On Friday morning, Donald Trump dismissed the whistleblower complaint filed against him as “highly partisan” even though he said he doesn’t know the person’s identity. In the Oval Office, Trump also said of the conversations he’s had with Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, “It doesn’t matter what I discussed. Someone should look into Joe Biden.” From The Washington Post:
“Trump’s call with Zelensky is under investigation by House Democrats, who are examining whether Trump and his attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, sought to manipulate the Ukrainian government into helping Trump’s reelection campaign by seeking information that could be damaging to Biden, a Democratic presidential candidate.
According to the Post, Trump maintained that his “conversations with foreign leaders are always appropriate,” and that it was a “beautiful conversation” with Zelensky.
The conversations in questions happened at the same time the White House was withholding aid from the Ukrainian military. The question is did Trump promise to release the aid only if the Ukrainians investigated Joe Biden? That could be seen as straight-up election interference.
Here’s a quick backgrounder on how we got here. It all began on September 5th when the Washington Post editorial board wrote this:
“Is Trump strong-arming Volodymyr Zelensky for political gain?” Here’s a good take from Brian Stelter of CNN:
“The editorial board said Trump had “suspended the delivery of $250 million in U.S. military aid to a country still fighting Russian aggression in its eastern provinces,” leading some to suspect that he was “once again catering” to Vladimir Putin. “But we’re reliably told that the president has a second and more venal agenda: He is attempting to force Mr. Zelensky to intervene in the 2020 U.S. presidential election by launching an investigation of the leading Democratic candidate, Joe Biden,” the editorial said. “Mr. Trump is not just soliciting Ukraine’s help with his presidential campaign; he is using U.S. military aid the country desperately needs in an attempt to extort it.”
It was just a few days later that the whistleblower complaint surfaced, a complaint that the director of national intelligence still refuses to send to Congress. And only last night that it was a phone call or calls between Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart.