Hard To Imagine Trumpists Won't Be Going To Prison Over The Ukraine Cover-Up

Barr, Pompeo, Trump And Pence-- Where's Mulvaney?

As the GOP was deciding to put Ohio neo-fascist Gym Jordan on the Intel Committee to disrupt the impeachment inquiry, the Ttrumpist defense was dealt another deadly blow as Gordon Sondland "revised" the testimony he gave last month and now admits Trump was guilt of instituting a quid pro quo in the Ukraine case. CNN reported that Sondland's attorney sent the committee a letter and a three-page addition to his testimony, which said he had remembered a conversation on September 1 with Andriy Yermak, an aide to the Ukrainian President, linking the aid to the investigations. 'I now recall speaking individually with Mr. Yermak, where I said resumption of U.S. aid would likely not occur until Ukraine provided the public anti-corruption statement that we had been discussing for many weeks,' Sondland said. Sondland's new testimony, which was included in the public release of his closed-door deposition transcript on Tuesday, adds to Democrats' evidence that the President connected the freezing of $400 million in US security aid to Ukraine to investigations into the 2016 election and former Vice President Joe Biden."

Yesterday, Washington Post reporters Phil Rucker and Toluse Olorunnipa wrote that at his failed election eve visit to Lexington, Kentucky "Trump repeated a false claim he has made more than 100 times in the past six weeks: that a whistleblower from the intelligence community misrepresented a presidential phone call at the center of the impeachment inquiry that threatens his presidency. 'The whistleblower said lots of things that weren’t so good, folks. You’re going to find out,' Trump said Monday at a campaign rally. 'These are very dishonest people.' Behind him were men and women in 'Read the Transcript' T-shirts-- echoing through their apparel Trump’s attempt to recast an incriminating summary of his July 25 call with Ukraine’s president as a piece of exonerating evidence. It’s a form of gaslighting that has become the central defense strategy for the president as he faces his greatest political threat yet. But the approach is coming under increasing strain as congressional Democrats release transcripts and prepare to hold public hearings presenting evidence that directly undercuts Trump’s claims. That the whistleblower report essentially mirrors the set of facts that have since been revealed by a stream of documented evidence and sworn testimony has not stopped Trump from repeatedly claiming otherwise. He has also pushed other specious arguments in his harried attempt to counter the growing evidence from witnesses implicating his administration in a quid pro quo scheme linking military aid to Ukrainian investigations targeting Democrats." Lexington voters appeared to know Trump was lying his ass off. Fayette County went massively for Beshear in a two-to-one landslide-- 73,397 (65.51%) to 36,915 (32.95%).

Mick Mulvaney is an idiot with loose lips and a lot to hide and he's not going to be showing up for any questioning by Congress' impeachment committees. Nevertheless, yesterday, Adam Schiff, the Chair of the Intelligence Committee, Eliot Engel, Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee,and Carolyn Maloney, Acting Chair of the Oversight Committee, sent a letter asking Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney to appear at a deposition this Friday, November 8, as part of the impeachment investigation into Señor Trumpanzee.

My favorite part of the letter: "Based on evidence gathered in the impeachment inquiry and public reporting, we believe that you possess substantial first-hand knowledge and information relevant to the House’s impeachment inquiry.  Specifically, the investigation has revealed that you may have been directly involved in an effort orchestrated by President Trump, his personal agent, Rudolph Giuliani, and others to withhold a coveted White House meeting and nearly $400 million in security assistance in order to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to pursue investigations that would benefit President Trump’s personal political interests, and jeopardized our national security in attempting to do so."

The early October documents subpoena the three congressional committees sent Mulvaney was ignored, although 2 weeks later Mulvaney-- apparently inadvertently-- revealed in a press conference that Trump blocked nearly $400 million in congressionally approved security assistance for Ukraine in order to further his own personal political interest, rather than the national interest. There is overwhelming evidence already gathered in the impeachment inquiry and public reporting that Mulvaney played a direct role in the scheme to pressure the Ukrainian government to interfere in the 2020 U.S. election by manufacturing damaging information about the Bidens and in the ensuing and on-going coverup.

On Sunday, Rachel Bade, Josh Dawsey and Eric Werner reported for the Washington Post Russell Vought, a Mulvaney protege who runs the White House OMB intends to present "a wall of concerted defiance of congressional subpoenas" this week, along with two of his subordinates-- proving their loyalty to Trumpanzee while attempting to create a firewall for Republicans to use while defending Trump's use of foreign aid to elicit political favors from Ukraine. "The OMB," they wrote, "is at the nexus of the impeachment inquiry because Democrats are pressing for details about why the White House budget office effectively froze the Ukraine funds that Congress had already appropriated." Mulvaney seems to have orchestrated a defense.

The anticipated defiance toward impeachment investigators comes as Trump has grown enraged that so many of “his employees,” as he refers to them, are going to Capitol Hill and testifying, said a person who regularly talks with him and who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The president has asked for copies of witness statements so he can decide how to criticize them, complained that his lawyers are not doing enough to stop people from talking, and even encouraged members of Congress to question the credibility of people working in his own administration, current and former officials said.

“He is the war room,” press secretary Stephanie Grisham said on Fox News.

Vought, who serves in an acting capacity in the job Mulvaney once held, has sought to build a relationship with the president for some time and sees standing firm against the impeachment inquiry as a way to bolster it, according to two White House officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Like Trump, the longtime conservative warrior has derided the impeachment inquiry as a “sham process” and has said he will not comply with the subpoena to appear for a deposition this coming Wednesday. Vought shares the president’s disdain of foreign aid and has sought to cut it in previous budgets.

Trump has at times questioned the loyalty of Mulvaney’s aides, but OMB officials have assured the president they will not show up and help the Democrats’ probe, two officials said, pleasing the president.

Vought’s move to stonewall Congress follows a string of National Security Council and State Department witnesses testifying that the president tried to withhold nearly $400 million in security aid for Ukraine unless that country would launch politically charged investigations that could benefit Trump. Vought, Blair and the other two OMB officials called to testify could shed more light on those decisions and the process.

Although OMB officials were not the ones calling the shots about how to handle the military aid, it was their responsibility to implement those decisions and to release the aid-- or hold it up-- as directed. Their testimony could fill in important details about the decision-making process around the money.

“We know from the president that he wanted the Ukrainians to do these investigations, and we know that aid was being withheld when he was asking the Ukrainians,” said Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA), an impeachment investigator. “You still have to connect all the dots… They’re dot-connecting witnesses.”

Vought was immediately told of the president’s decision to scuttle the aid and agreed with some other top advisers that it was legal, two administration officials said. Michael Duffey, one of Vought’s subordinates who has also been called to testify on Tuesday and who controls foreign aid decisions in the OMB, signed the OMB document freezing the Ukraine aid, according to the administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Duffey is OMB’s associate director for national security programs.

An agency spokeswoman said its officials are simply abiding by the White House’s directive, which is that the impeachment inquiry is illegitimate and the administration is not cooperating.

“The idea that OMB’s posture is informed by anything other than respecting the prerogatives of the president is absurd,” said OMB spokeswoman Rachel Semmel.

Trump suggested on Sunday he could continue exerting his prerogative over OMB when he told a reporter that he wouldn’t rule out directing another government shutdown later this month if negotiations with Democrats don’t lead to the results he wants.

The expected defiance from Mulvaney’s allies could bolster the standing of the acting chief, whose job has been a constant source of speculation. In an interview with the Washington Examiner last week, Trump seemed to sympathize with Senate Republicans’ annoyance at Mulvaney and refused to weigh in on whether he was “happy” with Mulvaney’s performance. He continues to complain about him, advisers say, but is unlikely to immediately replace him at this time.

“Happy?” he asked in response to a question from The Examiner. “I don’t want to comment on it.”

The OMB officials’ refusal to cooperate with the impeachment inquiry will mark a significant break from the trend of the past four weeks, when House Democrats have had success convincing a parade of current and former administration officials to testify about their concerns regarding Trump’s use of foreign policy for political gain. Those officials have come forward despite orders from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and White House Counsel Pat Cipollone to ignore impeachment summons.

The OMB’s posture could complicate Democrats’ investigation, keeping them from learning more details about alleged moves to link aid to Ukraine with Trump’s pressure on the nation. Democrats argued, however, that it might not matter in the long run, as they already have two witnesses testifying that the money hinged on the Biden investigations.

“In my view it would be useful to hear from them, but not essential,” said Rep. David N. Cicilline (D-RI), an impeachment investigator.

The decision to ignore a congressional subpoena comes with risk. House Democrats could hold Vought and his aides in contempt of Congress or take them to court to try to compel their testimony, as the party has done for former White House counsel Donald McGahn. Democrats have said they will not wait on the courts before they proceed with their impeachment inquiry. But by suing Trump officials, they could force testimony next year, shortly before the presidential election.