https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/11/4/1897153/-Former-Ukraine-ambassador-s-House-testimony-unpacks-a-clown-car-of-corruption
"The cast of characters involved in dragging Yovanovitch down is mind-blowing—Giuliani, Parnas, Fruman, Lutsenko, Sean freaking Hannity—as is the timidity of the State Department in defending its longtime employee because Trump was too likely buying into the attacks on her. And there are serious whiffs here of Giuliani being manipulated by Lutsenko and Parnas and Fruman to serve their interests, and in turn manipulating Trump based on his eagerness to recruit foreign assistance in winning in 2020. Every time House investigators look at something new it seems like more corruption comes into view, and there’s no sign they’re reaching the end."
Tuesday, November 12, 2019
Former Ambassador to Ukraine: Giuliani Aligned With a “Corrupt System”
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/11/former-ambassador-to-ukraine-giuliani-aligned-with-a-corrupt-system/
"The former US Ambassador to Ukraine told lawmakers last month that Rudy Giuliani and other allies of President Donald Trump had teamed up with corrupt players in that country to push her out of her job as they sought to dig up dirt aimed at helping Trump’s 2020 reelection effort."
"The former US Ambassador to Ukraine told lawmakers last month that Rudy Giuliani and other allies of President Donald Trump had teamed up with corrupt players in that country to push her out of her job as they sought to dig up dirt aimed at helping Trump’s 2020 reelection effort."
Ousted Ukraine ambassador Yovanovitch says she was told to tweet praise of Trump to save her job
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-impeachment-inquiry/ousted-ukraine-ambassador-yovanovitch-says-she-was-told-tweet-praise-n1076156
"Marie Yovanovitch, the ousted U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, told House impeachment investigators last month that U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland told her she should tweet out support or praise for President Donald Trump if she wanted to save her job, according to a transcript of her testimony made public Monday."
"Marie Yovanovitch, the ousted U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, told House impeachment investigators last month that U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland told her she should tweet out support or praise for President Donald Trump if she wanted to save her job, according to a transcript of her testimony made public Monday."
‘No Ambiguity’ In Quid Pro Quo, Alexander Vindman Declares In Impeachment Testimony
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/fiona-hill-alexander-vindman-testimony-transcript_n_5dc572e3e4b0fcfb7f64ffa2
"The transcripts are the seventh and eighth to be released as the House Intelligence, Oversight and Foreign Affairs committees prepare to host the inquiry’s first public hearings next week with three State Department officials who have already spoken with investigators privately. In a statement, committee chairs Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) said Hill and Vindman’s “superiors in the White House have declined to cooperate with the inquiry, but transcripts released today show clearly that individuals close to the president were alarmed by a presidential scheme as illicit and corrupt as a ‘drug deal.’” Following her deposition, Hill said she has been flooded with “hateful calls and conspiracy theories.” Hill and her boss, Bolton, were reportedly so alarmed by Trump insiders’ attempts to enact a shadow foreign policy with Ukraine that she alerted White House lawyers. Vindman, who previously reported to Hill, testified that he had also raised his concerns about Trump’s dealings with Ukraine internally. Additionally, Hill told investigators that she considered Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, to be a security risk."
"The transcripts are the seventh and eighth to be released as the House Intelligence, Oversight and Foreign Affairs committees prepare to host the inquiry’s first public hearings next week with three State Department officials who have already spoken with investigators privately. In a statement, committee chairs Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) said Hill and Vindman’s “superiors in the White House have declined to cooperate with the inquiry, but transcripts released today show clearly that individuals close to the president were alarmed by a presidential scheme as illicit and corrupt as a ‘drug deal.’” Following her deposition, Hill said she has been flooded with “hateful calls and conspiracy theories.” Hill and her boss, Bolton, were reportedly so alarmed by Trump insiders’ attempts to enact a shadow foreign policy with Ukraine that she alerted White House lawyers. Vindman, who previously reported to Hill, testified that he had also raised his concerns about Trump’s dealings with Ukraine internally. Additionally, Hill told investigators that she considered Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, to be a security risk."
Citing Sondland, Republicans went out on a limb (that’s broken off)
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/citing-sondland-republicans-went-out-limb-thats-broken
"In other words, the “evidence” that Trump and his allies were so excited about has been discredited by the same ambassador who presented it in the first place. Republicans went out on a shaky limb, only to find it snap off in an embarrassing and inconvenient way. Is it any wonder some of the president’s more sycophantic GOP allies have decided that evidence no longer matters?"
"In other words, the “evidence” that Trump and his allies were so excited about has been discredited by the same ambassador who presented it in the first place. Republicans went out on a shaky limb, only to find it snap off in an embarrassing and inconvenient way. Is it any wonder some of the president’s more sycophantic GOP allies have decided that evidence no longer matters?"
Now Gordon Sondland remembers a quid pro quo — but the Republican spin machine forgets
https://www.salon.com/2019/11/06/now-gordon-sondland-remembers-a-quid-pro-quo-but-the-republican-spin-machine-forgets/
"No amount of evidence appears to be able to puncture the bubble that the party has built to protect itself, and its president, from the truth."
"No amount of evidence appears to be able to puncture the bubble that the party has built to protect itself, and its president, from the truth."
Diplomat Points to Rudy Giuliani as Trump’s Ukraine Shakedown Man
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/11/gordon-sondland-fingers-rudy-giuliani-as-trumps-ukraine-shakedown-man/
"Here’s the thing about Donald Trump’s scandals: they often are too obvious. While Trump and his defenders have claimed there was no shifty quid pro quo in his dealings with Ukraine, all the evidence indicates there was. And the just-released congressional testimony of Ambassador Gordon Sondland, the hotel magnate whose $1 million donation to Trump’s inauguration won him a job as a diplomat, shows that Trump essentially ordered a shakedown of Ukraine and placed his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, in charge of this caper. Kurt Volker, the former special envoy to Ukraine, who worked with Sondland and Giuliani in pursuit of Trump’s political objectives in Ukraine, also fingered Giuliani as the mastermind of this effort in his deposition, which was released on Tuesday."
"Here’s the thing about Donald Trump’s scandals: they often are too obvious. While Trump and his defenders have claimed there was no shifty quid pro quo in his dealings with Ukraine, all the evidence indicates there was. And the just-released congressional testimony of Ambassador Gordon Sondland, the hotel magnate whose $1 million donation to Trump’s inauguration won him a job as a diplomat, shows that Trump essentially ordered a shakedown of Ukraine and placed his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, in charge of this caper. Kurt Volker, the former special envoy to Ukraine, who worked with Sondland and Giuliani in pursuit of Trump’s political objectives in Ukraine, also fingered Giuliani as the mastermind of this effort in his deposition, which was released on Tuesday."
Trump's Ukraine Call 'Transcript' Is Not a Transcript, and Alexander Vindman Suggested Why
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a29637491/trump-ukraine-call-transcript-alexander-vindman-burisma/
"No wonder they tried to smear Vindman as a double agent on Fox News. They don't want people to believe it when he makes it clear that the Ukrainian president knew exactly what Trump wanted. It wasn't some general crackdown on corruption—it was an investigation of the Bidens he could use as a political weapon. We've known this via other avenues, not least from the good work of Rudy Giuliani, International Man of Stupidity, who made it clear to the Ukrainians via backchannels that they wanted an announcement that specifically mentioned Burisma. But it's good to get this confirmed from all angles, just like it was useful to hear from European Union Ambassador Gordon Sondland—who served as Trump's henchman on this—that there was a quid pro quo. You need all the angles because Trump and his cronies are working all the angles in response. In the Age of Shamelessness, you cover all your bases in defense: we didn't do it, fake news, but even if we did do it, it's not a crime, OK we did it, but everybody does it and we do it all the time. You can even backtrack to saying it didn't happen after saying you do it all the time. It can be Fake News and Totally Normal, Nothing to See Here all at once. Because the truth doesn't actually matter. Language and rhetoric are hammers you use to bludgeon the various enemies until they stop fighting back. Trump's Republican allies will soon enough be saying that withholding military aid until a foreign power ratfucks your political opponent so you can win an election is good and smart. Also, it never happened."
"No wonder they tried to smear Vindman as a double agent on Fox News. They don't want people to believe it when he makes it clear that the Ukrainian president knew exactly what Trump wanted. It wasn't some general crackdown on corruption—it was an investigation of the Bidens he could use as a political weapon. We've known this via other avenues, not least from the good work of Rudy Giuliani, International Man of Stupidity, who made it clear to the Ukrainians via backchannels that they wanted an announcement that specifically mentioned Burisma. But it's good to get this confirmed from all angles, just like it was useful to hear from European Union Ambassador Gordon Sondland—who served as Trump's henchman on this—that there was a quid pro quo. You need all the angles because Trump and his cronies are working all the angles in response. In the Age of Shamelessness, you cover all your bases in defense: we didn't do it, fake news, but even if we did do it, it's not a crime, OK we did it, but everybody does it and we do it all the time. You can even backtrack to saying it didn't happen after saying you do it all the time. It can be Fake News and Totally Normal, Nothing to See Here all at once. Because the truth doesn't actually matter. Language and rhetoric are hammers you use to bludgeon the various enemies until they stop fighting back. Trump's Republican allies will soon enough be saying that withholding military aid until a foreign power ratfucks your political opponent so you can win an election is good and smart. Also, it never happened."
Lindsey Graham Has Run Out of Arguments for Defending Trump (Update: He Found a Dumb One)
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/lindsey-graham-reaction-gordon-sondland-testimony-908639/
"Graham’s full-throated defenses of Trump and attacks on Democrats have steadily crumbled as evidence of the president’s wrongdoing continues to emerge and Democrats continue to undercut Republican complaints about how they are conducting the impeachment inquiry. And so, out of arguments and buried under a barrage of evidence, he’s decided to just dismiss it entirely."
"Graham’s full-throated defenses of Trump and attacks on Democrats have steadily crumbled as evidence of the president’s wrongdoing continues to emerge and Democrats continue to undercut Republican complaints about how they are conducting the impeachment inquiry. And so, out of arguments and buried under a barrage of evidence, he’s decided to just dismiss it entirely."
Republicans want to out the whistleblower because they can’t defend Trump on the merits
https://www.vox.com/2019/11/5/20949637/rand-paul-trump-rally-lexington-kentucky-whistleblower
"The whistleblower complaint that initially sounded the alarm about President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukraine is no longer key to public understanding of the scandal, and for a straightforward reason: Sworn testimony and evidence released by the White House have already established that his central allegations are true."
"The whistleblower complaint that initially sounded the alarm about President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukraine is no longer key to public understanding of the scandal, and for a straightforward reason: Sworn testimony and evidence released by the White House have already established that his central allegations are true."
United States of America v. Rudolph W. Giuliani
https://www.justsecurity.org/66705/united-states-of-america-v-rudolph-w-giuliani/
"An individual who conspires to inject foreign interference into a U.S. election attacks the very heart of democracy. Our laws prohibit foreign influence in our elections because our founding fathers believed that only American citizens should decide who holds public office in the United States, and we recognize that foreign governments and their citizens act in their own interests, not ours. Criminal cases are prosecuted for several reasons, including deterring illegal conduct, promoting respect for the rule of law, and protecting public safety. A prosecution here would advance all of these important goals. A few observations on the charge for contempt of Congress deserve mention. Giuliani’s refusal to comply with a subpoena for documents, which was issued by the three House Committees conducting the impeachment inquiry, is a criminal offense. In a letter to the Committees, Giuliani stated that he would not comply with the subpoena because it is part of an “unconstitutional, baseless and illegitimate ‘impeachment inquiry.'” Witnesses may challenge the scope of a subpoena as harassing, oppressive or overly broad by filing a motion to quash in court. They may not simply ignore the subpoena and defy Congress’s authority as one of three co-equal branches of government. The Constitution gives the power of impeachment to the House, and allows it to fashion its own rules for handling impeachment. There is no requirement that the full House take a vote before it may begin an impeachment inquiry, and the House has the authority to investigate any matter on which it may act, including impeachment. Giuliani’s conduct violates the federal criminal statute prohibiting witnesses from defying subpoenas issued by Congress or its committees. A subpoenaed witness before Congress can no more ignore a subpoena than can a witness in a federal trial."
"An individual who conspires to inject foreign interference into a U.S. election attacks the very heart of democracy. Our laws prohibit foreign influence in our elections because our founding fathers believed that only American citizens should decide who holds public office in the United States, and we recognize that foreign governments and their citizens act in their own interests, not ours. Criminal cases are prosecuted for several reasons, including deterring illegal conduct, promoting respect for the rule of law, and protecting public safety. A prosecution here would advance all of these important goals. A few observations on the charge for contempt of Congress deserve mention. Giuliani’s refusal to comply with a subpoena for documents, which was issued by the three House Committees conducting the impeachment inquiry, is a criminal offense. In a letter to the Committees, Giuliani stated that he would not comply with the subpoena because it is part of an “unconstitutional, baseless and illegitimate ‘impeachment inquiry.'” Witnesses may challenge the scope of a subpoena as harassing, oppressive or overly broad by filing a motion to quash in court. They may not simply ignore the subpoena and defy Congress’s authority as one of three co-equal branches of government. The Constitution gives the power of impeachment to the House, and allows it to fashion its own rules for handling impeachment. There is no requirement that the full House take a vote before it may begin an impeachment inquiry, and the House has the authority to investigate any matter on which it may act, including impeachment. Giuliani’s conduct violates the federal criminal statute prohibiting witnesses from defying subpoenas issued by Congress or its committees. A subpoenaed witness before Congress can no more ignore a subpoena than can a witness in a federal trial."
He’s back! Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort resurfaces — at the heart of Ukraine inquiry
https://www.salon.com/2019/11/09/hes-back-former-trump-campaign-manager-paul-manafort-resurfaces-at-the-heart-of-ukraine-inquiry/
"For 2020, we’ve got a couple of real jewels by the names of Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, both born in the former Soviet Union, and you guessed it! Both are currently under indictment on federal campaign finance charges. In 2016, the connections to Trump were made through Manafort and campaign advisers like George Papadopoulos. This time, it’s Giuliani who is Trump’s cut-out to these foreign-born scam artists. And what was Giuliani using Parnas and Furman for? According to The New York Times, beginning in January of this year, “Mr. Giuliani had enlisted Mr. Parnas and Mr. Furman to collect information and make connections in Ukraine that could be used to damage Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic presidential contender, and to undermine the special counsel’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.” Even the way they have been moving funny money around was reminiscent of 2016. Back then, Manafort had pulled in millions from his work for former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, which he laundered through shell companies and bank accounts in Cyprus. This year, Parnas and his buddies used a company called Fraud Guarantee, that apparently had no employees and no customers, to funnel money to Giuliani through a complicated deal with a Long Island lawyer and a shell company in Belize. Parnas and Fruman were tapped out, having recently made the illegal $325,000 contribution to America First Action, a super PAC supporting Donald Trump, for which they are now under indictment. But they wanted a connection to Giuliani they could use back in Ukraine to drum up business deals, and apparently the way you get connected to Giuliani is to give him money. So they got a Long Island lawyer named Charles Gucciardo, who was a Trump supporter and large-money donor, to invest in their company, and then used the good offices of Fraud Guarantee to funnel $500,000 to Giuliani."
"For 2020, we’ve got a couple of real jewels by the names of Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, both born in the former Soviet Union, and you guessed it! Both are currently under indictment on federal campaign finance charges. In 2016, the connections to Trump were made through Manafort and campaign advisers like George Papadopoulos. This time, it’s Giuliani who is Trump’s cut-out to these foreign-born scam artists. And what was Giuliani using Parnas and Furman for? According to The New York Times, beginning in January of this year, “Mr. Giuliani had enlisted Mr. Parnas and Mr. Furman to collect information and make connections in Ukraine that could be used to damage Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic presidential contender, and to undermine the special counsel’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.” Even the way they have been moving funny money around was reminiscent of 2016. Back then, Manafort had pulled in millions from his work for former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, which he laundered through shell companies and bank accounts in Cyprus. This year, Parnas and his buddies used a company called Fraud Guarantee, that apparently had no employees and no customers, to funnel money to Giuliani through a complicated deal with a Long Island lawyer and a shell company in Belize. Parnas and Fruman were tapped out, having recently made the illegal $325,000 contribution to America First Action, a super PAC supporting Donald Trump, for which they are now under indictment. But they wanted a connection to Giuliani they could use back in Ukraine to drum up business deals, and apparently the way you get connected to Giuliani is to give him money. So they got a Long Island lawyer named Charles Gucciardo, who was a Trump supporter and large-money donor, to invest in their company, and then used the good offices of Fraud Guarantee to funnel $500,000 to Giuliani."
This Is No Ordinary Impeachment
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/11/andrew-sullivan-this-is-no-ordinary-impeachment.html
"It’s about whether the legitimacy of our entire system can last much longer without this man being removed from office. I’m talking about what political scientists call “regime cleavage” — a decline in democratic life so severe the country’s very institutions could lose legitimacy as a result of it. It is described by one political scientist as follows: “a division within the population marked by conflict about the foundations of the governing system itself — in the American case, our constitutional democracy. In societies facing a regime cleavage, a growing number of citizens and officials believe that norms, institutions, and laws may be ignored, subverted, or replaced.” A full-on regime cleavage is, indeed, an extinction-level event for our liberal democratic system. And it is one precipitated by the man who is supposed to be the guardian of that system, the president. Let us count the ways in which Trump has attacked and undermined the core legitimacy of our democracy. He is the only candidate in American history who refused to say that he would abide by the results of the vote. Even after winning the 2016 election, he still claimed that “millions” of voters — undocumented aliens — perpetrated massive electoral fraud in the last election, and voted for his opponent. He has repeatedly and publicly toyed with the idea that he could violate the 22nd Amendment, and get elected for three terms, or more. He consistently described a perfectly defensible inquiry into Russia’s role in the 2016 election as a “witch hunt” and a “hoax,” demonizing Robert Mueller, even as Mueller, in the end, couldn’t find evidence to support the idea of a conspiracy with Russia (perhaps in part because Trump ordered no cooperation, and refused to testify under oath). Trump then withheld release of the full report, while his pliant attorney general distorted its content and wrongly proclaimed that Trump had been entirely exonerated."
"It’s about whether the legitimacy of our entire system can last much longer without this man being removed from office. I’m talking about what political scientists call “regime cleavage” — a decline in democratic life so severe the country’s very institutions could lose legitimacy as a result of it. It is described by one political scientist as follows: “a division within the population marked by conflict about the foundations of the governing system itself — in the American case, our constitutional democracy. In societies facing a regime cleavage, a growing number of citizens and officials believe that norms, institutions, and laws may be ignored, subverted, or replaced.” A full-on regime cleavage is, indeed, an extinction-level event for our liberal democratic system. And it is one precipitated by the man who is supposed to be the guardian of that system, the president. Let us count the ways in which Trump has attacked and undermined the core legitimacy of our democracy. He is the only candidate in American history who refused to say that he would abide by the results of the vote. Even after winning the 2016 election, he still claimed that “millions” of voters — undocumented aliens — perpetrated massive electoral fraud in the last election, and voted for his opponent. He has repeatedly and publicly toyed with the idea that he could violate the 22nd Amendment, and get elected for three terms, or more. He consistently described a perfectly defensible inquiry into Russia’s role in the 2016 election as a “witch hunt” and a “hoax,” demonizing Robert Mueller, even as Mueller, in the end, couldn’t find evidence to support the idea of a conspiracy with Russia (perhaps in part because Trump ordered no cooperation, and refused to testify under oath). Trump then withheld release of the full report, while his pliant attorney general distorted its content and wrongly proclaimed that Trump had been entirely exonerated."
Saturday, November 9, 2019
The Impeachment Inquiry Is Fully Legitimate
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/why-impeachment-inquiry-legally-legitimate/601165/
"Yet, in the president’s world, the Constitution gives him “the right to do whatever I want as president.” That is not what the Constitution allows. All powers, even those of the president, are limited and subject to checks and balances to ensure their proper and legal exercise. There is no law that requires blindly following a president and assisting in a cover-up (for example, by editing and storing the transcript of a phone call on the nation’s most secret server, which ismeant only for the most sensitive national-security data). And there is no privilege that bars any official from disclosing evidence about criminal activities and abuses of power. But there is a Constitution, which the president and all his people swore to uphold, and which places limits on the presidency. There is also a law protecting the identity of whistle-blowers, one that Trump has been charged to follow but instead has been trying to break. If you add up the nonsense that the president’s defenders have proliferated and his protestation that the Constitution allows him to do whatever he wants, their proposed result is disturbing: an executive who can shut down an impeachment inquiry and protect from disclosure anything done by anyone in the executive branch, and who is immune to criminal investigation and allowed to defy subpoenas. This is not the president our Constitution established. He would be a king, in spite of the fact that the Founders’ generation rebelled against one. They set out to create a presidency that was accountable to Congress if the occupant abused power and breached the public’s trust. Donald Trump’s efforts to delegitimize the impeachment inquiry destroy their vision."
"Yet, in the president’s world, the Constitution gives him “the right to do whatever I want as president.” That is not what the Constitution allows. All powers, even those of the president, are limited and subject to checks and balances to ensure their proper and legal exercise. There is no law that requires blindly following a president and assisting in a cover-up (for example, by editing and storing the transcript of a phone call on the nation’s most secret server, which ismeant only for the most sensitive national-security data). And there is no privilege that bars any official from disclosing evidence about criminal activities and abuses of power. But there is a Constitution, which the president and all his people swore to uphold, and which places limits on the presidency. There is also a law protecting the identity of whistle-blowers, one that Trump has been charged to follow but instead has been trying to break. If you add up the nonsense that the president’s defenders have proliferated and his protestation that the Constitution allows him to do whatever he wants, their proposed result is disturbing: an executive who can shut down an impeachment inquiry and protect from disclosure anything done by anyone in the executive branch, and who is immune to criminal investigation and allowed to defy subpoenas. This is not the president our Constitution established. He would be a king, in spite of the fact that the Founders’ generation rebelled against one. They set out to create a presidency that was accountable to Congress if the occupant abused power and breached the public’s trust. Donald Trump’s efforts to delegitimize the impeachment inquiry destroy their vision."
Trump’s defense on Ukraine has completely collapsed
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/10/23/20928433/trump-ukraine-bill-taylor-statement-impeachment
"Now the president and his defenders are left flailing, trying to salvage the wreckage of their position through a combination of lies and tortured logic."
"Now the president and his defenders are left flailing, trying to salvage the wreckage of their position through a combination of lies and tortured logic."
The Ukraine Depositions Have Destroyed Trump’s “Corruption” Defense
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/11/ukraine-depositions-trump-republican-corruption-lies.html
"It wasn’t about cleaning up Ukraine. It was about using American power, including nearly $400 million in military aid, to hurt his enemies. And that behavior—the abuse of power for selective prosecution—is exactly the quagmire Ukraine was trying to escape. “That’s the way ‘anti-corruption’ was played out in Ukraine for decades,” Volker testified. “It wasn’t about just fighting corruption. It was about who are my enemies and who are my friends.” Instead of pulling Ukraine out of that quagmire, Trump plunged America into it."
"It wasn’t about cleaning up Ukraine. It was about using American power, including nearly $400 million in military aid, to hurt his enemies. And that behavior—the abuse of power for selective prosecution—is exactly the quagmire Ukraine was trying to escape. “That’s the way ‘anti-corruption’ was played out in Ukraine for decades,” Volker testified. “It wasn’t about just fighting corruption. It was about who are my enemies and who are my friends.” Instead of pulling Ukraine out of that quagmire, Trump plunged America into it."
How can GOP senators serve as impeachment jurors when they're implicated in Trump's misdeeds?
https://www.salon.com/2019/10/30/how-can-gop-senators-serve-as-impeachment-jurors-when-theyre-implicated-in-trumps-misdeeds/
"Ron Johnson and Marsha Blackburn are tied to Russian money and Trump's conspiracy theories. They're not alone"
"Ron Johnson and Marsha Blackburn are tied to Russian money and Trump's conspiracy theories. They're not alone"
The scope of Trump’s corruption is mind-boggling. New developments show how
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/11/05/scope-trumps-corruption-is-mind-boggling-new-developments-show-how/
"At this point, the broad contours of the Ukraine scandal are well understood. President Trump appears to have used hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer money appropriated as military aid to extort a vulnerable ally into helping him rig the 2020 election on his behalf. But there are two other aspects of this scandal that need elaboration. The first is the degree to which this whole scheme is corrupting multiple government agencies and effectively placing them at the disposal of Trump’s reelection effort. The second is that two of the scheme’s goals — getting Ukraine to validate a conspiracy theory absolving Russia of 2016 sabotage, and to manufacture smears of one of Trump’s leading 2020 rivals — are really part of the same story. At the core of this narrative is Trump’s continuing reliance on foreign help in corrupting our democracy to his advantage, through two presidential elections, and the covering up of all of it."
"At this point, the broad contours of the Ukraine scandal are well understood. President Trump appears to have used hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer money appropriated as military aid to extort a vulnerable ally into helping him rig the 2020 election on his behalf. But there are two other aspects of this scandal that need elaboration. The first is the degree to which this whole scheme is corrupting multiple government agencies and effectively placing them at the disposal of Trump’s reelection effort. The second is that two of the scheme’s goals — getting Ukraine to validate a conspiracy theory absolving Russia of 2016 sabotage, and to manufacture smears of one of Trump’s leading 2020 rivals — are really part of the same story. At the core of this narrative is Trump’s continuing reliance on foreign help in corrupting our democracy to his advantage, through two presidential elections, and the covering up of all of it."
‘The Truth Looked Bad for Donald Trump’: What We’re Learning from the Roger Stone Trial
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/roger-stone-trial-trump-truth-909445/
"If Stone is convicted he faces serious jail time, including as much as 20 years for witness tampering, and as much as five years each for six counts relating to obstructing and making false statements to Congress. The trial is expected to last three weeks."
"If Stone is convicted he faces serious jail time, including as much as 20 years for witness tampering, and as much as five years each for six counts relating to obstructing and making false statements to Congress. The trial is expected to last three weeks."
Some Thoughts on Describing the President’s Crimes
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/some-thoughts-on-describing-the-presidents-crimes
"The President used extortion to cheat in the 2020 presidential election. He used military aid dollars meant to aid an ally against his Russian patrons in order to force Ukraine to intervene in the 2020 elections, in order to remain in office by corrupt means. There are various crimes that get committed along the way. But that is the core of it. The President is delegated vast powers to act in the national interest and he has vast discretion to determine what he or she believes the national interest is. But when he uses those powers for his own personal or financial gain they are illegitimate on their face, abuses of power and merit impeachment. The fact that he was doing so to sabotage a national election makes it vastly worse. And the fact that he was getting a foreign power to sabotage a US election makes it worse still. Any talk of “quid pro quos” and this and that minutiae is a distortion of what happened. Quid pro quos are simply exchanges of one thing for another. Presidents will ask for help on one bill in exchange for another. They’ll condition one kind of aid to a country on assistance on another foreign policy goal. In itself it means nothing. The crimes are bribery and extortion, the abuses of power are using presidential power for personal gain and the central offense against the state is the attempt to sabotage a national election, the event on which the legitimacy of the entire system rests. It’s pretty obvious on its face that the President did these things for his own personal interest rather than the national interest. But even this isn’t left to accusations or logic or surmise. His chief coconspirator has said repeatedly that all his actions were done exclusively in the interest of Donald Trump. Rudy Giuliani reiterated the point as recently as last night. We don’t even need to get into the other crimes involved, having a crooked lawyer taking over US foreign policy in a critical part of the world and sidelining professional diplomats.
"The President used extortion to cheat in the 2020 presidential election. He used military aid dollars meant to aid an ally against his Russian patrons in order to force Ukraine to intervene in the 2020 elections, in order to remain in office by corrupt means. There are various crimes that get committed along the way. But that is the core of it. The President is delegated vast powers to act in the national interest and he has vast discretion to determine what he or she believes the national interest is. But when he uses those powers for his own personal or financial gain they are illegitimate on their face, abuses of power and merit impeachment. The fact that he was doing so to sabotage a national election makes it vastly worse. And the fact that he was getting a foreign power to sabotage a US election makes it worse still. Any talk of “quid pro quos” and this and that minutiae is a distortion of what happened. Quid pro quos are simply exchanges of one thing for another. Presidents will ask for help on one bill in exchange for another. They’ll condition one kind of aid to a country on assistance on another foreign policy goal. In itself it means nothing. The crimes are bribery and extortion, the abuses of power are using presidential power for personal gain and the central offense against the state is the attempt to sabotage a national election, the event on which the legitimacy of the entire system rests. It’s pretty obvious on its face that the President did these things for his own personal interest rather than the national interest. But even this isn’t left to accusations or logic or surmise. His chief coconspirator has said repeatedly that all his actions were done exclusively in the interest of Donald Trump. Rudy Giuliani reiterated the point as recently as last night. We don’t even need to get into the other crimes involved, having a crooked lawyer taking over US foreign policy in a critical part of the world and sidelining professional diplomats.
Trump Ordered to Pay $2 Million to Charities for Misuse of Foundation
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/07/nyregion/trump-charities-new-york.html
"The president admitted he had used funds raised by the Donald J. Trump Foundation to promote his campaign and pay business debts. A state judge ordered President Trump to pay $2 million in damages to nonprofit groups on Thursday after the president admitted misusing money raised by the Donald J. Trump Foundation to promote his presidential bid, pay off business debts and purchase a portrait of himself for one of his hotels. The damage award brought an end to a protracted legal battle over the foundation, whose giving patterns and management became a flash point during Mr. Trump’s run for office in 2016. New York’s attorney general had filed suit last year accusing Mr. Trump and his family of using the foundation as an extension of his businesses and his presidential campaign. The settlement, which was finalized last month and announced on Thursday in the judge’s order, included a detailed admission of misconduct that is rare for the president, who has long employed a scorched-earth approach toward fighting lawsuits. Among Mr. Trump’s admissions in court papers: The charity gave his campaign complete control over disbursing the $2.8 million that the foundation had raised at a fund-raiser for veterans in Iowa in January 2016, only days before the state’s presidential nominating caucuses. The fund-raiser, he acknowledged, was in fact a campaign event. The president also admitted to using the foundation to settle the legal obligations of companies he owned, including Mar-a-Lago, his private club in Florida, and the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, N.Y. And he acknowledged that the foundation purchased the $10,000 portrait of Mr. Trump, which was ultimately displayed at one of his Florida hotels."
"The president admitted he had used funds raised by the Donald J. Trump Foundation to promote his campaign and pay business debts. A state judge ordered President Trump to pay $2 million in damages to nonprofit groups on Thursday after the president admitted misusing money raised by the Donald J. Trump Foundation to promote his presidential bid, pay off business debts and purchase a portrait of himself for one of his hotels. The damage award brought an end to a protracted legal battle over the foundation, whose giving patterns and management became a flash point during Mr. Trump’s run for office in 2016. New York’s attorney general had filed suit last year accusing Mr. Trump and his family of using the foundation as an extension of his businesses and his presidential campaign. The settlement, which was finalized last month and announced on Thursday in the judge’s order, included a detailed admission of misconduct that is rare for the president, who has long employed a scorched-earth approach toward fighting lawsuits. Among Mr. Trump’s admissions in court papers: The charity gave his campaign complete control over disbursing the $2.8 million that the foundation had raised at a fund-raiser for veterans in Iowa in January 2016, only days before the state’s presidential nominating caucuses. The fund-raiser, he acknowledged, was in fact a campaign event. The president also admitted to using the foundation to settle the legal obligations of companies he owned, including Mar-a-Lago, his private club in Florida, and the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, N.Y. And he acknowledged that the foundation purchased the $10,000 portrait of Mr. Trump, which was ultimately displayed at one of his Florida hotels."
The President* of the United States Just Admitted He Looted a Charity for Political Purposes
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a29739052/trump-admits-foundation-malfeasance/
"Let’s just pause for a moment in this marvelously chaotic time of ours and ponder the reality that the President* of the United States stipulated in a courtroom on Thursday that he looted a fcking charity for his own political purposes. Think about how unprecedented that is, among presidents anyway. (One of the low-rent grifters Scott Walker hauled along in his wake in Wisconsin went to jail for stealing from a fund meant for Gold Star families to go to, among other places, the zoo.) The agreement is an amazing document. One of the highlights is the final accounting for the Event For Veterans in Iowa for which El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago braggadociously blew off a debate across town. From the settlement documents: The Iowa Fundraiser raised approximately $5.6 million in donations for veterans groups of which $2.823 million went to the Foundation; the balance was contributed by donors directly to various veterans groups. The Foundation is the Foundation that the president* used to pump the money donated to his “charitable” ventures into various personal and political purposes. Remember when the New York Times went into business with a professional ratfcker and pumped up his ridiculous charges against The Clinton Foundation, and those charges clung to the 2016 Democratic nominee like gum on her shoe for a flat year? Yeah, that was cool. This little bit of business already has sunk in the never-ending maelstrom of a news cycle. But the President* of the United States has stipulated in an official legal document that he used money meant for veterans to pump up his presidential campaign. So, of course, there’s no way he’d shake down a sovereign government for the same reason."
"Let’s just pause for a moment in this marvelously chaotic time of ours and ponder the reality that the President* of the United States stipulated in a courtroom on Thursday that he looted a fcking charity for his own political purposes. Think about how unprecedented that is, among presidents anyway. (One of the low-rent grifters Scott Walker hauled along in his wake in Wisconsin went to jail for stealing from a fund meant for Gold Star families to go to, among other places, the zoo.) The agreement is an amazing document. One of the highlights is the final accounting for the Event For Veterans in Iowa for which El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago braggadociously blew off a debate across town. From the settlement documents: The Iowa Fundraiser raised approximately $5.6 million in donations for veterans groups of which $2.823 million went to the Foundation; the balance was contributed by donors directly to various veterans groups. The Foundation is the Foundation that the president* used to pump the money donated to his “charitable” ventures into various personal and political purposes. Remember when the New York Times went into business with a professional ratfcker and pumped up his ridiculous charges against The Clinton Foundation, and those charges clung to the 2016 Democratic nominee like gum on her shoe for a flat year? Yeah, that was cool. This little bit of business already has sunk in the never-ending maelstrom of a news cycle. But the President* of the United States has stipulated in an official legal document that he used money meant for veterans to pump up his presidential campaign. So, of course, there’s no way he’d shake down a sovereign government for the same reason."
Here’s What the Framers of the Constitution Had to Say About Impeachment
https://truthout.org/articles/heres-what-the-framers-of-the-constitution-said-about-impeachment/
"the framers were very worried about a president who might be vulnerable to bribery or loyalties to governments other than the U.S. It seems that — even more than the impeachments of Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon (halted by his resignation) and Bill Clinton, the impeachment of Donald Trump is totally in line with the reasons the framers inserted that option in the Constitution."
"the framers were very worried about a president who might be vulnerable to bribery or loyalties to governments other than the U.S. It seems that — even more than the impeachments of Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon (halted by his resignation) and Bill Clinton, the impeachment of Donald Trump is totally in line with the reasons the framers inserted that option in the Constitution."
George Washington’s Advisors Agreed: Impeachment Did Away with Executive Privilege
https://www.justsecurity.org/66713/george-washingtons-advisors-agreed-impeachment-did-away-with-executive-privilege/
"these writings do make plain that Washington’s line about impeachment in the Jay Treaty was a deliberate concession, a seed planted in history that only now has full occasion to blossom."
"these writings do make plain that Washington’s line about impeachment in the Jay Treaty was a deliberate concession, a seed planted in history that only now has full occasion to blossom."
Friday, November 8, 2019
Self-Dealing in Ukraine: The Core of the Impeachment Inquiry
https://www.lawfareblog.com/self-dealing-ukraine-core-impeachment-inquiry
"Impeachment is only about removal of the president from office, not about criminal prosecution and imprisonment. So the standards and processes for impeachment are different. But it would be a mistake to ignore the criminal law entirely. Evidence of criminal misconduct, specifically, the federal bribery statute, should influence political judgments about impeachment. After all, “Bribery” is one of the grounds for impeachment specifically enumerated in the Constitution."
"Impeachment is only about removal of the president from office, not about criminal prosecution and imprisonment. So the standards and processes for impeachment are different. But it would be a mistake to ignore the criminal law entirely. Evidence of criminal misconduct, specifically, the federal bribery statute, should influence political judgments about impeachment. After all, “Bribery” is one of the grounds for impeachment specifically enumerated in the Constitution."
The (Full) Case for Impeachment
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/10/the-full-case-for-trump-impeachment.html
"The crimes for which impeachment is the prescribed punishment are notoriously undefined. And that’s for a reason: Presidential powers are vast, and it’s impossible to design laws to cover every possible abuse of the office’s authority. House Democrats have calculated that an impeachment focused narrowly on the Ukraine scandal will make the strongest legal case against President Trump. But that’s not Trump’s only impeachable offense. A full accounting would include a wide array of dangerous and authoritarian acts — 82, to be precise. His violations fall into seven broad categories of potentially impeachable misconduct that should be weighed, if not by the House, then at least by history."
"The crimes for which impeachment is the prescribed punishment are notoriously undefined. And that’s for a reason: Presidential powers are vast, and it’s impossible to design laws to cover every possible abuse of the office’s authority. House Democrats have calculated that an impeachment focused narrowly on the Ukraine scandal will make the strongest legal case against President Trump. But that’s not Trump’s only impeachable offense. A full accounting would include a wide array of dangerous and authoritarian acts — 82, to be precise. His violations fall into seven broad categories of potentially impeachable misconduct that should be weighed, if not by the House, then at least by history."
Trump’s Order to Defy Subpoenas Is Itself Grounds for Impeachment
https://truthout.org/articles/trumps-order-to-defy-subpoenas-is-itself-grounds-for-impeachment/
"The Constitution gives Congress the “sole Power of Impeachment.” Yet President Donald Trump has ordered all of his current and former senior advisers to defy congressional subpoenas to testify in the impeachment inquiry. Trump is claiming the subpoenaed witnesses have “absolute immunity” against civil or criminal liability for refusal to provide testimony. However, “absolute immunity” is a creation of the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel. No court, statute or constitution has ever recognized it."
"The Constitution gives Congress the “sole Power of Impeachment.” Yet President Donald Trump has ordered all of his current and former senior advisers to defy congressional subpoenas to testify in the impeachment inquiry. Trump is claiming the subpoenaed witnesses have “absolute immunity” against civil or criminal liability for refusal to provide testimony. However, “absolute immunity” is a creation of the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel. No court, statute or constitution has ever recognized it."
The Impeachment Transcripts Say Republicans Have to Choose Between Trump and Democracy
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/11/trump-impeachment-transcripts-facts-democracy-sondland-graham.html
"Trump’s lines of defense have been crumbling under each wave of new facts. First, his phone call with Zelensky was said to be “perfect.” (Trump continues to make this claim, though he is nearly alone in doing so.) Then, yes, Trump pressured Zelensky, but there was no quid pro quo. Then, OK, there was a quid pro quo, but diplomacy is all about quid pro quos. Then, well, all right, this quid pro quo involved pressuring a foreign power to defame a possible rival in an American presidential election, and that doesn’t look good, but it’s not an impeachable offense. Finally, at our present moment, some Republicans realize that it is impeachable as an abuse of power and possibly as an act of bribery. So they decide, like Graham, to ignore the evidence. The main way they’ve done this is to condemn the process of the impeachment inquiry as corrupt and, therefore, the evidence it has gathered as illegitimate—in the same sense that evidence improperly seized by police would be thrown out in a trial. But as the transcripts of the hearings have been made public, this final line of defense has crumbled too. First, the hearings were not partisan, much less “Soviet-style” show trials, as Rep. Steve Scalise, the House minority whip, put it while displaying a picture of St. Basil’s Cathedral (the least Soviet-style structure in Moscow’s Red Square). The transcripts list all the House members who attended, and, it turns out, they included several Republicans. (As had long been stated, all members of the House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, and Judiciary committees were authorized to attend the hearings.)"
"Trump’s lines of defense have been crumbling under each wave of new facts. First, his phone call with Zelensky was said to be “perfect.” (Trump continues to make this claim, though he is nearly alone in doing so.) Then, yes, Trump pressured Zelensky, but there was no quid pro quo. Then, OK, there was a quid pro quo, but diplomacy is all about quid pro quos. Then, well, all right, this quid pro quo involved pressuring a foreign power to defame a possible rival in an American presidential election, and that doesn’t look good, but it’s not an impeachable offense. Finally, at our present moment, some Republicans realize that it is impeachable as an abuse of power and possibly as an act of bribery. So they decide, like Graham, to ignore the evidence. The main way they’ve done this is to condemn the process of the impeachment inquiry as corrupt and, therefore, the evidence it has gathered as illegitimate—in the same sense that evidence improperly seized by police would be thrown out in a trial. But as the transcripts of the hearings have been made public, this final line of defense has crumbled too. First, the hearings were not partisan, much less “Soviet-style” show trials, as Rep. Steve Scalise, the House minority whip, put it while displaying a picture of St. Basil’s Cathedral (the least Soviet-style structure in Moscow’s Red Square). The transcripts list all the House members who attended, and, it turns out, they included several Republicans. (As had long been stated, all members of the House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, and Judiciary committees were authorized to attend the hearings.)"
Watch This Closely: New Details On How Giuliani Pal Met Ukrainian Oligarch
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/watch-this-closely-new-details-on-how-giuliani-pal-met-ukrainian-oligarch
"One of the most potentially explosive connections in the metastasizing Trump/Giuliani/Ukraine scandal is that of Dmitry Firtash. A middleman in the gas trade between Ukraine and Russia who federal prosecutors describe as an “upper-echelon” member of the Russian mafia, Firtash appears to be using debunked allegations that Giuliani has made against Joe Biden in a last-ditch bid to prevent his extradition from Austria to the United States on foreign bribery charges. He has long argued that the case against him is politically motivated, and his legal team appears to see the dirt that President Trump wanted to Ukraine to manufacture against Biden as potentially useful to his case. A new Wall Street Journal report reinforces the point, while adding intriguing new timing. Take a look at the following paragraph: In June, Mr. Firtash was introduced to Lev Parnas, a Florida businessman who aided Mr. Giuliani’s efforts to get Ukraine to investigate the Bidens, according to the person with knowledge of the tycoon’s Vienna legal strategy. Mr. Parnas recommended hiring Mr. DiGenova and Ms. Toensing, the lawyers who back Mr. Trump. The lawyers in turn brought Mr. Parnas on as a translator, their law firm said in a statement. Parnas is the Giuliani buddy who was indicted last week, and who allegedly pressured Ukrainian prosecutors to fabricate dirt for President Trump’s benefit."
"One of the most potentially explosive connections in the metastasizing Trump/Giuliani/Ukraine scandal is that of Dmitry Firtash. A middleman in the gas trade between Ukraine and Russia who federal prosecutors describe as an “upper-echelon” member of the Russian mafia, Firtash appears to be using debunked allegations that Giuliani has made against Joe Biden in a last-ditch bid to prevent his extradition from Austria to the United States on foreign bribery charges. He has long argued that the case against him is politically motivated, and his legal team appears to see the dirt that President Trump wanted to Ukraine to manufacture against Biden as potentially useful to his case. A new Wall Street Journal report reinforces the point, while adding intriguing new timing. Take a look at the following paragraph: In June, Mr. Firtash was introduced to Lev Parnas, a Florida businessman who aided Mr. Giuliani’s efforts to get Ukraine to investigate the Bidens, according to the person with knowledge of the tycoon’s Vienna legal strategy. Mr. Parnas recommended hiring Mr. DiGenova and Ms. Toensing, the lawyers who back Mr. Trump. The lawyers in turn brought Mr. Parnas on as a translator, their law firm said in a statement. Parnas is the Giuliani buddy who was indicted last week, and who allegedly pressured Ukrainian prosecutors to fabricate dirt for President Trump’s benefit."
The Debunked Biden Allegations Are Incredibly Useful To Dmitry Firtash
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/the-debunked-biden-allegations-are-incredibly-useful-to-dmitry-firtash
"Firtash has been fighting a U.S. extradition request for five years, calling it politically motivated, and has begun to boost allegations against the Bidens as part of that campaign, hitching himself to the Trump train. He’s spent years wrapped up in his legal battles while stuck in the Austrian capital of Vienna, where he was located at the time the indictment dropped. Bloomberg reported on Friday that Firtash had paid around $1 million for a dirt-digging project on the Bidens. American lawyers he hired with ties to Trumpworld reportedly hoped to transfer the information to Giuliani in exchange for the Justice Department dropping the case. Firtash’s activities would appear to add another element to Trump’s pressure campaign on Ukraine: an indicted oligarch bankrolled at least part of the efforts to manufacture dirt on the Bidens, as Trump himself urged Ukraine’s president to investigate the same allegations. Firtash — an oligarch who made his money as a middleman in the country’s gas trade with Russia — has long argued that the case was brought against him for political reasons, specifically saying that U.S. officials sought to wall him and his political influence off from Ukraine. Being extradited and tried in the U.S. could spell the end for his ability to maintain control over his business empire. Thanks to his admitted association with Russian mafia grandaddy Semyon Mogilevich and to his lucrative position in the country’s gas trade with Russia, U.S. officials have long seen Firtash as a Russian cutout."
"Firtash has been fighting a U.S. extradition request for five years, calling it politically motivated, and has begun to boost allegations against the Bidens as part of that campaign, hitching himself to the Trump train. He’s spent years wrapped up in his legal battles while stuck in the Austrian capital of Vienna, where he was located at the time the indictment dropped. Bloomberg reported on Friday that Firtash had paid around $1 million for a dirt-digging project on the Bidens. American lawyers he hired with ties to Trumpworld reportedly hoped to transfer the information to Giuliani in exchange for the Justice Department dropping the case. Firtash’s activities would appear to add another element to Trump’s pressure campaign on Ukraine: an indicted oligarch bankrolled at least part of the efforts to manufacture dirt on the Bidens, as Trump himself urged Ukraine’s president to investigate the same allegations. Firtash — an oligarch who made his money as a middleman in the country’s gas trade with Russia — has long argued that the case was brought against him for political reasons, specifically saying that U.S. officials sought to wall him and his political influence off from Ukraine. Being extradited and tried in the U.S. could spell the end for his ability to maintain control over his business empire. Thanks to his admitted association with Russian mafia grandaddy Semyon Mogilevich and to his lucrative position in the country’s gas trade with Russia, U.S. officials have long seen Firtash as a Russian cutout."
How an Indicted Oligarch Became a Key Player in Trump’s Ukraine Scandal
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/10/how-an-indicted-oligarch-became-a-key-player-in-trumps-ukraine-scandal/
"Firtash is a controversial figure in Ukraine. He made a fortune—which Forbes in 2014 estimated at $500 million—by working with Russia’s Gazprom. The state-run natural gas giant gave Firtash a role as its partner in a business shipping gas from Russia to Ukraine. In 2010, Firtash was a key backer of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, a pro-Russian leader accused of massive corruption. (Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chair now serving a seven-and-a-half-year sentence in prison, was a top consultant for Yanukovych.) In 2014, shortly after Yanukovych fled Ukraine during the Maidan revolution, US prosecutors in Chicago indicted Firtash for allegedly bribing Indian government officials to secure a contract to sell titanium to Boeing. He once told the US ambassador in Kiev that years earlier he had to obtain the approval of Semion Mogilevich, an alleged Russian mobster, for his initial business endeavors. The Justice Department in 2017 called Firtash an “upper-echelon [associate] of Russian organized crime,” an allegation he denies. In June, a US federal judge cleared the way for Firtash to face charges in Chicago. But he is fighting extradition from Austria, where he has been been under house arrest since 2014, arguing in court there that he was targeted for prosecution by US officials for political reasons. This summer, Firtash hired Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing, a husband-and-wife legal team known for championing Republican causes and defending Trump on Fox News. A year earlier, diGenova and Toensing had agreed to join Trump’s defense team, but that arrangement was scuttled due to conflicts of interest caused by the couple’s prior work for other clients involved in the Trump-Russia scandal. Toensing has also worked with Giuliani to find dirt on the Bidens in Ukraine. She planned to join the former New York City mayor on a trip to Kiev in May, during which they hoped to gather more negative information about Trump’s Democratic rival."
"Firtash is a controversial figure in Ukraine. He made a fortune—which Forbes in 2014 estimated at $500 million—by working with Russia’s Gazprom. The state-run natural gas giant gave Firtash a role as its partner in a business shipping gas from Russia to Ukraine. In 2010, Firtash was a key backer of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, a pro-Russian leader accused of massive corruption. (Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chair now serving a seven-and-a-half-year sentence in prison, was a top consultant for Yanukovych.) In 2014, shortly after Yanukovych fled Ukraine during the Maidan revolution, US prosecutors in Chicago indicted Firtash for allegedly bribing Indian government officials to secure a contract to sell titanium to Boeing. He once told the US ambassador in Kiev that years earlier he had to obtain the approval of Semion Mogilevich, an alleged Russian mobster, for his initial business endeavors. The Justice Department in 2017 called Firtash an “upper-echelon [associate] of Russian organized crime,” an allegation he denies. In June, a US federal judge cleared the way for Firtash to face charges in Chicago. But he is fighting extradition from Austria, where he has been been under house arrest since 2014, arguing in court there that he was targeted for prosecution by US officials for political reasons. This summer, Firtash hired Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing, a husband-and-wife legal team known for championing Republican causes and defending Trump on Fox News. A year earlier, diGenova and Toensing had agreed to join Trump’s defense team, but that arrangement was scuttled due to conflicts of interest caused by the couple’s prior work for other clients involved in the Trump-Russia scandal. Toensing has also worked with Giuliani to find dirt on the Bidens in Ukraine. She planned to join the former New York City mayor on a trip to Kiev in May, during which they hoped to gather more negative information about Trump’s Democratic rival."
Why We Must Impeach
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/sean-wilentz-why-we-must-impeach-donald-trump-897246/
"The nation’s founders understood, having fought a revolution against monarchy, that no government of the people was invulnerable to such egregious abuses of power. They were particularly concerned, as Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers, that a president, through “cabal, intrigue, and corruption,” might help “foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils.” In their wisdom, they created a mechanism to halt this disloyal corruption in its tracks: impeachment. Impeachment is a severe measure of last resort, which ought to be used only in the most extreme cases. In the United States, the voters are supposed to decide who governs. That’s what the Framers of the Constitution had in mind when they formed a new government in which, at every level, ultimate sovereignty lay in “We, the People.” Elections legitimately won cannot be illegitimately undone at the whim of a faction or party. They should only be undone by throwing the bum out at the next election. What happens, though, if a president uses the powers of office to disrupt the next election? What if that president does so by brazenly enlisting the aid of a hostile foreign power? Or if he does so by trying in secret to extort cooperation from a foreign ally threatened by that same hostile power? What if the president has denied the existence of an ongoing systematic cyberattack from the hostile power, which every U.S. intelligence service calls a clear and present threat to our democracy? What if the actions of that president raise urgent questions about the legitimacy of the next election and cast a darker cloud over how he gained the office in the first place? There have been earlier impeachments and interferences with democratic institutions in our history, but nothing like this one. In this, as he likes to say, Trump truly stands alone. He has assaulted American democracy, claimed he has the authority to do so, and dared anybody to do anything about it"
"The nation’s founders understood, having fought a revolution against monarchy, that no government of the people was invulnerable to such egregious abuses of power. They were particularly concerned, as Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers, that a president, through “cabal, intrigue, and corruption,” might help “foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils.” In their wisdom, they created a mechanism to halt this disloyal corruption in its tracks: impeachment. Impeachment is a severe measure of last resort, which ought to be used only in the most extreme cases. In the United States, the voters are supposed to decide who governs. That’s what the Framers of the Constitution had in mind when they formed a new government in which, at every level, ultimate sovereignty lay in “We, the People.” Elections legitimately won cannot be illegitimately undone at the whim of a faction or party. They should only be undone by throwing the bum out at the next election. What happens, though, if a president uses the powers of office to disrupt the next election? What if that president does so by brazenly enlisting the aid of a hostile foreign power? Or if he does so by trying in secret to extort cooperation from a foreign ally threatened by that same hostile power? What if the president has denied the existence of an ongoing systematic cyberattack from the hostile power, which every U.S. intelligence service calls a clear and present threat to our democracy? What if the actions of that president raise urgent questions about the legitimacy of the next election and cast a darker cloud over how he gained the office in the first place? There have been earlier impeachments and interferences with democratic institutions in our history, but nothing like this one. In this, as he likes to say, Trump truly stands alone. He has assaulted American democracy, claimed he has the authority to do so, and dared anybody to do anything about it"
This Is Still Happening: Steven Mnuchin
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/10/steven-mnuchin-trump-corruption-still-happening.html
"What Is Still Happening: Mnuchin has been implicated in many, many, many scandals—big, medium, and small—since President Donald Trump first nominated the former Goldman Sachs chief information officer, hedge fund manager, foreclosure specialist, and film executive to be secretary of the treasury. He has been most recently in the news not for any of that early-term malfeasance, but for his current and ongoing efforts to cover up Trump’s tax returns. In April, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal issued a formal request to the Internal Revenue Service for Trump’s tax returns under a 1924 update to the tax code, which commanded that “upon written request” from the chairmen of the relevant committees, the Treasury “Secretary shall furnish such committee with any return or return information specified in such request.” Mnuchin, fulfilling an earlier promise to defy any such request, responded in May that he would not be furnishing the tax returns as the statute obligated. This came after Mnuchin acknowledged that his department had communicated with the White House about how it should handle the issue. As the Washington Post noted, the tax request “process is designed to be walled off from White House interference, in part because of corruption that took place during the Teapot Dome scandal in the 1920s.” Oh, well! In his response to Neal, Mnuchin argued that he could ignore both the spirit and the letter of the law, making an unsupported claim that the request for tax information “lacks a legitimate legislative purpose.” Even though the law says that “the Secretary shall furnish” the requested tax information, no questions asked, Neal had offered a legitimate legislative purpose for the request, namely to ensure that IRS policies subjecting presidential tax returns to “mandatory examinations” were being carried out properly."
"What Is Still Happening: Mnuchin has been implicated in many, many, many scandals—big, medium, and small—since President Donald Trump first nominated the former Goldman Sachs chief information officer, hedge fund manager, foreclosure specialist, and film executive to be secretary of the treasury. He has been most recently in the news not for any of that early-term malfeasance, but for his current and ongoing efforts to cover up Trump’s tax returns. In April, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal issued a formal request to the Internal Revenue Service for Trump’s tax returns under a 1924 update to the tax code, which commanded that “upon written request” from the chairmen of the relevant committees, the Treasury “Secretary shall furnish such committee with any return or return information specified in such request.” Mnuchin, fulfilling an earlier promise to defy any such request, responded in May that he would not be furnishing the tax returns as the statute obligated. This came after Mnuchin acknowledged that his department had communicated with the White House about how it should handle the issue. As the Washington Post noted, the tax request “process is designed to be walled off from White House interference, in part because of corruption that took place during the Teapot Dome scandal in the 1920s.” Oh, well! In his response to Neal, Mnuchin argued that he could ignore both the spirit and the letter of the law, making an unsupported claim that the request for tax information “lacks a legitimate legislative purpose.” Even though the law says that “the Secretary shall furnish” the requested tax information, no questions asked, Neal had offered a legitimate legislative purpose for the request, namely to ensure that IRS policies subjecting presidential tax returns to “mandatory examinations” were being carried out properly."
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