Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) rushed to impeaching the president on the basis of a phone call transcript that nobody — including herself — had yet read.
In a dramatic statement invoking the Founding Fathers and seeming to confess to the world that she no longer has a handle on the Democratic Party, Pelosi accused Trump on Tuesday of treason for asking Ukraine’s president to investigate Joe Biden and his son Hunter. But Trump released a transcript of the call Wednesday, and it’s not exactly what was promised: there is no mention of any quid pro quo and Trump does not, as Democrats predicted, mention military aid.
No quid pro quo
After months of holding back on impeachment, Pelosi prompted mutterings of a backlash when she suddenly announced this week that her party would begin a formal impeachment inquiry, Breitbart reports. It was a bold, and many say foolhardy, move, especially since Pelosi had read neither the whistleblower complaint accusing Trump of a quid pro quo with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, nor the transcript of the phone call the complaint allegedly mentions.
Even before Pelosi announced the impeachment, she showed signs of lowering expectations — and the goalposts — when she said that impeachment would be likely regardless of whether Trump actually discussed a quid pro quo on the call. The transcript is now available, and there’s no quid pro quo there. Not that it matters to Democrats.
At Zelensky’s prompting, the transcript shows that the two men discussed Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who was involved in discussions with the Ukrainians to investigate Biden, according to Fox News.
Trump vaguely mentioned that America has been “good” to Ukraine and the relationship between the countries is not “totally reciprocal,” and Zelensky — but not Trump — makes some mention of “military aid,” saying: “I would like to thank you in the area of defense.” Trump then brings up “Biden’s son” and how Biden “went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it… It sounds horrible to me.”
Trump was referring to Biden’s boasts of pressuring Ukraine, by threatening to withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees, to fire a prosecutor who was looking into a company in which his son Hunter was a stakeholder. Democrats have ignored any alleged wrongdoing by the Bidens while accusing Trump of freezing $400 million in aid to Ukraine as part of a quid pro quo to boost his election efforts. But the call makes no mention of the aid or any such scheme.
Dems move the goalposts
Predictably, Democrats reacted to the transcript’s release by moving the goalposts and claiming vindication. A joint statement from Reps. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), Adam Schiff (D-CA), and Elijah Cummings (D-MD) said that the call is an “unambiguous, damning, and shocking abuse of the Office of the Presidency for personal political gain” — as they explicitly moved the goalposts down below the level of quid pro quo.
“This is a clear breach of trust placed in the President to faithfully execute the laws and to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution,” they said, according to the New York Post. “Let’s be clear: no quid pro quo is required to betray our country. Trump asked a foreign government to interfere in our elections — that is betrayal enough. The corruption exists whether or not Trump threatened — explicitly or implicitly — that a lack of cooperation could result in withholding military aid.”
Democrats are now talking double, saying that the transcript is “not enough” but also “enough” to impeach Trump at the same time (I wonder how that works). Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said that Democrats still need the whistleblower complaint, saying, “We don’t even know what the complaint is about.” Yeah, no kidding.
Still, Schumer somehow also thinks the transcript “absolutely validates” Pelosi pulling the trigger on impeachment. But Republicans, so far, aren’t caving to the smear campaign.
Wow. Impeachment over this?
What a nothing (non-quid pro quo) burger.
Democrats have lost their minds when it comes to President @realDonaldTrump.
— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) September 25, 2019
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