this disinformation from former Ukraine prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko.
      • John Solomon, known for reporting on the conspiracy theories about Ukraine’s involvement in our elections, relied on some of that disinformation for his reporting. Solomon denies he participated in any disinformation campaign.
      • Kent points out that the “do not prosecute” list was an obvious phony, given the typos and misspellings that a career official would never make.
    • Kent was concerned about the undue influence a private attorney like Giuliani had in foreign policy.
    • Giuliani accused Kent of trying to protect the Bidens.
    • Giuliani asked the State Department and White House to grant a visa to Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin. Shokin is the person Joe Biden was working to oust because he wasn’t doing enough to fight or investigate corruption.
      • Shokin had promised Giuliani that he’d deliver dirt on Democrats.
    • Kent raised concerns in 2015 with Joe Biden’s staff about Hunter Biden serving on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, but the staffer turned him away.
      • Kent worried it would make it harder to show Ukrainians how to avoid conflicts of interest.
      • Joe Biden was also dealing with his other son, Beau, who was dying of cancer at the time (not an excuse, just for context).

Michael McKinley Deposition:

  1. Michael McKinley, a top aide to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, gives his deposition to the impeachment panel. He says:
    • He resigned last week out of frustration with the politicization fo the State Department.
    • He was particularly upset that control of Ukraine was removed from career diplomats, especially the removal of Marie Yovanovitch from her post as U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine.
    • Mike Pompeo should be standing up for and defending his State Department employees.
    • Trump’s administration was using the State Department to advance a “domestic political objective.”

Gordon Sondland Deposition:

  1. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, who the Trump administration blocked from appearing last week, gives his deposition. He says:
    • Trump outsourced U.S. policy on Ukraine to Giuliani, which made Sondland uncomfortable but he still carried out Trump’s wishes.
    • He didn’t know that Giuliani was looking for dirt on the Bidens, though Sondland has said several times publicly that this was exactly what Giuliani was doing.
    • When Sondland texted Bill Taylor to say there was no quid pro quo in withholding military aid to Ukraine, he was taking Trump at his word that there was no quid pro quo.
    • He didn’t know why military aid was delayed, who ordered it, or whether there was a quid pro quo.
  1. Sondland contradicted Bolton in a meeting with Ukrainian officials at the White House when he said that Trump would meet with Zelensky on the condition that Zelensky open a corruption case. Bolton shut the meeting down.
    • But then, in a private meeting with Ukrainian officials following that, Sondland brought up Burisma with the Ukrainians. Bolton was present at that meeting, as well.
    • This all seems to indicate Sondland was well aware there was a quid pro quo going on.
    • This was the meeting that led Bolton to call the whole thing a drug deal.

Week 142 in Trump

Posted on October 23, 2019 in Politics, Trump

How do you burst the bubble of conspiracy theories? How do you unmuddy the waters stirred up by innuendos and lies and fake news? Seriously folks, we all need to be using our powers of rational thinking and logic. There was a time I would’ve said that if something sounds too outrageous to be true, it probably isn’t. But you can’t make up the shit we’re learning about right now. You just can’t.

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending October 13…

Missing From Last Week:

  1. A federal judge says that lawsuits brought by Native Americans to prevent Trump from shrinking the Bears Ears National Monument have legal standing and can move forward.

Shootings This Week:

  1. There are ELEVEN mass shootings in the U.S. this week (defined as killing or injuring four or more people). Condensed version: Shooters kill 20 people and injure 34.
  2. A shooter at a Jewish synagogue in Germany is foiled when he can’t get in through the doors of the synagogue. He pushes on the doors, shoots at the locks, and even tries a small explosive to force the doors open. Still, he kills two people outside the synagogue, but the 51 people inside are unharmed.
  3. Gunmen kill 15 people as they’re worshipping in a mosque in Burkina Faso.

Russia:

  1. The DOJ argues that the grand-jury materials from Robert Mueller’s investigation shouldn’t be given to Congress, arguing that Congress shouldn’t have been able to obtain information from the Watergate grand jury either.
    • The judge’s response to that argument? “Wow. OK….the department is taking extraordinary positions in this case.”
    • She says Trump administration lawyers have given her several extreme arguments in their attempts to prevent the release of information.
  1. The Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee releases its second volume of findings in their investigations into Russian interference in our 2016 elections. This volume focuses on the social media disinformation campaign by the Internet Research Agency (IRA). The much-redacted report finds pretty much the same as all previous investigations:
    • Russia meddled in our elections.
    • The IRA, backed by the Kremlin, set out to harm Hillary’s chances of winning and assist Trump in winning.
    • The IRA’s purpose was to sow discord in the U.S. and they strongly aimed to stoke racial divisions. Russia continues to do this long after the 2016 elections, including exploiting Colin Kaepernick’s decision to kneel for the anthem.
    • The IRA’s activity increased after the 2016 election.
    • Russia’s targeting of the 2016 election is part of a larger, sophisticated, and ongoing disinformation campaign.
    • We need sweeping changes to protect ourselves from foreign interference, and we need them now.
  1. Here’s an excerpt of a communication obtained by the committee detailing an IRA employee’s description of election day:
    • “On November 9, 2016, a sleepless night was ahead of us. And when around 8 a.m. the most important result of our work arrived, we uncorked a tiny bottle of champagne…took one gulp each and looked into each other’s eyes…. We uttered almost in unison: ‘We made America great.’” Welcome to Russia 2.0, comrades. Wake up.
  1. And in the midst of this, Facebook announces they won’t remove debunked political ads from their platform, citing the right to free speech. So if you believe what you read on Facebook, don’t say I didn’t warn you that you’re reading a bunch of lies.
  2. Also in the midst of this, Mitch McConnell still refuses to take up House bills addressing election fraud, voter suppression, and election security.

Legal Fallout:

  1. Former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson says that Trump once asked him to try to get the DOJ to drop a case against an Iranian-Turkish gold trader.
    • Why on earth would Trump be interested in this case? Maybe because Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wanted the case dismissed.
    • The trader, Reza Zarrab, has since agreed to cooperate with the prosecution in the case, which centered on efforts to help Iran evade sanctions by hiding money transfers in gold sales.
    • A Turkish official from state bank Halkbank was found guilty in the case, and Zarrab also implicated Erdogan.
    • Zarrab was Rudy Giuliani’s client at the time.
    • Can we just take a moment to remember that the reason Michael Flynn is in trouble is from his work for Erdogan?
  1. It’s an up and down week for Trump’s attempts to keep his finances private.
    • At the beginning of the week, a federal judge rules that Trump’s accounting firm must release eight years of his tax returns.
    • Then a federal court grants Trump a temporary stay on releasing those returns to the Manhattan D.A.
    • But by the end of the week, a federal appeals court rules that the accounting firm must release Trump’s financial records to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform. I’m not sure what the implications are for the Manhattan D.A.’s case.
    • Even the lone dissenting judge says that impeachment is the only valid way to get the records (though she doesn’t actually say that would work).
    • In case you’re wondering, the judges rejected the argument that sitting presidents can’t be criminally investigated.
  1. A judge rules that Education Secretary Betsy DeVos has been violating a court order by continuing to collect student debts for a college that has folded. The judge threatens her with jail time.
  2. Attorney General William Barr meets with Rupert Murdoch. Who knows what they talk about, but two days later, Shepherd Smith announces his last day at Fox News.
  3. Trump Organization refuses to pay the Scottish government’s legal costs in Trump’s failed lawsuit to block a wind farm near his golf course.

Impeachment:

Including all this info just makes this too long, so I moved it out into its own post. You can skip right over to it if that’s your focus.

Courts/Justice:

  1. The Supreme Court Justices decide on what they’ll hear in the next session. Jumping right into the political fray, they’ll hear cases about abortion, guns, LGBTQ rights, separation of church and state, immigration, congressional oversight, and presidential power.

International:

Syria/Kurds:

  1. Trump’s surprise announcement about abandoning our Kurdish allies in Syria alarms the rest of our allies for its sheer impulsiveness.
  2. U.S. troops begin to withdraw from the area.
  3. The Pentagon, the State Department, soldiers on the ground in Syria, and even Republican Members of Congress harshly criticize Trump’s decision, and Trump seems surprised by this.
  4. Trump defends the move, saying it’s time to get out of these endless wars. But he’s just moving those troops to Iraq; he’s not bringing them home. He also defends himself by saying that the Kurds didn’t help us with Normandy, a line he got from a Fox contributor (and since when is that how we measure our allies?).
  5. Trump invites Turkish President Erdogan to the White House.
  6. Turkey says they want to combat Kurdish soldiers in the border area and create a safe zone for Syrian refugees now living in Turkey.
  7. The White House says we’ve defeated the ISIS caliphate, but experts say ISIS is regrouping already. They also say this is the most destabilizing move we could’ve made.
  8. Trump threatens Turkey if they do anything Trump thinks is off-limits. But Turkey immediately mobilizes their forces at the border and begins their assault against the Kurds, launching airstrikes and firing artillery. In other words, they’re bombing the Kurds.
  9. The White House says that Turkey will take over control of over 12,000 suspected ISIS fighters captured and held by Kurdish allies. The U.S. takes custody of two ISIS militants known for beheading their enemies. Some ISIS militants escape after Turkish forces start shelling nearby areas.
  10. Kurdish civilians begin to flee, and some soldiers begin to leave their posts to go home and protect their families. These are people who were forced to flee ISIS fighters just a few years ago. International Rescue Committee estimates 64,000 people have already fled, and that number could end up being more than 300,000.
  11. Turkey strikes at least six towns along the border, killing at least two dozen people and critically injuring 19, mostly civilians and several children.
  12. The fighting escalates on the second day after Trump’s announcement, and Saudi-backed Syrian fighters join in, killing Kurdish captives. A Kurdish politician is also killed. This whole thing has just tossed fuel on Syria’s 8-year-long war.
  13. To be clear, Turkey, a NATO nation, bombed an area where hundreds of U.S. troops were stationed. What could go wrong? Maybe this: A contingent of U.S. Special Forces is caught in Turkish artillery fire, and they withdraw instead of firing back. Because we’re not at war. Right? Are we?
    • The U.S. forces say Turkey targeted them.
  1. Even with this, the order to withdraw all U.S. troops from the area doesn’t come until the end of the week.
  2. A National Security Council member says Trump got rolled and out-negotiated by Erdogan.
  3. The Secretary of Defense and the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff both call their counterparts in Turkey to try to get them to back down.
  4. Even Russia blames the U.S. for the chaos at the Syrian border.
  5. Trump says he’ll move some troops from Syria to Saudi Arabia. Also, the Pentagon says they’re sending 1,800 troops to Saudi Arabia to protect their oil fields from alleged attacks from Iran. One Saudi prince admits they really don’t know where the U.S. stands on Syria.
  6. Trump has two towers in Turkey, one residential and the other offices, in a single complex with a shopping mall and theaters.
  7. The UN calls an emergency meeting of the Security Council to condemn Turkey’s attack on our Kurdish allies. Russia opposed the condemnation, as did the U.S. (despite Trump’s claims that he’d hold Turkey in check).
  8. The bombing of four Syrian hospitals within a 12-hour period in May has been traced back to the Russian Air Force.

Other International:

  1. Trump says he’s thinking about withdrawing from the Open Skies Treaty, which is seen as a cornerstone of global defense. The treaty lets us monitor Russian military deployments and lets them monitor ours. The treaty has 34 signatory countries.
  2. The State Department announces they’ll impose visa restrictions on certain Chinese government officials believed to be responsible for the detention and surveillance of Uighurs and other Muslim minority groups.
  3. Military generals agree on a few things about Trump’s military leadership:
    • He isn’t interested in policy details and disdains expertise and process, and thus he makes ill-informed decisions.
    • He thinks his own gut feelings are genius, and only trusts his own instincts.
    • He’d rather keep perceived enemies confused than stick to a strategy, increasing the risk of a miscalculation.
    • He likes others to agree with him but is himself a contrarian.
    • His ideas of the military are simplistic and outdated.
    • He’s risked unnecessary wars and created major problems for his field commanders in combat operations. They’re saving his hide right now.
  1. A U.S. peace envoy meets with the Taliban for the first time since Trump canceled the Labor Day weekend peace talks with the Taliban and Afghan government.
  2. Violent protests continue in Ecuador until the president comes to an agreement with protestors to end austerity measures. Protestors and officials both help clean up the residual mess.
  3. The Hong Kong protests have been ongoing since March, and protesters just upped their game by using flash mob tactics to avoid arrest. I don’t mean to make light of it; the protests have been violent and destructive at times, and many of the citizens are tired of it.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. Yet another federal judge rules that Trump’s emergency declaration to fund his border wall is unlawful. The complainants argued that the wall didn’t qualify as an emergency and Trump overstepped his authority.

Family Separation:

  1. Loopholes in our immigration laws let judges grant custody of migrant children to American parents without notifying the deported parents of those children. In some cases, foster families ignore requests from the Department of Homeland Security to return the children. This isn’t new to the Trump administration.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A white police officer called to investigate a home late at night because the front door was open shoots the black women inside playing video games with her nephew. The woman, Atatiana Jefferson, heard noises outside so she stood up and got her handgun. That’s when the officer shot her through the window, without announcing himself and without warning. He’s charged with murder. He also resigns.
  2. Contradicting all medical science, a Florida judge rejects a Tampa ordinance banning conversion therapy for LGTBQ minors because he says it limits parental rights to make healthcare choices for their kids.
  3. Over 100 activists are arrested at a protest outside the Supreme Court while they heard arguments for three LGBTQ employment cases.
  4. Two towns in Alabama—Montgomery and Talladega—elect their first black mayors.
  5. Three separate courts block Trump’s efforts to keep low-income immigrants out of the country (his “public charge” rule).

Climate:

  1. The climate change activist group Extinction Rebellion holds demonstrations and die-ins across the globe, closing down streets and at times vandalizing public property. The group says the demonstrations will last for two weeks.
  2. Almost 600 former EPA officials call for an investigation into the Trump administration’s treatment of California. They accuse the administration of abusing their authority by retaliating against California officials for not following Trump’s political agenda.
  3. The House Science Committee finds that Commerce Department officials, not NOAA staff, were responsible for issuing the statement rebuking National Weather Service staff in Alabama who contradicted Trump’s warning that Hurricane Dorian would hit Alabama hard.
  4. Typhoon Hagibis is the largest to hit Japan in decades. It causes widespread flooding, leaves at least 35 dead, and injures 166 people.
  5. Arctic ice melt has started a power struggle in the area because it’s opened up access to oil and gas reserves. Every country wants a piece of it.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Employment grew more in Obama’s first 31 months than it did in Trump’s first 31 months (1.5 million more). In fairness, Obama started out with a lot more room to grow than Trump did.
  2. According to Pro Publica, the new limits on state and local taxes and to mortgage interest deductions resulted in a reduction or plateau in home values in some areas. Areas in the Northeast and Chicago saw the biggest drops.
  3. In 2018, for the first time on record, the 400 wealthiest Americans paid the lowest tax rate of all income groups. People who’re making more than $1 million per year paid a lower tax rate than all of us. Is that how anybody really thinks this should work?
  4. The U.S. and China announce an interim trade deal, a truce if you will. China will buy more agricultural products and start to open its economy, and the U.S. won’t implement the planned tariff hikes.
  5. The Treasury Department considers rolling back a rule designed to prevent American companies from moving money offshore in order to avoid taxes.

Elections:

  1. In response to Facebook refusing to remove an ad from the Trump campaign smearing Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren takes out a Facebook ad claiming that Mark Zuckerberg endorsed Trump. She then goes on to explain that it’s a lie, but Facebook wouldn’t take the ad down even knowing it was full of lies.
    • Several media outlets refuse to air Trump’s ad because it’s full of misinformation.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Trump awards former Reagan Attorney General Ed Meese with the Medal of Freedom, one of our highest civilian honors. Meese was directly implicated in three scandals under Reagan, including the Iran-Contra affair.
  2. The Oath Keepers say they’ll protect Trump supporters at his rally in Minneapolis, which draws an enormous protest outside the arena. Several neighboring businesses donate their proceeds for the day to groups like Planned Parenthood.
  3. Trump is mad at the rally, under pressure from impeachment hearings. And it shows. As one person put it, his words “were stunning in ugliness & tone.”
    • He targets Representative Ilhan Omar and Somali refugees in the city with the largest concentration of Somali refugees. He says he’d protect cities like Minneapolis from refugees they don’t want.
    • He as much as says that Somalis bring violent ideologies to our shores. He calls Omar an “America-hating Socialist.”
    • He says the Bidens got rich off Americans, though there’s no evidence of that. Also, with his kids making international deals left and right, he shouldn’t be pointing any fingers.
    • He says Biden “was only a good vice president because he knew how to kiss Barack Obama’s ass.”
    • He calls Speaker Nancy Pelosi “really stupid.”
  1. One of the few voices of truth on Fox News, Shepherd Smith, announces his sudden departure from the network to explore “another chapter.” This comes at a time when tensions between the opinion division (Carlson, Hannity, Perry, Ingraham, etc.) and the news division (Smith, Baier, Wallace, etc.) are at a peak. Do you suppose this is what Barr and Rupert Murdoch met about the other night? If I were Brett Baier or Chris Wallace, I’d be polishing my resume.
  2. Mark Zuckerberg has been having informal meetings with conservative politicians and journalists. He’s discussing free speech and partnerships.

Polls:

  1. A Fox poll indicates a record high level of support for impeachment.
    • 51% want Trump impeached and removed from office.
    • 4% want him impeached by not removed from office.
    • 40% are opposed to impeachment.

Week 142 in Trump – Impeachment News

Posted on October 23, 2019 in Impeachment, Trump

Here’s a catch-up post from the previous week. I took a much-needed vacation and came back to oh-so-much news! We’re starting to get depositions from witnesses to Trump’s dealings with Ukraine, so things should start moving more quickly now. Hopefully, we’ll be getting some public testimony soon.

Here’s what happened on the impeachment front for the week ending October 13…

General Happenings:

  1. Several GOP politicians criticize Trump’s dealings with Ukraine around withholding military aid, but they also say nothing Trump did rises to the level of impeachable acts.
  2. According to a memo written by the whistleblower, one White House official said Trump’s phone call with Ukraine was “crazy,” “frightening,” and “completely lacking in substance related to national security.” Several White House officials voiced concern that the call didn’t follow traditional diplomacy, with some feeling that it had crossed the line and was a criminal act.
    • Much of this memo comports with the public record of the call.
  1. Trump ordered Energy Secretary Rick Perry and two top diplomats (Kurt Volker and Gordon Sondland) to circumvent official diplomatic channels and work directly with Rudy Giuliani to set up meetings between Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky and Trump.
  2. After career staff at the Office of Management and Budget (OMD) questioned whether withholding military aid to Ukraine was legal, Trump shifted authority over those funds to a political appointee.
  3. In a win for Trump, Ukraine President Zelensky says for the first time publicly that Ukraine is happy to investigate the far-right conspiracy theory that it was the Ukrainians, and not the Russians (as unanimously concluded by all our intelligence agencies), who interfered in our 2016 elections. Zelensky also encouraged officials to reopen investigations into Burisma.
    • At the same time, Zelensky insists that he isn’t Trump’s puppet and there was no blackmail.
    • He also says U.S. officials haven’t provided any evidence of Ukraine’s interference in the elections.
  1. At least four national security officials brought their concerns about Trump’s pressuring Ukraine and about the call itself to a White House lawyer. One of their early concerns was the removal of Ambassador Maria Yovanovitch, followed by Giuliani’s conspiracy theories and indications that the White House wanted Ukraine’s new government to investigate the Bidens.
  2. Andriy Yermak, a top advisor to Zelensky, says that political leaders from the U.S. have been peddling accounts about Ukraine that are ill-informed. He thinks these false narratives gave Trump an excuse to withhold military aid.
  3. In a letter with dubious legal reasoning, White House counsel Pat Cipollone tells House members that the White House won’t cooperate with the impeachment inquiry.
    • He also accuses Democrats of wanting to overturn the 2016 election. It’s about three years too late for that, Pat.
    • The White House had already been blocking requests for documents and witness testimony.
    • Legal experts say the letter gives mostly political arguments rather than legal ones, and the arguments that are legal aren’t legally valid.
    • It’s actually kind of a doozy, if you want to read it.
  1. One complaint by the White House is that the House hasn’t taken a full vote to start impeachment hearings, so the investigations are being done in private. Because of this, Republicans accuse Democrats of not letting them participate fully in the inquiries. House Democrats say Republicans are participating; the depositions just aren’t open to everyone yet. Since it’s behind closed doors, it’s all he-said/she-said.
  2. After the White House blocks Gordon Sondland’s testimony, House leaders subpoena him for testimony and documents. Sondland agrees to testify to Congress next week.
  3. House Democrats consider masking the identity of the whistleblower from Trump’s allies in Congress to prevent them from exposing the person. This is extraordinary and illustrates the level of distrust in Congress right now.
  4. House leaders subpoena Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Office of Management and Budget acting director Russell Vought for documents related to Ukraine.
  5. While the State Department strongly supported issuing military aid to Ukraine, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is receiving criticism from within his department because he didn’t push the administration to issue the aid and didn’t intervene to protect U.S. diplomats caught in the middle.
  6. After Trump throws Rick Perry under the bus and blames him for the call with Ukraine, House Democrats subpoena Perry for documents related to a state-owned energy company in Ukraine and related to Perry’s involvement in Trump’s call with the Ukraine president.
  7. Once again, the White House accidentally sends their talking points to Democrats on The Hill, this time to counter Yovanovitch’s testimony.
    • One of the talking points included attacking House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff, and those attacks were hard to miss this week.
  1. Seventeen former Watergate prosecutors write an op-ed describing why they think Trump should be impeached. They support impeachment based on:
    • Trump’s public statements
    • Mueller’s findings
    • The transcript of Trump’s phone call with Zelensky
    • Trump’s continued obstruction of investigations
    • Public information, including the newly released text messages
  1. Speaker Nancy Pelosi continues to try to keep the focus of the impeachment inquiries on Trump’s behavior with Ukraine; but as allegations of the abuses of power start to come out, other Congressional Democrats push her to expand the scope.
  2. Michael McKinley, a career diplomat and senior adviser to Pompeo, resigns. He doesn’t give a reason, but he’s been disappointed in Pompeo’s lack of public support for diplomats.
  3. Following Trump’s request to China that they investigate Hunter Biden, Michael Pillsbury, a Trump advisor who previously said he had dirt on Biden walks that back and says everything he knew was public knowledge.
  4. Hunter Biden steps down from the board of a China-backed company, a position that’s become the target of Trump’s accusations. He says it’s because he wants to avoid any appearance of conflicts of interest and that he won’t work for any foreign companies should Joe Biden become president.
  5. Congressional sources say additional whistleblowers have stepped forward and are currently being vetted.
  6. Former GOP Representative Trey Gowdy agrees to serve as Trump’s personal legal advisor on impeachment issues.

Trouble for Parnas, Fruman, and Giuliani:

  1. Here’s a super big surprise in the middle of all this. The Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office indicts Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman and officers arrest them at Dulles airport as they appear to be fleeing the country. Rudy Giuliani, ironically enough, was planning to meet up with them in Europe.
    • The charges against the two include setting up shell companies to funnel foreign money to federal and state candidates in order to buy influence. Recipients of the funds include:
      • America First, the main pro-Trump super PAC.
      • House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), who received $500,000 and who previously accused Trump and former Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of being paid by Russia.
      • Rep. Pete Session (R-TX), who received $3 million. The two wanted Session’s help in removing U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Maria Yovanovitch from her post.
    • Parnas and Fruman arranged for Giuliani to meet with former Ukraine prosecutors Shokin and Lutsenko. These are the two who told Giuliani what he wanted to hear, but are now backpedaling on their stories. For example, Lutsenko told Giuliani that Yovanovitch gave him a “do not prosecute” list, something he now says isn’t true.
    • Parnas and Fruman also wanted political help with setting up a marijuana business in Nevada.
    • Both Parnas and Fruman did work for Russian oligarch Dmytro Firtash, who currently faces bribery charges in the U.S.
    • House Democrats subpoena the two for information about what they worked on for Giuliani. They both say they’ll refuse to cooperate.
  1. Trump denies knowing Parnas and Fruman, though they’ve dined together and have pictures together.
  2. Federal prosecutors New York are investigating Giuliani for potential lobbying violations in his dealings with Ukraine.
  3. Giuliani says he won’t cooperate with the impeachment inquiries, though he’s been subpoenaed for both testimony and documents.

Maria Yovanovitch Deposition:

  1. Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Maria Yovanovitch testifies under subpoena, even though she was ordered by the State Department not to. Here are some highlights of what we know she said:
    • With no warning, she was told to leave Kyiv on the “next plane” and was removed from her post upon arrival.
    • The Deputy Secretary of State told her she hadn’t done anything wrong but that Trump had lost confidence in her.
    • The White House had been applying significant pressure to remove her for almost a year.
    • Giuliani had been criticizing her behind her back, accusing her of privately badmouthing Trump and trying to protect Biden (both of which she denies).
    • She says she was removed based on “unfounded and false” stories
    • Yovanovitch made enemies in Ukraine due to her efforts to help build the National Anti-Corruption Bureau in Ukraine, which has also come under fire from the Trump administration.
  1. In Trump’s call with Zelensky, he said that Yovanovitch “is going to go through some things.” I wonder what that meant? Was it a threat?
  2. Giuliani says that Trump ordered Pompeo to fire Yovanovitch.

Week 141 in Trump – Impeachment News

Posted on October 9, 2019 in Impeachment, Trump

As more and more information comes out this week about how U.S. officials worked with Ukraine to help them acquiesce to Trump’s conditions, support for impeachment inquiries continues to grow. This week, we got a glimpse of the text messages being sent among our diplomats in Ukraine, plus a second whistleblower is in the wings. And Democratic Representatives have been at home talking to their constituents about impeachment concerns.

So here’s what happened on the impeachment front for the week ending October 5…

General Happenings:

  1. Intelligence Inspector General Michael Atkinson testifies privately before Congress about his reasoning for finding the whistleblower complaint credible and urgent. Atkinson did his own investigation upon receiving the complaint.
  2. When it comes out that the whistleblower contacted House Intelligence Committee staff members to find out how to proceed, Trump accuses Chair Adam Schiff of orchestrating the complaint, even of helping the whistleblower to write the complaint.
    • The whistleblower came to the committee after he filed his complaint with the CIA general counsel because he was concerned it wasn’t being handled.
    • The CIA lawyer’s intent was to make a criminal referral to the DOJ, indicating she thought a potential crime was reported. The DOJ says they weren’t sure whether it was a criminal referral.
  1. Trump continues to lash out at the whistleblower and Democratic leadership throughout the week. He thinks he should be able to meet with the whistleblower. He thinks Schiff should be tried for treason for running impeachment inquiries (or maybe it’s because Schiff paraphrased Trump’s conversation with Ukraine President Zelensky in a hearing).
    • Just a reminder that the whistleblower is now under federal protection over fears for his safety.
  1. Trump repeats a conspiracy theory that the intelligence community recently eliminated a requirement that whistleblower information be firsthand. The office of the intelligence community inspector general denies there ever was such a requirement.
    • But that doesn’t matter anymore, because a second whistleblower with firsthand knowledge of the call is in negotiations to come forward.
  1. Mitch McConnell reiterates that if the House passes articles of impeachment, the Senate has no choice but to hold the trial.
  2. Even GOP lawmakers criticize Trump for retweeting a pastor who says that if Trump is removed from office, it will “cause a Civil War like fracture in this Nation…”
  3. The GOP pushes all the conspiracy theories to defend Trump’s actions with Ukraine. So now Hillary’s missing emails are all mixed up with a missing DNC server (that’s not missing) and CrowdStrike being a Ukraine organization (that’s actually a U.S. company) and the Biden’s apparent conflict of interest in Ukraine.
    • These are sticking with the base, and the corruption and maneuvering by Ukraine officials, past and present, are only muddying the waters.
  1. Three House committees subpoena Rudy Giuliani for documents around his Ukraine dealings. They also request information from three of Giuliani’s business associates.
  2. We learn that Giuliani consulted with an imprisoned Paul Manafort on Ukraine through Manafort’s lawyer.
    • How does Manafort fit into all of this? Manafort lobbied for the pro-Russian former government in Ukraine. His name and payments made to him were included in a “black ledger” that was exposed as part of an anti-corruption campaign. Giuliani’s theory is that the DNC worked with Ukraine officials to release the book to force out Manafort and help Hillary.
    • Because of Giuliani’s conspiracy theory, at least two Senate committees renew their inquiries into whether the DNC and Ukraine coordinated efforts. These efforts are led by Senators Chuck Grassley (Senate Finance Chair) and Ron Johnson (Homeland Security Chair).
    • Manafort is in jail for this, so it’s not like he wasn’t doing anything wrong.
    • Giuliani says the ledger was a pretext to reopen investigations into Manafort, but the FBI had a case open against him before the 2016 campaign.
  1. Trump calls the impeachment inquiries “BULLSHIT,” and then gets into an argument with a reporter during a press conference with the president of Finland. He calls Schiff dishonest, shifty, treasonous. He again calls the press the enemy of the people.
  2. Nancy Pelosi holds a press conference, opening with what the House is doing to lower drug prices, to move the renegotiated NAFTA forward, and to restart infrastructure talks, showing that impeachment inquiries really aren’t taking up all their time.
    • She says it’s a sad time when we have to be impeaching the president.
  1. Jared Kushner will lead the White House’s impeachment strategy.
  2. In 2016, three Republican Senators signed on to a letter backing Joe Biden’s efforts in Ukraine, undercutting Trump’s claims of wrongdoing by Biden. Both Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) have come out publicly against Trump’s desire to investigate the Bidens over Ukraine, saying Shokin needed to be ousted. Trump calls Shokin a “good guy.” Johnson later backtracks.
  3. It’s possible Trump broke election laws with his call with Ukraine, but the FEC has so many empty positions that they don’t have a quorum to enforce the law. Normally, the backup would be the DOJ, but Barr won’t prosecute.
  4. Former and current officials say that Trump’s calls with foreign leaders have always been fraught with anxiety over what he’d say and horror with what he actually did say. These calls typically take weeks of preparation, and experts guide presidents as to what the other leader might say and how to best respond. But Trump improvs everything, including these calls, leading to embarrassments, scrapping weeks of work on an issue, and conflicts with U.S. foreign policy.
  5. The whistleblower’s attorney, Mark Zaid, says he’s representing multiple whistleblowers at this time. At least one more whistleblower has come forward that we know of, and this one has firsthand knowledge of the call.
  6. A district judge orders the White House to retain all records of Trump’s phone calls with foreign leaders and to maintain records of efforts to hide that information. This stems from a lawsuit filed in May by activist groups and agencies focused on ethics and maintaining national records.
  7. State Department staff say the Ukraine scandal has opened a rift between apolitical career diplomats and political appointees who want to investigate the conspiracy theories.
  8. In the middle of all of this, Trump still publicly calls for Ukraine to investigate the Bidens, and for China to do the same. He even asked China on a phone call, defeating the GOP’s efforts to dismiss that as a joke.
    • The China request originated from a multi-million-dollar deal that happened on a trip Hunter and Joe Biden took together—Hunter for business and Joe for government work. Trump says it was a $1.5 trillion deal and hasn’t provided any evidence of wrongdoing.

Who Else Is Involved:

  1. House committees subpoena acting Chief of Staff/OMB Director Mick Mulvaney for documents relating to Ukraine.
  2. It turns out that Attorney General William Barr is in this up to his nuts.
    • Not only did Trump tell Zelensky to talk to Barr about investigating the Bidens and CrowdStrike, but Barr asked Trump to call Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison to help out with the DOJ’s review of FBI and CIA actions in 2016.
    • Trump made the call to Morrison and restricted access to the transcript of that call, just like with the Ukraine call transcript.
    • Morrison says Australia is always happy to shed light on investigations, but defends the Australian ambassador who alerted U.S. intelligence to George Papadopoulos’s drunken confession that he was working with Russia to get dirt on Hillary.
    • Barr has also traveled to Italy to meet with Italian and British officials to discuss the review and secure cooperation.
    • And yet Barr didn’t recuse himself from the decision not to follow up on the whistleblower complaint.
  1. Just a reminder that the DOJ already has two legitimate efforts going on to review the investigations into the 2016 elections:
    • DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz is analyzing FBI and DOJ activity around Russian election interference and the FISA warrant approving the surveillance of Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. That report is expected within weeks.
    • John Durham, the U.S. attorney in Connecticut, is looking more broadly at intelligence activities around the election both abroad and here at home. This could take years to complete.
  1. After denying it for a week, Mike Pompeo says he took part in the Trump’s phone call with Zelensky. He only admits it after Giuliani outs him on national TV.
    • Pompeo had also argued against the White House releasing the excerpt of the call with Ukraine.
    • House committees subpoena him for records of the call.
    • Pompeo says he won’t let his subpoenaed employees talk to Congress. He says he’s protecting them from being bullied by Congress. What a whiner. Two of them say they’ll testify anyway, and committee heads accuse Pompeo of illegal obstruction.
    • Of note, both Barr’s and Pompeo’s predecessors’ relationships with Trump soured after they refused to carry out illegal requests by Trump.
    • Ironically, Pompeo was one of the loudest complainers that the Obama administration was “deeply obstructive.”
  1. Steve Mnuchin was also aware of Trump’s conversation with Zelensky and urged the White House not to release the excerpt of the call.
  2. Senator Lindsey Graham sent letters to the Prime Ministers of Australia, Great Britain, and Italy urging them to cooperate with Barr’s investigation. Here’s why those countries specifically:
    • Italy: Professor Joseph Mifsud, who offered George Papadopoulos dirt from the Russians on Hillary, is Italian. Everyone’s looking for him.
    • Australia: Papadopoulos spilled the tea about Mifsud to an Australian diplomat who then alerted U.S. intelligence, getting this whole ball rolling.
    • Great Britain: Christopher Steele, author of the Steele Dossier, was a British agent.
  1. State Department Inspector General Steve Linick requests an urgent meeting with House committees.
    • He turns over an envelope of documents sent from Giuliani to the State Department, full of mostly debunked conspiracy theories generated by the far-right and spread by far-right media outlets about the Bidens and the former ambassador to Ukraine.
    • Pompeo told Giuliani he’d investigate them.
  1. Trump throws Energy Secretary Rick Perry under the bus. He says that he didn’t even want to call Zelensky but that Perry urged him to do it. Perry wasn’t discussed in the call that we know of.
  2. The ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee sends letters to Perry and to Vice President Pence demanding answers by the end of the week about what they knew and what their roles were regarding Ukraine.
    • Perry announces his resignation. Up until now, he’s kept a pretty low profile, but it turns out he’s traveled to Ukraine recently working on energy issues, including making changes to the state-run oil and gas company, Naftogaz. This puts him in the middle of the impeachment inquiry.
    • Pence was involved in Trump’s pressure campaign against Ukraine. Initially, Trump told Pence not to attend Zelensky’s inauguration (Perry went instead). Pence later told Zelensky he had to take more aggressive action against corruption and that U.S. aid was still being withheld. Also, one of Pence’s top advisors was on the Ukraine call, so Pence should’ve had access to the transcript within hours of the call. It’s not clear whether Pence was aware of the conditions Trump was placing on Ukraine, but if he wasn’t, then he wasn’t doing his job.
  1. A little more on Ukraine’s state-run oil and gas company. A group of American businessmen and Republican donors used their ties to Trump and Giuliani to try to install their handpicked management to run Naftogaz so they could steer lucrative contracts their way. The election of a new president, Zelensky, threw a wrench into their plans. But then Rick Perry takes up the mantel and tries to install his own donors in the company. All of this would require multiple global agencies to authorize.

And What About Ukraine?

  1. Super randomly, Ukraine signs an agreement with pro-Russia separatists allowing them to hold local elections in eastern Ukraine.
    • The separatists want special status for self-governance.
    • Ukraine says there won’t be any elections until troops from both sides are withdrawn, and only with international observers allowed in.
    • Russia has refused to participate in peace talks unless the separatists are allowed their own elections. Score one for the aggressors.
    • Hundreds march in Kyiv in protest.
  1. Serhiy Leshchenko, a former member of the Ukrainian Parliament and current advisor to Zelensky says it was well-known that Trump wanted compromising information on the Bidens and that officials knew U.S. aid was contingent on cooperating with that request.
  2. Zelensky says his country can’t be pressured to open investigations. They’re an independent country. He’s being squeezed between the U.S. and Russia and his promises to rout out corruption.
  3. Ukraine’s new chief prosecutor, Russian Ryaboshapka, says he’ll review all previous investigations into Burisma among other. He reiterates that he hasn’t seen any wrongdoing by either Biden.
  4. Also, it’s super hard to get a straight answer about what Burisma’s owner was being investigated for and how the cases were resolved. Here’s hoping the new guy will shed some light here; the previous prosecutors have put out conflicting stories, even contradicting their own stories.

Volker, Text Messages, and the State Department:

  1. Kurt Volker, the former U.S. envoy to Ukraine, testifies privately before Congress and provides text messages showing that senior State Department officials didn’t think Trump would meet with Zelensky unless Zelensky promised to publicly launch investigations. According to the texts:
    • Our officials coordinated with Zelensky’s top aide (Andrey Yermak) and Giuliani to try to leverage that promise to make a summit happen between the two presidents.
    • Ukraine was afraid of looking like a U.S. puppet to the rest of the world.
    • A text from Volker to Yermak includes this: “… assuming President Z convinces Trump he will investigate / ‘get to the bottom of what happened’ in 2016, we can nail down date for visit…” This was just before the infamous phone call, and it’s a pretty explicit quid pro quo.
    • Two weeks after the phone call, there was still no date for a summit and State Department officials let the Ukrainians know that Trump needed a public pledge. So Ukraine agreed to announce that they’ll open the investigations requested by Trump along with a date for the summit.
    • Here’s the text from Yermak: “Once we have a date, will call for a press briefing, announcing upcoming visit and outlining vision for the reboot of US-UKRAINE relationship, including among other things Burisma and election meddling in investigations.”
    • Volker coached Yermak on what the message to use in order to convince Trump. He coached him to include the conspiracy theory about Ukraine involvement in our elections: “Special attention should be paid to the problem of interference in the political processes of the United States especially with the alleged involvement of some Ukrainian politicians. I want to declare that this is unacceptable. We intend to initiate and complete a transparent and unbiased investigation of all available facts and episodes, including those involving Burisma and the 2016 U.S. elections, which in turn will prevent the recurrence of this problem in the future.”
    • Trump really, really wanted the public promise of investigations in order to meet with Zelensky.
    • After Trump skipped a trip to Poland where he was slated to meet with Zelensky, Bill Taylor, the U.S. Charges D’affaires to Ukraine, texted this to Sondland: “Are we now saying that security assistance and WH meeting are conditioned on investigations?”
    • After the call, Taylor texted, “The nightmare is they give the interview and don’t get the security assistance. The Russians love it. (And I quit.)”
    • Taylor told Sondland he’s counting on him to be right, and Sondland replied: “Bill, I never said I was “right”. I said we are where we are and believe we have identified the best pathway forward. Lets hope it works.” To which Taylor replied: “As I said on the phone, I think it’s crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign.”
    • “The president has been crystal clear no quid pro quo’s of any kind,” Sondland replied.
    • It seems Sondland’s concern is getting aid to Ukraine no matter what he has to do to get it. Taylor is more concerned about ethics.
    • Here’s the kicker. A U.S. official says they didn’t use official State Department email for these conversations; they used WhatsApp.
  1. To me, the most important takeaway from the texts is that our ambassadors helped Yermak write a statement that would’ve publicly committed Ukraine to pursuing investigations into far-right conspiracy theories. This was unsuccessful, though, because the statement was never released. Ukraine wanted to make the statement less specific, simply saying they promised to go after corruption.
  2. The texts from Bill Taylor indicate a known quid pro quo. All participants in the text conversations seem to know that a meeting between Zelensky and Trump was contingent on the investigations.
  3. Volker says he warned Giuliani that the sources he was using for information about the Bidens in Ukraine were unreliable. Giuliani’s response? “Yes, I know that.”

Week 140 in Trump

Posted on October 2, 2019 in Impeachment, Legislation, Trump

Just read the damn transcript and claim already! They're short.

If you’re wondering whether your Members of Congress are really informed about what’s going on, you should know that many of them haven’t read the Mueller report yet. They haven’t even read the summaries. They also, obviously haven’t even bothered to read Trump’s 5-page excerpt from his conversation with the Ukraine president (as evidenced by Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s interview on 60 Minutes where he didn’t even know that Trump said, “I would like you to do us a favor though.” It’s not even that far down in the conversation. Don’t let your elected officials be that lazy. Make them take this seriously whether you want Trump exonerated or impeached. Call them and write to them and ask them to be informed and do their jobs.

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending September 29…

Shootings This Week:

I’m putting this section on hold this week. There’s too much else to sort out with the whistleblower complaint.

Legal Fallout:

  1. Research by the Senate Finance Committee’s Democratic staff finds that the NRA facilitated political access for Russians Maria Butina and Alexander Torshin to a greater extent than previously thought. New York and DC attorneys general are also investigating this.
  2. Trump meets with NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre to talk about how the NRA can support Trump financially. LaPierre is working to steer Trump away from universal background check legislation.
  3. A federal judge reverses Bijan Kian’s guilty verdict. Kian was Michael Flynn’s lobbying associate working on Turkish issues and was convicted of acting as a foreign agent and conspiring to hide it.
  4. The Southern District of New York drops their case against Tony Podesta and Vin Weber in connection with lobbying for Ukraine without registering as foreign agents.
  5. A judge says Trump must testify in a case from 2015 over a fight between his security guards and protestors. Protestors say Trump’s security guards assaulted them during a protest in the Bronx where they were protesting Trump’s derogatory comments about immigrants.
  6. And just a reminder, Trump now has two whistleblower complaints against him. The Ukraine one I’ll go into below, but there’s also a complaint that Trump tried to influence the IRS audit of his personal tax returns.
  7. The Manhattan District Attorney agrees to wait to enforce his subpoena to obtain eight years of Trump’s tax returns until after a judge rules on whether to dismiss Trump’s request to block the subpoena.
  8. Trump says he brought up the issue of Hunter Biden to his intermediary on the trade talks with China. He alleges that Hunter got China to put $1.5 billion into an investment fund. The dollar amount is vastly exaggerated—it was in the millions.
  9. The Trump administration intensifies their investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails, snaring about 130 officials who shared emails with her. The administration is reviewing each email, and in some cases retroactively marking them as classified. The 130 officials received letters saying there are potential security violations from them sharing those emails several years ago. Some of these officials have already retired or moved on to other jobs.

Impeachment/Ukraine:

  1. The background of this story is pretty complex, so I won’t get into it all here. Here are some resources:
  1. In mid-August, the whistleblower made his complaint to Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson. When Atkinson realized that whistleblower protocol wasn’t being followed, he alerted the House and Senate Intelligence Committees.
  2. That same day, three House committees opened investigations into whether Trump and Rudy Giuliani acted improperly in pushing Ukraine to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden and CrowdStrike.
  3. The Chairs of the House Intelligence, Oversight, and Foreign Affairs committees send a letter to the White House counsel demanding the White House give them documents about Trump’s conversations with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky.
  4. The Senate unanimously passes a non-binding resolution demanding that Trump release the whistleblower complaint about pressuring Ukraine. No GOP Senators object to the resolution.
  5. After months of slow-walking an official impeachment inquiry, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the start of official impeachment inquiries, provoked by the whistleblower complaint. It’s what I like to call an impeachment buffet.
    • She directs the heads of six House committees to proceed with their own inquiries, each focused on a different issue.
    • Democrats debate whether the scope of the impeachment inquiry should focus on the whistleblower complaint about Trump’s dealing with Ukraine or if they should include other potential crimes, like those brought up in the Mueller report, financial transactions, FEC violations, emoluments clause violations, and so on.
  1. Trump and Pelosi have a phone conversation where Trump asks if they can “work something out” about the whistleblower complaint.
  2. Senate Republicans say they’ll quash any articles of impeachment passed by the House, but McConnell has said the Senate will have to hold a trial. As a refresher:
    • The House holds hearings and votes on articles of impeachment.
    • If they pass articles of impeachment, the Senate then holds a trial.
    • If found guilty, Trump would be removed from office (this has never happened, and I can’t imagine it happening here).
    • Otherwise, Trump goes on record has having been impeached by the House but can stay in office.
  1. At least a week before the call, Trump told his acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, to hold back almost $400 million in military aid for Ukraine. The Office of Management and Budget (which is run by the same Mick Mulvaney) then relayed that info to the State Department and the Pentagon.
    • Legislators realized by mid-August that the OMB had taken over the decision-making process for the funds from the Defense and State Departments.
    • Administration officials were told to give Congress no explanation other than that the funding was delayed because of interagency processes.
  1. Trump released the money only after the whistleblower complaint became known, but administration officials say there’s no link. Congress also pressured the administration to release the funds.
  2. In early September, Ukrainian officials voiced concern about whether aid was cut off because the Ukraine government wasn’t investigating the Bidens.
  3. First Trump says he withheld the money over corruption concerns, but the next day he says it’s because NATO countries aren’t contributing enough money.
    • A letter from the Pentagon disputes the first point.
    • As for the second point, the EU has provided more aid to Ukraine than the U.S.
    • Trump’s defenders say he had to evaluate whether the newly elected Zelensky is pro-Russia or pro-United States and whether he is corrupt.
  1. Trump says that the money was eventually released, so that’s evidence he didn’t do anything wrong.
  2. Trump releases a partial transcript of his call with Ukraine President Zelensky. It corroborates much of the whistleblower complaint. It shows he did ask Zelensky to investigate the Bidens and to investigate CrowdStrike, the company that handled the review of the hacked DNC server. Here’s some background on CrowdStrike and the whole Ukraine conspiracy theory.
  3. Trump thinks the excerpt exonerates him; you can decide for yourself. Here’s the complete excerpt. Below are the highlights I pulled out:
    • Zelensky is either on the Trump train or he knows how to fluff Trump up (I think the latter).
    • They talk about Ukraine obtaining military weapons and then Trump says, “I would like you to do us a favor though…”
    • That favor is for the Ukraine government to investigate CrowdStrike and the DNC server (which, by the way, isn’t missing and isn’t sitting in some basement in Ukraine).
    • Several times, Trump mentions having Zelensky get in touch with Attorney General Barr (five times) and Rudy Giuliani (four times) to work on this.
    • Trump criticizes Mueller’s investigation (this is the day after Mueller testified to Congress).
    • Zelensky says that one of his aides spoke with Giuliani recently. He guarantees open and candid investigations. At this point, it seems he’s only referring to the server.
    • Trump appears to call Ukraine General Prosecutor Shokin a very good prosecutor who got shut down.
      Background: Shokin was voted out of office by the Ukraine Parliament for failing to prosecute corruption cases, which is what Biden was working on. Shokin‘s failure to act included the Burisma investigation, where Hunter Biden worked.
    • Then Trump makes the ask for Zelensky to open an investigation into the Bidens. He says Biden bragged about stopping the prosecution in that case. Just to set the record straight, Biden didn’t stop any prosecution of the Burisma case nor did he say he did. The Bidens were never being prosecuted. (This whole bit is super convoluted. I refer you back to the timeline.)
    • Zelensky assures Trump that the next prosecutor will be 100% Zelensky’s person. The former prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko, stepped down in the middle of all this. Now there’s a new prosecutor.
    • Zelensky agrees to investigate Burisma and Biden, and brings up how bad the U.S. Ambassador is.
  1. On the same day Trump releases the rough notes of his conversation with Zelensky, certain members of Congress get access to the whistleblower complaint in a SCIF, which means it contains classified information.
  2. They later release an unclassified version of the complaint to the public without the underlying classified evidence. Here are a few points, but you can read it yourself (it’s concise and well-written).
    • The complaint discusses the phone call, attempts to hide the content of the call, and additional ongoing concerns, like the meetings between Ukraine officials and Giuliani, and between Ukraine officials and our ambassadors.
    • On August 9, Trump told reporters that he thinks Zelensky will make a deal with Putin. (UPDATE: It was just announced publicly that this is happening.)
    • The White House used a super-secure computer system (a codeword-level system) to store details about Trump’s conversation with Ukraine President Zelensky. This is a very unusual use for this computer system, designed for highly classified national security information and not for politically sensitive information. This was at the direction of National Security Council attorneys, so it was serious.
    • Most interesting is the section on all the events leading up to the call, I recommend you all read it.
  1. This isn’t the only time the White House used the codeword-level system to hide conversations with foreign leaders. The White House also took extraordinary efforts to conceal conversations Trump had with Putin and Saudi’s Mohammad bin Salman.
    • The Russian government warns Trump not to release transcripts of any of his calls with Putin.
    • In 2018, the White House asked DoD officials to return transcripts of calls over worries their contents would be disclosed.
    • The White House also cut the number of aides allowed to listen in on secure lines and the number of officials who could review memos about the contents of calls.
  1. The White House accidentally sends out their talking points defending Trump to a number of House Democrats. And then they asked the Democrats to send them back. Here’s a summary of the talking points, along with my take on them.
  2. Republicans defend Trump by pointing out that three Democratic lawmakers sent Ukraine a letter threatening Ukraine if they don’t keep up their investigations into Manafort (those investigations were in conjunction with the current U.S. cases against Manafort). IMO, the letter is more of an inquiry, and not threatening at all. You can read it here.
  3. Trump says Congress should ask about Vice-President Mike Pence’s conversations with Zelensky.
    • Pence advises Trump not to release any of the contents of Trump’s call with Zelensky.
  1. DNI Joseph Maguire testifies before Congress. Some key takeaways:
    • This is unprecedented. All of it.
    • He was concerned about executive privilege in handling the complaint. Once Trump released the transcript, though, executive privilege was gone. Of note, executive privilege doesn’t cover criminal acts.
    • He thinks the whistleblower did the right thing and is acting in good faith, and that he should be able to testify before Congress.
    • He questions whether it is the purview of Congress to investigate this.
    • He doesn’t think he’s the best guy for this job.
  1. The whistleblower tentatively agrees to meet with Members of Congress as long as the whistleblower’s lawyer has the required security clearances.
    • If you’re curious about his credibility, the whistleblower identified several people who can corroborate his report, and the inspector general did his own followup investigation before finding the claim credible and urgent.
  1. A former advisor to Zelensky says that discussing the Biden case was a prerequisite to having a conversation between the two presidents.
  2. It turns out that while former Ukraine prosecutor Shokin wasn’t aggressively investigating Burisma, he was using the threat of investigation to extort the company’s owner and his friends.
  3. Ukrainian officials say that Lutsenko, who at the time was the Ukraine general prosecutor, was trying to give Giuliani the information he wanted earlier this year as a way to get into Trump’s good graces and possibly extricate himself from Ukraine. Lutsenko has since contradicted himself and said the Bidens didn’t violate any Ukrainian laws.
  4. Lutsenko says that the violations being investigated at Burisma occurred two years before Hunter Biden came on board.
  5. Lutsenko closed the investigation into Burisma in 2017, but begin looking at the company again early this year after he started meeting with Giuliani. His office disputes that he ever re-opened an investigation into the company, though.
  6. Lutsenko says he told Giuliani to open his own investigation with the FBI or CIA, but not to drag Ukraine into our politics. He also told him to bring his own court case if he had any evidence.
  7. Lutsenko told Giuliani that former U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch gave him a list of people not to prosecute.
    • Never one to let the chance at a good conspiracy slip by, Giuliani says the list was part of a liberal anti-trump conspiracy (is there any other kind?) that was bankrolled by George Soros (who else?).
    • The US State Department dismisses the list as an “outright fabrication.”
    • Nonetheless, the administration removed Yovanovitch from Ukraine in May.
  1. The number of Democrats in the House who support impeachment has grown to 224, from about 135 before the whistleblower complaint was made public.
  2. Over 300 former national security and foreign policy officials sign on to a statement voicing concern over the phone call with Ukraine and calling for impeachment inquiries to get to the facts. They say Trump’s actions constitute a profound national security risk.
  3. Three House committees issue subpoenas for documents from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and also instruct him to make these department employees available for deposition: former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, former Ambassador Kurt Volker, George Kent, T. Ulrich Brechbuhl, and Ambassador Gordon Sondland.
    • Volker is said to have arranged for Giuliani to meet with Ukrainian officials.
    • Volker resigns the day after the contents of the whistleblower complaint is published (which is also the day after Giuliani goes on the talkshow circuit showing everyone the texts he exchanged with Volker).
    • The whistleblower complaint alleges that the day after Trump’s phone call with Zelensky, Volker and Sondland met with Ukrainian officials to help them navigate Trump’s demands. Whatever that means. Volker will testify next week.
  1. In light of the impeachment announcement, the House Intelligence Committee will work through the two-week recess at the beginning of October.
  2. Trump defenders claim that the Intelligence Community changed the rules requiring whistleblower’s to have firsthand information just so this whistleblower could make a claim. Those rules were never in the code to begin with and the form hasn’t changed.
  3. Fox News reports that DC husband and wife lawyers Joe DiGenova and Victoria Toensing worked with Giuliani to get dirt on Biden from Ukrainian officials. They all three worked “off the books” and only Trump knew what they were doing. All three lawyers deny this.
  4. Trump and the GOP really push the narrative that Biden intervened in Ukraine to get the prosecutor to stop investigating his son. That’s really not what happened, but there was definitely the appearance of a conflict of interest. Here’s the straight scoop, with links to their sources.
  5. The whistleblower is now under federal protection out of fear for his safety.
  6. In 2018, Trump told the world he takes Putin at his word when he says Russia didn’t meddle in our 2016 elections. This week, we learn that in 2017, Trump did acknowledge that Russia meddled in our elections and that he told Russian officials that he didn’t care.
  7. Trump’s efforts with Ukraine seem to have three parts: 1) discredit his political opponent Biden, and 2) clear Russia of meddling in the 2016 election so we can drop sanctions, and 3) push Ukraine toward a peace agreement with Russia, again so we can drop sanctions.

Courts/Justice:

  1. A Michigan judge strikes down a law that would’ve made it harder for voters to get initiatives on the ballot. This was one of the laws passed by last year’s lame-duck legislature to restrict the new Democratic governor’s ability to enact his agenda.
  2. The day before Nancy Pelosi announces impeachment inquiries into Trump, Rep. Ayanna Pressley files articles of impeachment against Brett Kavanaugh.

Healthcare:

  1. As an example of how we have a “do nothing” Congress who just wants to impeach him, Trump says that Democrats haven’t taken any action to lower drug prices. But just last week he praised the bill they passed and sent to the Senate that would… yes, lower drug prices.
  2. At the UN, Trump’s administration says abortion isn’t an international right, and they push to eliminate terms like sexual and reproductive health from UN documents. Only 19 nations agree, including those bastions of women’s rights, Saudi Arabia and Russia.
  3. Employer health insurance plans have become more expensive over the past decade and they provide less coverage.
  4. The suicide rate in the military hit its highest level in five years.
  5. The FDA delayed regulating vaping products for years, and only started to regulate them in 2016; still, they pushed back critical deadlines until 2022.

International:

  1. In the middle of all the whistleblower kerfuffle, Trump meets with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky at the UN and they hold a joint press conference.
    • Trump talks about having the best employment we’ve ever had and the best economy we’ve ever had.
    • He also resurrects his accusations that NATO countries don’t spend enough money to help Ukraine.
    • Zelensky says there was no pressure during the whistleblower phone call, and also says he doesn’t want to get in the middle of U.S. elections.
    • Trump closes with, “Unfortunately she [Nancy Pelosi] is no longer Speaker of the House.
  1. Trump complains that the press isn’t covering all the great things he did at the UN summit because they’re too busy covering the whistleblower complaint. Here are just a few things they covered:
    • In Trump’s UN speech, he promotes nationalism and criticizes globalists, socialists, and several countries.
    • On the plus side, he says his administration is working to end the criminalization of homosexuality abroad and to empower women.
    • Trump holds a session on ending religious persecution and protecting religious sites and relics.
    • Trump planned to skip the UN Climate Summit, but he makes a brief appearance.
  1. Without a clear winner in Israel’s second elections this year, President Reuven Rivlin gives Netanyahu first dibs at trying to form a government. If Netanyahu can’t form a government, the mandate goes back to the president. Or there could be yet more elections.
  2. Netanyahu and opponent Benny Gantz plan to meet next week to see if they can agree on a unity government. Those talks will be the same day that Netanyahu’s pre-indictment hearing begins.
  3. Parliament resumes in the UK after the Supreme Court rules that Boris Johnson’s suspension of the Parliament was unlawful. Johnson was trying to prevent them from blocking a no-deal Brexit.
  4. Johnson’s opposition in Parliament wants to hold a vote of no confidence in order to replace Johnson with an interim administrator.
  5. Oh, and Johnson is now embroiled in a romantic scandal. He had an affair with an American businesswomen who received money from an agency that Johnson controlled as Mayor of London.
  6. Hong Kong is in its 17th straight week of pro-democracy protests. In an unauthorized march, thousands of protestors clash with police, and the entryways to subway stations are closed. Protestors set one entryway on fire, police arrest more than 100 people, and more than 25 protestors are injured. This was a violent weekend, with police firing water canons, tear gas, and rubber bullets, and with protestors throwing gas bombs, starting fires, and breaking windows. China’s 70th anniversary of Communist Party rule (which the protestors are fighting against) is coming up,
  7. Protestors block streets in Lebanon over the country’s economic crisis. They accuse the ruling class of stealing from the people.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. If you don’t think the House should impeach because you want them passing laws and working for the American people instead, take a look at this. It’s what the House has been doing outside of investigating Trump. Impeachment isn’t taking up all their time.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. For the second time, the Senate approves a resolution to block Trump’s emergency declaration to fund his border wall. The House follows suit, but Trump can still veto it and is likely to do so.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Trump cuts the U.S. refugee program by nearly half. He had already dropped it from 110,000 per year under Obama to 30,000 per year in 2019. In 2020, we’ll only allow 18,000 refugees in.
    • The U.S. takes in less than 1 refugee for everyone 1,000 residents each year. France, Canada, and Israel take in 4 to 5 times what we do per capita. Even Ecuador and Venezuela take in more per capita than we do (around 7 times more). Iran takes in 12 times as many refugees per capita.
  1. A district court judge says she’ll block Trump’s changes to the rules for how long we can detain immigrant children.
  2. Insomniac Events (a music festival company) changes their tents into shelters for around 5,000 Bahamans displaced by Hurricane Dorian.
  3. It’s been four years since Germany took in 1 million + immigrants, mostly from Syria. After initial opposition, these immigrants are integrating and helping to revitalize rural areas.
  4. In 1968, Olympic sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos were expelled for raising their fists on the winners podium in protest of racial injustice. Now they’re being inducted into the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee’s Hall of Fame. Just another example of how prevailing attitudes change and aren’t always on the right side of history. Hmmm…
  5. Trump calls six non-white Members of Congress “savages.” Two are Jewish, one is Puerto Rican, two are African American, and one is Palestinian.

Climate:

  1. Three Norwegian legislators nominate 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg for the Nobel Peace Prize. While at the same time, Trump makes fun of her in a tweet.
    • Actually, since her speech, Greta has taken a shit-ton of online abuse from adults for her climate activism. What inspires people to be such assholes?
  1. Even Russia formally joins the Paris climate agreement.
  2. Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro says the Amazon rainforest isn’t on fire; it’s brimming with riches that he wants to develop.
  3. A new report based on 7,000 studies says that climate change has heated the oceans and changed the ecosystem so dramatically that seafood supplies are threatened. The warmer ocean waters also fuel cyclones and flooding along coastal areas.
  4. At a meeting of fossil fuel executives, an industry lawyer says it’s time for energy companies to accept their role in fueling climate change. For decades, major oil companies have downplayed the effects of climate change, despite documents showing that their own studies supported the science as far back as the mid-80s.
    • Ironically, Trump’s deregulation efforts are part of what brought the industry to their “Come to Jesus” moment, because while larger companies will keep in place safety and environmental protections, smaller companies might take shortcuts. And that could be bad for the industry as a whole.
  1. Summer’s only been gone a week, but winter’s chomping at the bit. Parts of the West get hit with up to three feet of snow, with record low temps and strong winds. Montana Governor Steve Bullock declares a winter storm emergency.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The oldest travel company in the world, Thomas Cook, collapses, leaving hundreds of thousands of travelers stranded on their vacations. The British government refused to intervene to save the company, but they do say they’ll assist travelers. The collapse puts 21,000 jobs at risk.
  2. Just when the market looks optimistic, Trump addresses the UN and accuses China of not keeping its promises to us and engaging in predatory business practices. Stocks have their worst day of the month.
  3. And then, stocks fall further as more Democrats express support for impeaching Trump. But it ends the week pretty even. There’s no real precedent for how markets react to impeachment proceedings.
  4. The housing market slows a bit, with mortgage applications falling 10.1% and prices remaining steady.
  5. Income inequality is now at its highest level in over 50 years. Inequality is still highest in wealthy coastal states, but states in the middle saw the greatest growth in inequality in 2018 (the latest year for which we have numbers).
  6. The IMF names Kristalina Georgieva to be their managing director. Why is this news? Because, of all things, she’s an economist. Right now, Fed Chair Jerome Power, incoming ECB President Christine Lagarde, and World Bank President David Malpass are all lawyers with no solid backgrounds in economics. Having a lawyer in these positions makes them more agile, but also means they lack the understanding behind economic moves.
  7. The New York Fed continues to provide cash infusions to the repo market, but things continue to worsen. The problem is the decreasing level of liquidity, meaning banks don’t have fast access to cash.
  8. It’s been a while since we’ve heard about a teachers’ strike, but Chicago teachers vote to strike, possibly sometime in October.
  9. The UK economy shrank for the first time in seven years, with the GDP falling by 0.2%. The problem is largely uncertainty over Brexit.

Miscellaneous:

  1. At least 22 people are dead and 700 are injured after a 5.6-magnitude earthquake hits northern Pakistan.
  2. The former Chair of the North Carolina GOP, Robin Hayes, plans to plead guilty to lying to the FBI in a bribery case involving a major political donor. Hayes is also a former Member of Congress.
  3. New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger reveals that in 2017, a U.S. official sent The New York Times an urgent warning that Egypt wanted to arrest the paper’s Cairo reporter, Declan Walsh. The official also said that the Trump administration had tried to keep the warning secret and let the arrest occur.

Polls:

  1. Support for impeaching Trump jumped 13 percentage points among Democrats and 12 points among voters since the whistleblower claim came out.
  2. A majority of Americans approve of moving ahead with impeachment inquiries.
  3. In a Monmouth University Poll, 6 of 10 Republicans don’t think Trump mentioned Biden to Ukraine president Zelensky. Here’s a quote directly from the 5-page excerpt Trump released:
    “There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it… It sounds horrible to me.”
    Moral of the story? READ THE DAMN SOURCE MATERIAL.

Week 139 in Trump

Posted on September 25, 2019 in Politics, Trump

Leila Navidi, leila.navidi@startribune.com

Corey Lewandowski makes a spectacle of his hearing; details about the whistleblower complaint come out, and yes, it’s about Trump; huge Youth Climate Strikes span the globe; Boris Johnson might have illegally suspended Parliament; Israel holds new elections (yet again); costs stall Trump’s border wall; DHS reinstates medically protected status; Trump waives more tariffs; and will we go to war with Iran? It was a big week, and it’s already totally eclipsed by the news from the following week.

Here what happened in politics for the week ending September 22…

Shootings This Week:

  1. Here are this week’s mass shootings (defined as killing or injuring four or more people):
    • A shooter kills two adults and injures two teenagers in Cheyenne, WY. It was apparently a drug deal gone wrong.
    • A shooter in Wilmington, CA, walks up to a group of people and kills two of them and injures two others.
    • A drive-by shooter kills three people and injures one more in Chicago.
    • A shooter kills one person and injures five others in Washington, DC.
    • A shooter kills one person and injures five others in New Orleans.
    • A shooter in a nightclub in Lancaster, SC, kills two people and injures eight others.
    • Four people are found dead from gunshot wounds in an abandoned house in Cleveland, OH.
    • A shooting between two cars in New Orleans leaves four people injured.
    • A nightclub shooting in Kansas City, MO, leaves five people injured.
    • Two people are dead and two are injured in Gary, IN, after someone shoots at a car and the driver swerves into a tree.
    • A shooter kills one teenage boy and injures three others as they’re walking down a street in Chicago.
  1. Almost 230,000 people have experienced a school shooting since the Columbine shootings.
  2. Colt announces that they’ll suspend production of the AR-15 for civilian use. They say it’s because they’ve reached market capacity, not that they don’t think civilians should have the weapons.
    • Colt’s competitors sell similar guns for less than what Colt charges for theirs.

Russia:

  1. Corey Lewandowski “testifies” to the House Judiciary Committee. He says the White House told him not to provide any answers that can’t already be found in the Mueller report, and as such he is combative.
    • Lewandowski does confirm that everything in the report about Trump asking him to fire Jeff Sessions is accurate.
    • Lewandowski says the investigation is an attempt to “take down a duly elected President of the United States.” But then he says he never questioned the validity of the Mueller report.
    • Lewandowski appears to be using the hearing to make a splash in New Hampshire, where he plans a Senate run.
  1. The hearing is chaotic until the staff counsel starts asking the questions (as opposed to Members of Congress). Counsel gets Lewandowski to admit:
    • He lied to the American people multiple times on TV. Lewandowski says he doesn’t have to tell the media, and by extension the American people, the truth.
    • He took the Fifth and asked for immunity before meeting with Mueller’s team. Lewandowski has also said publicly that you only take the Fifth when you’ve done something wrong.
    • Before Trump asked him to fire Sessions, he brought up the possibility of giving Lewandowski a job in the White House.
    • He wanted to meet in private with Sessions so there would be no record.
  1. Trump tweets his appreciation of Lewandowski’s performance.
  2. Committee Chair Jerry Nadler is considering holding Lewandowski in contempt.
  3. There’s an explosion in Russia at the State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology, which is one of two locations in the world where live smallpox viruses are stored. Russia says there’s no threat from the virus, just like they said there was no radiation released from the explosion of their nuclear-propelled missile.

Legal Fallout:

  1. The Manhattan district attorney subpoenas eight years of tax returns from Trump’s accounting firm, Mazars USA. This is related to the Stormy Daniels case. Mazars says they’ll comply.
    • I feel like I just keep writing the same stories over and over again, but yet again, Trump sues his accounting firm to stop them from complying with the subpoena.
    • In attempting to block the subpoena, Trump’s lawyers argue that a sitting president can’t be subject to the criminal process, suggesting that Trump can’t be investigated or tried.
  1. Senator Chris Coons says he told the FBI last year about the allegations of more bad behavior by Brett Kavanaugh while in school, but the FBI doesn’t appear to have followed up on it.
  2. In addition to the Air Force sometimes housing their crew at Trump’s Turnberry golf resort in Scotland, Turnberry gifts high-ranking officials with special pins on their visits, and some of the visits last for up to five days. Sometimes the crew gets stranded due to bad weather, and some complain that their per diem is barely enough to get by at the expensive resort.
    • In the past two years, Air Force spending at Trump’s Turnberry golf course has nearly tripled from the previous two years.
  1. It’s still in question whether the DOJ will prosecute former acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe for allegedly lying about a media leak, but his lawyers say Trump’s attacks on McCabe have made a fair prosecution impossible.
  2. A federal court of appeals reinstates the lawsuit filed by Seth Rich’s parents against Fox News. Rich was a DNC staffer who was murdered in a botched robbery, and Fox repeatedly pushed the conspiracy theory that he was murdered because he was behind the leak of DNC documents in 2016.
  3. Last week we learned about a whistleblower report that wasn’t turned over to Congress as required. Per the Wall Street Journal, the complaint revolves around the Ukraine. During a phone call in July, Trump repeatedly pressured Ukraine’s new president to investigate Joe Biden’s son, and asked him several times to work with Rudy Giuliani on this. Giuliani met with top Ukrainian officials in June and August about it.
    • Trump doesn’t deny asking Ukraine’s president about Joe Biden and says he didn’t do anything wrong. He also says someone should look into Biden’s efforts force out Ukraine’s prosecutor general as it relates to Biden’s son, Hunter, being on the board of Burisma Holdings, which at one point was under investigation by Ukraine’s prosecutor.
    • A Ukrainian prosecutor has already found there was no evidence of wrongdoing by Biden or by his son.
    • Background: This has been fully investigated in Ukraine, and neither Joe Biden nor his son Hunter were found to have done anything wrong. The investigation into Burisma Holdings didn’t involve Hunter and was over a deal that occurred before Hunter joined the board. Around that time, Biden threatened to withhold aid from Ukraine in order to battle the corruption of the government (which, in a strange way of coming full circle, Paul Manafort helped into power). Joe Biden’s actions to remove Ukraine prosecutor Viktor Shokin were coordinated with our allies, and the recommendation to do so came from our embassy in Kiev. In fact, the IMF had threatened to withhold money for the same reason a month earlier.
    • Trump says the complaint was filed by a partisan whistleblower. Does that mean he knows the identity of the whistleblower? He says he doesn’t, which means he’s just making that partisan bit up.
    • Trump says it doesn’t matter what he discussed with foreign leaders.
    • Three House committees are already investigating Rudy Giuliani over this matter, and committee chairs and Nancy Pelosi threaten additional legal actions if the whistleblower complaint isn’t turned over as mandated by law.
    • Rudy Giuliani goes on the press circuit to try to get ahead of the Ukraine story. He says he didn’t ask Ukrainian officials to investigate Joe Biden, but literally less than 30 seconds later he says that of course he did.
    • The news of the whistleblower story causes growing support in the Democratic House caucus for impeachment.
    • Both Representative Adam Schiff and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi say that impeachment might be the only way forward now. This is notable because both have been reticent to fully commit to impeachment.

Healthcare:

  1. You might remember that a while back, Trump loosened up the laws on temporary healthcare plans that don’t meet the standards of the ACA by expanding their coverage from three months to one year. Well, now those plans have flooded the market, and people are finding out that their healthcare costs aren’t being covered. Just one success in the GOP’s efforts to gut the ACA.
  2. Two bills expanding access to abortions go into effect in Maine after anti-abortion activists fail to get the necessary signatures to fight them. One bill requires insurance plans covering prenatal care to also cover abortion care, and the other overturns a ban on nurse practitioners providing abortion care.
  3. A federal judge denies Missouri’s request to put into effect their ban on abortions after 20 weeks while the case against it moves through the courts. The original law bans abortions after 8 weeks, but includes triggers to ban abortions at 14, 18, and 20 weeks if the 8-week ban is found unconstitutional.
  4. The House passes a bill designed to help lower prescription drug prices by increasing the ability to negotiate prices. Trump praises the bill right after Mitch McConnell says the bill is dead on arrival in the Senate because it’s “socialist.”
  5. Purdue Pharma, maker of OxyContin, files for bankruptcy.

International:

  1. The Trump administration releases satellite images that appear to implicate Iran in the attacks on Saudi oil plants. The images show 19 strikes at two facilities, which Trump officials say couldn’t be carried out with 10 drones, as claimed by the Yemeni rebels. Iran continues to deny involvement.
    • Officials say that our surveillance satellites caught Iran preparing for the attacks, but are calling the evidence circumstantial.
    • Trump and Rouhani were working on setting up a meeting at the UN summit, but now Iran is ruling that out completely.
    • Mike Pompeo heads over to Saudi Arabia to discuss a response to the attacks. Pompeo says the administration wants a peaceful resolution, but defense officials present a list of potential targets should we decide to retaliate alongside Saudi Arabia.
    • Iran’s foreign minister threatens an all-out war if the U.S. or Saudi Arabia strikes Iran.
    • Trump deploys 500 additional U.S. troops to Saudi Arabia.
    • Trump announces additional sanctions on Iran, which target their national bank.
  1. Two suicide bombings in Afghanistan kill nearly 50 people. One was near the U.S. embassy and NATO compound.
  2. A Scottish court finds that Boris Johnson illegally suspended Parliament last month, pushing the case up to Britain’s Supreme Court.
  3. Does this sound familiar? Close to the Israeli election, Netanyahu and his party accuse minority Arab citizens of voter fraud and they send out racist robocalls warning about high Arab turnout.
    • The Israeli vote is too close to call. Netanyahu’s Likud party trails the centrist Blue and White party by two seats. Israeli President Reuven Rivlin will consult with party leaders and decide whether Netanyahu or Gantz gets a first shot at forming a government. In a first, Arab parties have said they’d be open to forming a government with Blue and White.
    • With his lead, Gantz declares victory, but Netanyahu says they should share power. Gantz rejects the power sharing offer, and says he’ll lead a coalition of parties from across the political spectrum.
  1. Trump names Robert O’Brien to be the new National Security Advisor. O’Brien is the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs (aka a hostage negotiator) who recently made news when Trump sent him to Sweden to monitor the trial of A$AP Rocky.
  2. In the middle of the whistleblower controversy, Trump says he’ll meet with the Ukraine president at next week’s UN summit.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. House Democrats hold hearings on DC statehood.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. Trump starts to discuss sensors in the fences going up at the border, which is apparently sensitive technology. When he asks the General in charge to describe the technology, the General says, “Sir, there could be some merit in not discussing that.”
  2. At the same visit, Trump says that the world’s best mountain climbers have tested his wall and couldn’t scale it. I think rock climbers would be better testers, but regardless, world-class mountain climbers have no idea what he’s talking about.
  3. The Department of Defense says they won’t go forward with three projects to build border wall in Arizona and California because it’s too expensive. So far 60 miles of fencing have been updated.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A new study finds that one in 16 women say their first sexual experience was rape, and those women tend to have higher rates of unwanted first pregnancies, abortions, and subsequent physical and mental health problems. 75% were younger than 17 when it happened, and nearly half of those were younger than 14.
  2. After Trump says the DOJ should rescue Brett Kavanaugh, Attorney General William Barr’s past skepticism over rape claims comes to light. Barr has accused Obama of “fanning the false narrative of rape culture” (um, see above study, Mr. Barr). He also endorsed a book that accuses schools of treating people accused of rape unfairly.
  3. Immigration services reverses their new policy of deporting people who are here under medical protected status (the deferred action program) after a huge public outcry and a House hearing about it.
  4. The Pentagon is the group in the Trump administration still fighting against Stephen Miller’s plans to drastically cut the number of refugees allowed in the U.S. The Pentagon argues that bringing in refugees is in our national security interest, and they’re specifically arguing for visas for Iraqis who’ve helped out U.S. troops.
  5. Trump plans to skip the UN summit on climate change next week and instead will chair a session on worldwide religious persecution.
  6. Due to the recent mass shootings, the Department of Homeland Security finally adds White Supremacy to its list of terrorist threats. The DHS was formed as a reaction to the 9/11 attacks, so their focus was on Muslim extremists, rightly or wrongly so. They unbelievably expanded to include minority groups before they included the White Supremacists attacking those groups.
    • This victory rings hollow to me. Six of the victims of the El Paso shooting were family members of DHS employees. So this is another instance of “it’s not a problem until it affects me.”

Climate:

  1. EPA administrator Andrew Wheeler threatens to cut U.S. highway funds to California, saying that our air is too polluted.
    • Why is this ironic? At the same time, Trump formally revokes California’s waiver on federal emission standards. The waiver allows the state to set stricter emissions limits than what the federal government mandates so that we can reduce our air pollution.
    • But whatevs. Ford, Honda, BMW and Volkswagen all say they’ll stick to their agreement with California on stricter emissions standards. Industry leaders say that Trump’s anti-trust lawsuit against them is causing other automakers to think twice about joining them, though.
  1. Tropical Depression Imelda drops over 40 inches of rain on parts of Texas, causing massive flooding and killing three people. This is the same area hit by Hurricane Harvey.
  2. Before the upcoming UN summit on climate change, millions of people march in the Youth Climate Strike in over 150 countries. An estimated 4 million people in thousands of cities participate.
  3. The bird population in the U.S. and Canada has fallen by almost a third since 1970, partly due to our encroachment on their habitats and the growing use of pesticides.
  4. In order to justify cutting aid to Guatemala, the Trump administration had to ignore its own evidence of climate change being a major factor in the current migration from Guatemala. Part of the aid Trump froze was supposed to go to help small farmers mitigate the effects of climate change. From a DHS official:
    • “Everyone knows [White House adviser Stephen] Miller isn’t interested in hearing about climate change,”
  1. Three Mile Island, the site of the worst nuclear accident in U.S. history, finally shuts down for good. Because of the nature of nuclear energy, it will take decades to completely decommission the plant—it should be complete in 2078.

Budget/Economy:

  1. In the first auto workers strike in 12 years, about 46,000 members of the United Auto Workers’ (UAW) at GM walk off the job. At issue is GM’s idling of five plants, wages, healthcare, and permanent positions for temporary employees.
    • There’s also a scandal within the union right now regarding misappropriation of funds. Bad timing there.
  1. All market indicators seem to be weird right now. The inverted bond yield might or might not be predicting a recession. The consumer price index might or might not be predicting inflation. Your guess is as good as anybody’s at this point.
  2. Trump complains that homeless people live in “our best highways, our best streets, our best entrances to buildings.” He says he’s speaking to tenants who “want to leave the country,” whatever that means. He also says homelessness started two years ago, and that he ended it in DC already.
  3. CEO confidence is at its lowest level since before Trump took office, and they’re downgrading their expectations for hiring and growth.
  4. The Fed cuts interest rates by 1/4 point for the second consecutive quarter with three dissenting votes from the board, reflecting 1) concerns about an economic downturn and 2) conflict within the Fed over whether the action is warranted.
  5. For the first time since 2007, the Fed injects money into the short-term money market due to a spiking “repo” rate. The repo rate is the price at which securities like U.S. government bonds can be temporarily swapped for cash. The Fed pumps up the market with $128 billion in cash.
  6. Trump waives tariffs on over 400 items imported from China. He says he’s having a little spat with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
  7. The farm bailout reaches $28 billion, which is more than twice what the automaker bailout cost us after they paid everything back (the auto bailout ended up costing U.S. taxpayers around $12 billion).
  8. Saudi Arabia says their oil output and production will return to normal by the end of the month.
  9. Amid hopes that Britain will avoid a no-deal Brexit, the British pound rises to a 2-month high against the dollar. Which isn’t saying much. In August, the pound was at its lowest rate against the dollar since 1985.
  10. The Trump administration asks the Supreme Court to hear a case that could allow them to fire the head of the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, the agency created by Elizabeth Warren to be a watchdog against the kind of corporate malfeasance that played such a big role in the Great Recession.

Elections:

  1. Republicans in four states have cancelled their GOP primary elections, but Michigan Republicans aren’t able to. So instead they change the rules to ensure Trump gets all their delegates.
  2. The Alaska Republican Party cancels its 2020 presidential primary, becoming the fifth state to do so.
  3. Hate those coastal elites? Well, Trump just fundraised about $15 million off of them in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
  4. Finally Mitch McConnell puts his support behind $250 million in funding to harden our election security.

Miscellaneous:

  1. With Trump’s current nominee to head up FEMA being held up for personal issues, Trump will nominate Peter Gaynor to head up FEMA. He’s the current deputy director of FEMA.
  2. Police finally arrest Democratic donor Ed Buck after a third victim nearly dies at his home, which police are calling a drug house. This is a super bizarre story, and I don’t know how he wasn’t arrested sooner.
  3. Darrell Issa’s FBI file is holding up his nomination for director of the U.S. Trade and Development Agency. No word on what specifically is in that file, but Issa’s already looking into running for the House again in California’s 50th district where the current representative, Duncan Hunter, is indicted on 60 felony counts.
  4. Mike Pence brings his motorcade (eight SUVs) to Mackinac Island, MI, a national historic site that typically doesn’t allow non-emergency vehicular traffic. Pence is the first government official to break with the island’s tradition of not allowing cars. His trek from the airport to the Grand Hotel, host of the Republican Party conference, is all of one mile.
  5. Trump’s administration has one of the highest levels of turnover, with change in 78% of the positions. 31% of those have turned over multiple times.

Polls:

  1. A recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finds that 69% of registered voters do not like Trump, even if they like his policies. That makes him the most disliked out of his five most recent predecessors.