We now have the White House's own transcript of Trump's call to the Ukrainian president and the whistleblower claim of what happened on that call. They are remarkably consistent with each other. It is now obvious that Donald Trump threatened to withhold critical military aid passed by Congress unless Ukrainian officials helped him dig up dirt on Joe Biden and his son (evidence of which simply does not exist).
This has left White House aides and congressional Republicans scrambling to try and protect Trump from impeachment. Those attempts are pathetic, inadequate, and fall far short of succeeding. Here is how John Harwood at cnbc.com lists the sad attempts and tells us how they fail:
It was hearsay
House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy notes that “the whistleblower wasn’t on the call” between Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart. “Hearsay,” Sen. Lindsey Graham insists, cannot be a basis for impeachment.
Both observations are irrelevant. In the partial transcript of the call released by the White House itself, Trump’s own words affirm the whistleblower’s account. That is direct evidence, not hearsay.
Biased whistleblower
The president says the still-unidentified whistleblower harbors “known bias” against him. This observation, which the intelligence community inspector general called “arguable,” does not discredit the whistleblower’s allegations, which the inspector general found “credible.”
If the whistleblower’s information is accurate, his motivation doesn’t matter. Trump’s own former homeland security advisor, Thomas Bossert, has described himself as “deeply disturbed” by the president’s behavior, too.
Media distortion
On “60 Minutes” Sunday night, CBS correspondent Scott Pelley asked about Trump’s comment that “I need you to do us a favor, though” after Ukraine’s new president requested military aid to counter Russian aggression.
“You added a word there,” GOP leader McCarthy replied, referring to the damning “though.”
McCarthy’s assertion was false; Pelley accurately quoted the White House-released document. The most charitable interpretation of the GOP leader’s embarrassment is that he had not actually reviewed the evidence he had gone on national television to discuss.
It wasn’t about Biden
On “Meet the Press,” House GOP Whip Steve Scalise insisted the favor Trump sought was an investigation into the cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike, rather than dirt on Biden. That investigation, in turn, might explain the true source of outside interference in the 2016 election.
In fact, the partial transcript shows Trump specifically requested an investigation of Biden and his son. The U.S. government already knows the origin of 2016 interference: Russia, which favored Trump over Hillary Clinton.
Scalise alluded to unfounded suspicions among conspiracy-minded Republicans that Ukraine, seeking to help Clinton, was the real meddler. Those suspicions, former Trump aide Bossert notes, have been “completely debunked.”
Biden interfered
Trump asserts that, as Barack Obama’s vice president, Biden sought to protect his son by demanding that Ukraine fire a prosecutor. At the time, Hunter Biden worked for a Ukrainian energy firm that had faced an investigation
Yet Biden’s demand was not personal. He made it on behalf of the U.S. government and allies including the European Union and the International Monetary Fund – none of whom have accused the former vice president of misconduct.
Moreover, Ukrainian officials say the investigation into Hunter Biden’s company was inactive when the prosecutor was ousted. The prosecutor who replaced him told the Los Angeles Times he had no evidence of illegality.
No quid pro quo
In the call, Trump did not explicitly condition military aid on a new Biden investigation. “I didn’t do it,” the president told reporters. “There was no quid pro quo.”
As a matter of propriety, that does not absolve Trump for baselessly seeking derogatory information about a domestic rival from a foreign government – an abuse of presidential power under any circumstances.
But former federal prosecutor Mimi Rocah, calling Trump’s purpose “100%” clear, notes that even mobsters don’t make extortion demands explicit. Writing in The Washington Post, Flake said the partial transcript “removed all ambiguity about the president’s intent.”
“The whistleblower’s account seems convincing,” concludes Kori Schake, a former national security aide to President George W. Bush, “that the president was using our country’s foreign policy to blackmail a foreign country.”
Ukraine is getting aid
The U.S. expanded military assistance to Ukraine after Russia seized part of its territory in 2014. Trump says he has helped more than Obama.
But furnishing aid requires support by Congress. Both parties have provided it.
The Trump administration’s Pentagon, State Department and National Security Council all supported the aid this summer, Fox News has reported. But Trump personally froze it just days before calling the Ukrainian leader.
Trump unfroze the aid only after the whistleblower complained to Congress.