Tag: RudyBlewTheWhistle

Week 145 in Trump

Posted on November 15, 2019 in Politics, Trump

Super-redacted Mueller interview notes, released this week.

Trump just can’t go anywhere anymore. On top of getting booed at the World Series last week, this week he gets booed at the Ultimate Fighting Championship at Madison Square Garden. You’d think the UFC crowd would be a little more Trump-friendly. But then Trump, a life-long New Yorker, just changed his residence to Florida because New York officials are mean to him. Or so he says.

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending November 3…

Shootings This Week:

  1. There were ELEVEN mass shootings in the U.S. this week (defined as killing and/or injuring 4 or more people). Shooters kill 16 people and injure 39 more. Here are the most deadly:
    • A shooter (or shooters) kills 3 people and injures 9 at a Halloween party in a park in Long Beach, CA.
    • A shooter kills 4 family members in a home in West Philadelphia, PA. The shooter is the oldest son of the woman he killed.
    • A shooter kills 5 people and injures 3 more in Orinda, CA, on Halloween. The shooting could be related to another quadruple murder that happened in 2015.

Russia:

  1. A judge rules in favor of a FOIA request for the release of Robert Mueller’s witness interview notes. The DOJ must continue to release the notes, and will do so monthly to CNN and Buzzfeed, the agencies that filed the FOIA request. Here are a few things we learn from the notes:
    • Caveat: I didn’t read the handwritten notes very closely because they’re pretty hard to decipher.
    • Trump and Trump campaign officials repeatedly discussed how they could get access to the hacked DNC emails that they knew were stolen.
    • According to Rick Gates, the campaign was “very happy” that a foreign government helped to release the hacked DNC emails. After the emails were hacked, Trump told Gates that more leaks were coming.
    • Michael Flynn offered to use his intelligence sources to get the emails.
    • Along with Trump, these guys also expressed interest in getting the emails: Michael Flynn, Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort, Corey Lewandowski, Jeff Sessions, Sam Clovis, Donald Trump Jr., and someone whose name is redacted.
    • Sean Hannity was an integral part of the campaign.
    • The RNC worked to amplify the WikiLeaks releases of the stolen documents, and appeared to be aware of the timing of those releases.
    • The conspiracy theory that Ukraine hacked the DNC and not Russia (like all our intelligence agencies found) appears to have originated with Konstantin Kilimnik. Paul Manafort was pushing that conspiracy theory back in 2016. Michael Flynn was also adamant that Russia wasn’t behind the DNC hack. All this mucking around in conspiracy theories is how Trump ended up in this impeachment process—he repeated uncorroborated rumors from a pro-Russian agent instead of trusting our own intelligence.
    • Steve Bannon was pushing the Uranium One conspiracy theory and was convinced that’s what Hillary’s “missing” 33,000 emails were about.
    • Trump wants an Attorney General who will protect him. He finally got that in William Barr, that’s for sure.
    • Erik Prince advised the campaign on the East and Mideast. He also questioned Russia’s involvement in the 2016 elections.
    • The notes are highly redacted. In fact, they’re so redacted that it’s hard to get much that’s new from them. Since much of this document relates to Rick Gates’ testimony, I would assume much of the redacted information relates to Roger Stone’s upcoming court case.
  1. The Trump administration appeals a ruling requiring that the DOJ give the House Judiciary Committee material related to Mueller’s report.
    • A federal appeals court places a temporary hold on that material until it can be determined whether to block the release during the entire appeals process.

Legal Fallout:

  1. Bob Menendez calls for an investigation into whether Mike Pompeo’s trips to Kansas involve campaign activities and are thus a violation of the Hatch Act, which limits such activities for federal employees.
  2. Trump uses his large network of donors to raise funds for GOP Senators facing tough races. Normally not a big deal, unless you’re facing a possible impeachment trial in the Senate. Richard Painter, a former ethics lawyer for the White House, says that this looks like “felony bribery.” All of the Senators in question signed on to a resolution condemning the impeachment inquiry.

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. In Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan’s confirmation hearing to become Ambassador to Russia, he agrees that it’s not appropriate for the president to use his office to solicit investigations into his domestic political opponents. “I don’t think that would be in accord with our values.”
    • However, he also expresses a lack of curiosity or care about the current policies on Ukraine.
    • He also generally agrees with the threat from Russia in the realms of cybersecurity and their expansion in the Mideast.
  1. The American Bar Association rated Trump’s judicial nominee Lawrence VanDyke not qualified. In a particularly harsh assessment, their report says he’s “arrogant, lazy, an ideologue, and lacking in knowledge of the day-to-day practice.” He breaks down over it during the hearing.

Healthcare:

  1. A judge temporarily blocks Alabama’s latest restrictions on abortion, which would’ve made it a felony for a doctor to perform an abortion in almost all circumstances. The law was designed to push the limits of Roe v. Wade in order to get it pushed to the Supreme Court. It’s notable that Alabama has tried to pass several abortion restrictions this year, but courts have blocked them all.
  2. Missouri’s Health Director was keeping tabs on the menstrual cycles of women who were patients at a Planned Parenthood. He claimed to be tracking failed abortions (he thought there were four of them).
  3. Missouri requires pelvic exams before medication abortions, so Planned Parenthood doesn’t offer medication abortions.
  4. The Senate rejects a resolution that would’ve overturned a Trump administration rule that allows states to ignore parts of the ACA. Trump’s rule makes it easier for states to prioritize “junk” insurance policies that don’t meet ACA requirements.

International:

  1. Russia replaces the U.S. flag at a Syrian military base with the Russian flag.
  2. Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney didn’t know about the raid on Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi until after it was underway. The chief of staff is generally front and center to any major presidential actions.
  3. Protests in Chile continue despite President Sebastián Piñera reversing the subway fare increase that started the whole thing. He also reversed an increase in electricity charges, raised minimum wages and pension benefits, raised taxes on the rich, and made changes to his cabinet. Chile is normally a stable country.
    • Because of the protests, Chile’s President Piñera cancels the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in November and the UN Climate Summit in December. Trump had hoped to sign his phase 1 trade agreement with China at APEC.
  1. Protests also continue in Hong Kong, where protestors are asking for U.S. help. They think the U.S. can save Hong Kong from losing their democratic rights.
  2. Governments in Iraq and Lebanon agree to resign as a result of the protests in those countries. In Lebanon, they’re protesting corruption and a stagnant economy.
  3. Trump withholds $105 million in security aid for Lebanon two days after the country’s prime minister resigns. This could be completely legit, but because we can’t trust Trump with foreign relations anymore, it comes off as suspect. The State Department says that the White House budget office and National Security Council made the decision, but doesn’t give a reason for it. Congress, the Pentagon, and the State Department oppose the move. Gosh, this all sounds so familiar…
  4. Catalonian protestors start up again in Spain, calling for Catalan independence.
  5. Remember the Turkish cleric that Michael Flynn was trying to help Erdogan extradite to Turkey? Well, this week we learned that Trump looked into cutting funding for the schools he runs.
  6. British Parliament gives Boris Johnson the December election he asked for.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. Using commercially available reciprocating saws, smugglers in Mexico have sawed through new sections of Trump’s border wall, leaving openings big enough for people to pass through (and obviously big enough for drugs to pass through). Reciprocating saws can be bought for as little as $100. According to engineers, it’s the new design of the fences that make it so easy to breach.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A federal judge changes his previous ruling and reopens part of Nicholas Sandmann’s lawsuit against The Washington Post for misrepresenting the situation over his confrontation with a Native American protestor. Sandmann was wearing a “Make American Great Again” cap at the time of the confrontation. I have a feeling that this case might initiate some changes to video journalism.
  2. The Trump administration announces they’ll no longer enforce an Obama-era rule that required child welfare providers who accept federal funds to not discriminate against people based on religion.
    • Obama’s rule prevented faith-based organizations in the foster system from discriminating against prospective adopters because of closely held religious beliefs.
    • Trump’s ruling reduces the pool of accepting parents who will be allowed to foster through certain organizations.
  1. Trump appoints the current undersecretary of strategy and policy at DHS to be the new acting head of DHS… to replace his previous acting head of DHS.
  2. Attorney General William Barr limits the options immigrants have to fight deportation by getting rid of existing paths to legal immigration for people with minor or old criminal convictions.
  3. October will end with no refugees admitted to the U.S. for the month. Trump placed a moratorium on refugees and delayed it twice, canceling around 500 flights at taxpayer expense.

Climate:

  1. The government of the U.K. halts fracking in England.
  2. The Keystone Pipeline spills over 380,000 gallons of sludgy tar sands oil in a wetland area in North Dakota. The pipeline transports a mixture of clay, water, bitumen (a think oil), and a combination of chemicals that help it flow. The chemicals disperse fairly quickly, but unlike regular oil, the tar sands oil sinks. The wetlands will likely be unable to be completely restored.
  3. Jane Fonda is arrested for the fourth consecutive week for protesting inaction on climate change.
  4. Taking a page from their U.S. counterparts, 15 young Canadians file a lawsuit against their government for not taking acting against climate change.
  5. The Ocean Cleanup project starts cleaning plastic out of rivers to stop it from draining into the ocean in the first place.
  6. The International Energy Agency publishes the results of a study that they say shows that offshore wind turbines could power every home and every business on the planet.
  7. Murray Energy files for bankruptcy, becoming the eighth coal mining company to file for it in the past year.
  8. General Motors, Fiat Chrysler, and Toyota side with the Trump administration in the battle for California to retain its waiver over federal fuel emission standards. Other automakers, including Ford, Honda, Volkswagen, and BMW, have already reached a deal with California.
  9. The EPA announces they’ll weaken limits on coal-power plant releases of heavy metals like arsenic, lead, and mercury.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan, is considering moving his company’s Manhattan headquarters to U.S. cities with cheaper costs and better tax benefits. Just another victim of the 2017 tax reform.
    • Dimon does say the reason is partly to protect the company from a looming economic downturn, and JPMorgan is just one of several companies rolling back spending over fears of a global recession (though economists don’t see this in our near future).
    • More companies are also stocking up on their cash reserves instead of making risky bets.
  1. While expressing optimism in general about the economy, high net worth individuals and business owners also have more of their assets in cash than is typically recommended. Globally, investors have 27% of their holdings in cash.
    • This could help cushion the effects of a recession for them, should it happen.
  1. The Federal Reserve cuts interest rates by a quarter point for the third straight quarter, so they’re still protecting the economy from risks created by the trade wars, a slowing housing market, and sluggish manufacturing numbers. Feds suggest that this is likely the last reduction for a while.
  2. Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping had planned to sign their Phase 1 agreement at the APEC Summit in Chile this month. With Chile canceling APEC, they have to look at a different venue.
  3. The stock market pops on the 3-month extension for Brexit, a possible first-phase agreement in the U.S.-China trade war, and the Fed’s interest rate cut.
  4. The U.S. economy added 128,000 jobs in October and unemployment ticked up just a bit to 3.6%. The jobs numbers beat expectations, but they were set pretty low.
  5. Senator Chuck Grassley says he’s worried Trump will shut down the government again, this time over the impeachment process.
  6. Trump threatens to end federal aid to California in no less than twelve tweets in one day. Maybe California should stop sending funds to the federal government?
  7. The UAW comes to an agreement with GM and Ford, ending the six-week-long workers’ strike. Both sides agree to a 4-year labor plan.
  8. The Senate passes four spending bills to keep up operations at the departments of Agriculture, Transportation, and Interior. The majority of funding, which runs out on November 21, is being held up in a fight over the border wall.
  9. The White House considers another set of tax cuts to be announced during the 2020 presidential campaign. It’s designed to help Republicans run on a message of a strong economy.

Elections:

  1. Freshman Congresswoman Katie Hill (D-CA) resigns over rumors of an affair with a congressional staffer (which is against the rules of Congress and which she denies), an affair with a campaign staffer (which she confirms but which isn’t against the rules), and the publication of intimate and nude photos.
    • Her reason for not fighting this is that she was warned there are 700 pictures that would be released bit by bit to keep it in the news.
    • Also, her political competitors made posters out of some of the pictures and posted them around Hill’s parent’s town.
    • One of the leakers worked for the campaign of the Republican incumbent that Hill beat in 2018. That incumbent, Steve Knight, is running for her seat now.
    • George Papadopoulos, the guy who started the whole Russia investigation, also files to run. Somehow I don’t think he’ll get the RNC’s backing.
  1. A court hands North Carolina Republicans another gerrymandering defeat, ruling that the current congressional districts cannot be used for the 2020 elections. Likely, they’ll need to redraw the districts to be less discriminatory. I have literally lost count of the number of times these districts have been ruled unconstitutional. A previous ruling on gerrymandering in the state said the lines targeted African Americans with surgical precision.
  2. Twitter announces they’ll stop accepting any political ads across their platform.
  3. The top Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee says he won’t run for reelection next year. Greg Walden is the 22nd House Republican to retire, resign, or run for another office.
  4. Upon the impeachment vote, the National Republican Congressional Committee sends boxes to the offices of vulnerable Democrats in purple/red districts. Apparently, they didn’t think through government security procedures and got called in for questioning.
    • Democrats tell them that when they get done with being questioned, let us put those boxes to good use by using them for our canned food drive for Thanksgiving.
  1. Georgia plans to purge around 315,000 voters from the voter rolls before the 2020 elections if they don’t return their cancellation notices. This is about 4% of registered voters.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Trump changes his legal residence from New York to Florida. People say it’s because of his tax reform and reduction of SALT deductions, but property taxes will still be the same no matter where he lives.
  2. After Joe Biden criticizes Trump for appointing Ivanka and Jared Kushner to White House positions, Kushner says that most of his job has been cleaning up Biden’s messes.
  3. Trump adds his personal pastor to the administration in an official capacity. Paula White is a televangelist who will oversee outreach and advise the Faith and Opportunity Initiative. The initiative is designed to give religious groups a bigger voice in government. I wonder if it includes Muslim voices? Buddhist? Bahai?
  4. Mark Zuckerberg says Facebook won’t police political speech, even if it’s blatantly false.
  5. Thousands of protestors gather at Trump Tower in Chicago during a fundraiser for Trump and Pence.

Polls:

  1. 55% of Americans think what Trump did regarding Ukraine is out of line, but only 49% say he should be impeached and removed from office.
  2. 78% of Fox News watchers agree that the impeachment inquiry is like a lynching. 66% of voters overall think the White House should comply with House subpoenas.
  3. 54% of Americans think Trump has made us less respected globally; 28% say he’s made us more respected.

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.