Internal emails reportedly reveal how the White House had to come up with a legal justification for delaying the congressionally-approved military aid to Ukraine after President Donald Trump had frozen the funds in July.
This is right up there with “everybody knows.”
Of course they withheld the aid as part of their extortion and bribery attempt.
Of course they only released it when the whistleblower report said they were doing it.
It doesn’t matter if Ukraine “eventually” got the aid.
It’s still bribery and extortion.
Doesn’t matter that they’re too stupid to do it right. It’s still illegal.
The first thing criminals do once they think they are about to be caught? Start trying to cover up…
“In mid-October, the acting chief of staff flatly admitted the aid was held up as quid pro quo in exchange for such investigations, then claimed he didn’t actually say that.”
“You’re gonna need a bigger gaslight.”
(h/t Chief Brody)
When the whole story comes out, and it will, the republicans defending trump now will be toast. 40-some people were convicted of various crimes associated with Watergate and the cover-up. This will make that look like little Johnny getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
Several unnamed sources told the Washington Post on Sunday that White House lawyers have reviewed relevant documents regarding the frozen aid
The sources also told the Post that [acting Office of Management and Budget Director Russell] Vought told skeptical State Department officials and National Security Council members in the emails that the aid delay was legal.
For a group of people who supposedly think Trump “won” the hearings, they still seem intent on trying to pass the buck …
this will grow
carol leonnig corrected her first parameter… that the internal review started before the whistle blower, immediately after a CIA employee first filed a “concern” and the White House was notified
she also noted that in the review the legality of the OMB was challenged by GAO… the exchanges got messy as one group said “legal” and the other said “illegal”
she also said she’d been briefed by lawyers and their opinion was docs between the White House and government agencies were going to be accessible, while docs white house to white house departments might be difficult to expose
My hope is for leakers to give more reporters more information.
O/T: If Esper had an ounce of honor, he’d be resigning as well in protest of the blatant politicization of military justice.
The murderer did not strangle his victim, he just placed a temporary hold on her windpipe and, regrettably, mistakes were made.
Well, some also stop crimin’ for a while.
A little rough sex that got out of hand? What was she wearing(bad joke).
Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney
Acting Office of Budget and Management Director Russell Vought
Acting POTUS Donald Trump
Who’s in charge here that’s not “Acting”?
It’s pretty bad acting, but there’s bottomless popcorn, so that’s a redeeming quality.
Yeah but no refills, and you only get a small cup.
I’d say that Dump isn’t acting - he really is that crazy.
In a related story, Attorney General William Barr is busily preparing a memo to support Trump’s contention that the Fifth Avenue shooting victim was “a Never-Trumper human scum who got what he deserved.”
WHETHER THERE WAS A LEGAL JUSTIFICATION FOR WITHHOLDING AID IS IRRELEVANT. Let’s say that again: Whether there was a legal justification for withholding aid is irrelavant. What is relevant is the PURPOSE for which aid was withheld–to help Trumps re-electoin campaign. That is the only thing that we sho\uld care about.
I hope this is the first of many resignations.
Whole lot of weird shit going on with regard to this issue and many others in Trumplandia. I am hoping we are in the lag phase of the Trump regime’s cascade failure. I believe this is inevitable in the long run, even if I lack faith in the system in the short run.
In any sane world, the military-loving republicans would dump a president who did this to the military.
