Tag: Ukraine scandal

Federal judge who sentenced Roger Stone to prison orders Trump administration to turn over FOIA’d Ukraine emails

AlterNet logoThe Trump Administration has been refusing to publicly release 20 e-mails pertaining to President Donald Trump’s decision to withhold military aid to Ukraine in 2019, insisting that executive privilege protects them from having to do so. But Amy Berman Jackson, the federal judge and Barack Obama appointee who sentenced Trump ally Roger Stone to three years in federal prison, disagrees — and she has ordered the Trump Administration to release the e-mails.

Jackson’s decision, reporter Jerry Lambe notes in Law & Crime, “stems from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed by the New York Times, which sought communications between Michael Duffey, principal associate director for national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and Robert Blair, a senior advisor to then-Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney.”

Trump and his allies have been arguing that keeping the e-mails from being released publicly is a matter of national security and that a sitting president can claim executive privilege on such matters. OMB Deputy General Counsel Heather Walsh argued that making the e-mails available to the public would “risk harming the quality of the information and advice.” Continue reading.

Trump’s Mob Boss Tactics Failed In Ukraine — But They Work Here

At the core of the Ukraine scandal that led to President Donald Trump’s impeachment was a simple quid pro quo. Trump wanted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to announce the beginning of an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden, his likely 2020 rival, in exchange for U.S. support.

That scheme came very close to working, but it fell through and was exposed before it came to fruition. But as the coronavirus crisis has engulfed the United States, once again, Trump tried the same gambit — this time with state governors.

And this time, it worked.

Trump was, according to testimony and evidence brought forward during the impeachment proceedings, quite explicit about what he wanted from Zelensky in the summer of 2019. Ambassador Bill Taylor testified: Continue reading.

How Democrats’ missing witnesses could fill in the Ukraine story

The Hill logoThe stonewalling from several key witnesses at the center of President Trump‘s dealings with Ukraine is not stopping Democrats from plowing ahead with their fast-moving inquiry.

Rather than wait to secure their testimony, Democrats say they can move forward because other witnesses have corroborated a whistleblower complaint that sparked the inquiry in September.

Democrats continued to hold that view this week, even as they received a favorable court ruling from a judge who ordered former White House counsel Don McGahn to testify in the probe.

View the complete December 1 article by Cristina Marcos on The Hill website here.

Will Trump’s America end in ‘firing squads’? Pulitzer winner David Cay Johnston issues a dire warning

AlterNet logoCongressional hearings about Donald Trump’s attempts to extort  Ukraine into helping him in the 2020 presidential election on his behalf have concluded, at least for now.

These weeks of public and private hearings on the Ukraine scandal have established that Donald Trump and senior members of his administration, including Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and others, were involved in this plot. Documents released last Friday through a FOIA lawsuit provide further evidence of the scale of the Trump’s regime abuse of power and other high crimes and misdemeanors.

These hearings have also shown that Trump used his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and other operatives to conduct shadow diplomacy as part of the Ukraine scandal. It seems clear they advanced Trump’s political interests (and likely their own financial interests as well) over the interests of the United States and the American people.

View the complete November 27 article by Chauncey DeVega from Salon on the AlterNet website here.

Ukraine Knew of Aid Freeze by Early August, Undermining Trump Defense

New York Times logoTop officials were told in early August about the delay of $391 million in security assistance, undercutting a chief argument President Trump has used to deny any quid pro quo.

KIEV, Ukraine — To Democrats who say that President Trump’s decision to freeze $391 million in military aid was intended to bully Ukraine’s leader into carrying out investigations for Mr. Trump’s political benefit, the president and his allies have had a simple response: There was no quid pro quo because the Ukrainians did not know assistance had been blocked.

But then on Tuesday, William B. Taylor Jr., the top United States diplomat in Kiev, told House impeachment investigators that the freeze was directly linked to Mr. Trump’s demand. That did not deter the president, who on Wednesday approvingly tweeted a quote by a congressional Republican saying neither Mr. Taylor nor any other witness had “provided testimony that the Ukrainians were aware that military aid was being withheld.”

In fact, word of the aid freeze had gotten to high-level Ukrainian officials by the first week in August, according to interviews and documents obtained by The New York Times.

View the complete October 23 article by Andrew E. Kramer and Kenneth P. Vogel n The New York Times website here.

‘Are you really not capable of answering a question?’ CNN’s Tapper hammers GOP senator ranting about Mueller and Biden when asked about Trump’s Ukraine scandal

AlterNet logoCNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday hammered Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) over whether it’s appropriate for President Donald Trump to ask Ukraine and China to investigate his political rival, Democratic candidate Joe Biden, as the Republican senator repeatedly tried to deflect questions about the president’s alleged impropriety.

“As a hypothetical, just because I think there are a lot of people concerned about the precedent this is setting, would you have found it acceptable if ahead of the 2012 election then President Obama had asked a foreign leader to investigate one of Mitt Romney’s sons? Would that be okay with you?” Tapper asked Cramer.

Cramer bizarrely referenced special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the 2016 presidential election, insisting “the corruption involves a former vice president” and “rooting out corruption in other countries was something that Democrats thought they were doing with the Mueller investigation.”

View the complete October 13 article by Elizabeth Preza on the AlterNet website here.

Minnesota GOP Officials Silent on Contributions from Men Indicted for Conspiring to Funnel Foreign Money into U.S. Elections

Lewis, Stauber, Hagedorn, and Carnahan refuse to condemn foreign meddling in Minnesota elections

SAINT PAUL, MINNESOTA – Late last week, two associates of Rudy Giuliani, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, were arrested as they attempted to flee the United States. The two were charged with allegedly conspiring to funnel foreign money to Republican politicians and candidates for the purpose of buying influence in U.S. – Ukraine relations.

As the Pioneer Press reported, multiple Minnesota Republicans received money from Parnas and Fruman, including Jason Lewis, the Minnesota Republican Party, and the National Republican Congressional Committee, run by Tom Emmer.

While the NRCC and Republican officials in other states have returned the money they got from Parnas and Fruman, including Brian Mast, Kevin McCarthy, Joe Wilson, Brian Fitzpatrick, Lloyd Smucker, and John Katko, Jason Lewis and MN GOP Chair Jennifer Carnahan have thus far refused to return or donate the contributions. Continue reading “Minnesota GOP Officials Silent on Contributions from Men Indicted for Conspiring to Funnel Foreign Money into U.S. Elections”

Trump cites ‘obligation to end corruption,’ but ex-ethics official says he’s digging deeper hole

‘There’s no more debating the facts. He did it,’ Walter Shaub says

President Donald Trump on Friday dismissed criticism from House Democrats and others over his renewed calls for foreign governments to investigate his domestic political rivals, even as text messages from U.S. diplomats suggest he insisted of trading a White House visit with Ukraine’s president for just that.

Experts see a president and administration only digging a deeper hole — and unable to help themselves or build a strategy to allow congressional Republicans to counter House Democrats’ message that Trump is corrupt and putting his own interests over those of the United States.

In a morning tweet, the president wrote that he has “an obligation to end CORRUPTION, even if that means requesting the help of a foreign country or countries.”

View the complete October 4 article by John T. Bennett on The Roll Call website here.

Trump’s Ukraine Scandal Is Also Attorney General Bill Barr’s Scandal

“It’s as if the department’s only job is to protect Trump. They should change their name to the Department of Cover-up”

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Bill Barr got slammed by former prosecutors and Constitutional lawyers for playing a pivotal role in President Trump’s favor during the dying days of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.

He may have just done Trump another massive solid in the Ukraine whistleblower scandal, which now threatens to consume the White House.

Barr’s intimate involvement in the new scandal spilled out into public view on Wednesday, with vivid details that enraged Democratic members of Congress and left former prosecutors worrying openly about the Department of Justice’s increasingly battered reputation.

View the complete September 25 article by Greg Walters on the Vice website here.