There’s not much information out there right now. From what I can tell, some members of Congress will be briefed, but there’s a very tight lid on the information at the moment.
For discussion:
Who leaked? I’m guessing Bolton…
What did Trump (allegedly) do? It’s got to be pretty bad, right?
Is this the thread that unravels the sweater? Please, oh please, oh please.
I don’t think there has been any leak. The Inspector General, whose job it was to pass the whistleblower complaint to the House Intelligence Committee, advised Adam Schiff he was unable to do so because the Acting DNI forbade him based on some non-existent reasoning given him by the DOJ. There was no reason for the DOJ to become involved. The language in the rule compelling the IG to pass the complaint to the House Intelligence Committee is utterly unambiguous. There’s no interpretation of the law to be made by the DOJ. Adam Schiff simply made the issue public.
ETA: As I think about it, WaPo first broke the story, I believe. If that’s actually the first we heard of it, then your guess is a good one.
No one yet knows what Trump supposedly did, but it seems he made a promise to a foreign leader that was inappropriate and of “urgent concern.” In this matter, the term, “urgent concern” is a legal standard that the IG felt has been met. So yeah, pretty bad. The most common speculation I keep hearing is that Trump promised to lift Russian sanctions in exchange for Putin’s help to win election in 2020.
Since Trump supporters have been propagandized to believe that Russian support is preferable to Democrats winning an election, I doubt it will move the needle for them. Senate Republicans should be thinking long and hard about how this willful and blatant disregard for the rule of law could feel when the shoe is on the other foot, but I doubt they will. They’ve staked all their hopes on blindly following their lawless leader.
It was also required that Trump’s taxes be turned over to congress, and that was defied. Let’s hope today’s meeting was in some way tantamount to a handing-over of information. I doubt it was, though. Commence Republican wagon circling.
The inspector general didn’t exactly spill his guts. I read on Twitter that the DOJ “reasoning” on this is that the subject of the complaint is outside of the intelligence community, so the IC whistle-blower law doesn’t apply. :rolleyes: But the director of central intelligence wasn’t supposed to go to DOJ for guidance. The law says he “shall” give it to congress with seven days.
At this point, you’ve got to have to face that Republicans in congress, and many voters are just fine with anything Trump does. ANYthing.
They would be fine if Trump promised Putin that the US would abandon the Ukraine and put a stop to all sanctions, as long as Putin threw the entire support of his intelligence service behind getting Trump re-elected.
They would be fine if Trump promised Putin that the US would sell Alaska back to Russia in exchange for Trump Tower Moscow and $100 million in cash to Trump personally.
And they’d be fine with Trump ordering government officials to cover this up.
This is the simple state of affairs today. The USA has become a kleptocracy, run by a wanna-be dictator. So far, the Republican Party is indulging him in his dictatorial ways.
This may change. I doubt that it will though. I think that the entire party is in this shit-show all the way, and they know that they can’t extricate themselves now.
Is the mystery contained in this article from yesterday?
“The house committees’ chairs say they will scrutinise a telephone call between the US president and Mr Zelensky on 25 July, during which Mr Trump allegedly told the Ukrainian president to reopen the Biden investigation if he wanted to improve relations with the US.”
And that is certainly waaaay fucked up. If true, that would be a shining example of Trump’s so-called patriotism. And if true, what the hell does it say about those shielding him? Damn.
I mean, to be honest this is really just the equivalent of “Russia, if you’re listening…” but since it was done clandestine instead of completely in the open, it makes it seem worse.
It’s worse, I’d say, because it would prove that Trump has learned exactly jack shit about the whole thing. And this time he’s got the authority to promise aid, taxpayers’ money, etc.
Now being reported that the whistleblower complaint is based on multiple acts by Trump over the course of a lengthier period of time, culminating in his offer of a quid pro quo.
It just isn’t that hard to figure out what’s going on here.
Will this swing 20 R senators to vote for removal in an impeachment trial? Of course not.
Will it be a nice juicy nugget for the ongoing House impeachment hearings to expose and publicize with snowballing evidence throughout the course of the 2020 election? Let’s fucking hope so.