RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2019/09/democrats-bet-it-all-trumps-telephone-call-matthew-vadum/

A day after Democrats vowed to open a formal impeachment inquiry, President Trump dropped a bombshell Sept. 25 by releasing the transcript of a conversation he had with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that Trump’s enemies insist is the smoking gun that should drive him from office.

That the impeachment push is an attempt to placate the Democrats’ increasingly affective Antifa-loving base and probably also a tactic to direct attention away from the at least questionable dealings in Ukraine of Democrat presidential frontrunner Joe Biden and his cokehead grifter son, Hunter, have barely been mentioned in the media. The media is promoting the theory – based on an anonymous “whistleblower” complaint – that Trump tried to enlist a foreign government to help him in the 2020 election, even though Department of Justice lawyers have already issued an opinion that Trump’s conversation did not constitute a violation of U.S. campaign laws.

After months of hand-wringing, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi pulled the trigger to begin the process of impeaching Donald Trump, even before she read the transcript, dogmatically declaring that Trump “asked a foreign government to help him in his political campaign at the expense of our national security.”

The unsubstantiated claim is that Trump threatened to withhold a military aid package from Ukraine to pressure that country to investigate the Bidens.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-ukraine-transcript-fizzle-11569455303

The White House on Wednesday released the transcript of President Trump’s July call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and the news is that Mr. Trump was telling the truth about it. The conversation was largely routine diplomacy, and even the reference to Joe Biden was less than promoted by the press. Good luck persuading Americans that this is an impeachable offense.

The five-page transcript shows that Mr. Trump called to congratulate Mr. Zelensky on his party’s victory in Parliament. After niceties, Mr. Trump waxes on as he often does that the U.S. “spend[s] a lot of effort and a lot of time” on Ukraine, while complaining that European countries don’t do their share. At no point does Mr. Trump threaten a withdrawal of U.S. aid to Ukraine.

Mr. Trump does ask for a “favor”—that Ukraine look at 2016 election meddling. “I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike,” he says, referring to the company that investigated the 2016 hack of the Democratic National Committee.

He also disparages former Special Counsel Robert Mueller—no surprise there—and notes that “they say a lot of it started with Ukraine.” Mr. Trump is clearly still sore about the attempt by the Hillary Clinton campaign to dig up foreign dirt on him, but there is nothing wrong with asking a foreign head of state to investigate meddling in U.S. elections.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/poll-majority-of-americans-against-trump-impeachment/

Most Americans are against removing President Trump from office, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday.

The poll was conducted from September 19 to 23, before the Wednesday release of the transcript of a phone conversation between Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky. During this period, Trump faced growing outrage over accusations he improperly pressured Zelensky to conduct investigations that would damage presidential candidate Joe Biden.

37 percent of respondents to the poll said Trump should be impeached and removed from office, while 57 percent were against impeachment.

The poll surveyed 1,337 registered voters and had a 3.2 percent margin of error.

Voters were largely opposed to impeachment even though approval of Trump’s job performance stands at 38 percent, with 55 percent reporting an unfavorable view of the President.

The findings show almost no change in attitudes toward impeachment since late August. A Monmouth University poll released August 22 found that 35 percent of Americans were against impeachment, while 59 percent were opposed.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced on Tuesday that she would support an impeachment inquiry into the President.

A graphic in the New York Times shows 205 House Democrats who have come out in support of impeachment. A small fraction of the House Democratic caucus is either against impeachment, undecided, or has not responded to queries from the Times.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/09/transcript_of_trumpzelensky_call_released_impeachment_now_likely.html

With the release this morning of the unredacted transcript[i] of President Trump’s July 25 call to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, the bait has been set in a trap, and the House Democrats are very likely to vote to begin impeachment proceedings for President Trump. President Trump and his advisors hastened to release it because they now want impeachment.

There is no quid pro quo offer or demand in the call and no mention of military aid, but there is plenty of expression of Trump’s desire to have the affair investigated.

Trump began his expression of interest in Ukrainian cooperation with an apparent reference to the leaks from Ukrainian sources of material used to drive Paul Manafort out of his campaign:

I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike … I guess you have one of your wealthy people… The server, they say Ukraine has.it There are a lot. of things that went on, the whole situation .. I think you’re _surrounding yourself with some of the same people. I  would like to have the Attorney General call you or your people and I would like you to ·get to the bottom of it. As you said yesterday, that whole nonsetise ended with a very poor performance by a man named Robert Mueller, an incompetent performance, but they say a lot of it started with Ukraine. Whatever you can do, it’s very important that· you. do it if that’s possible.

President Zelensky’s reply indicated that he already was interested in pursuing corruption in his predecessors’ regimes, including corruption affecting the United States:

I wanted to tell you about the prosecutor. First of all, I understand arid I’m knowledgeable about the situation. Since we have won· the absolute majority in our Parliament, the next prosecutor general will be 100% my person, my candidate, who will be approved, by the parliament and will start as a new prosecutor in September. He or she will look. into the situation, specifically to the company that you mentioned in this issue. The issue of the investigation of the case is actually the issue of making sure to restore the honesty so we will take care of that and wi1l work on the investigation of the case. On top of that, I would kindly ask you if you have any additional information that you can provide to µs, it would be very helpful for the investigation to make sure that we administer justice in our country with regard to the Ambassador to the United States from Ukraine as far as I recall her name was Ivanovicli. It was great that you were the first one. who told me that she was a bad ambassador because I agree with you 100%. Her attitude towards me was far from the best as she admired the previous President and she was on his side. [emphasis added]

The text in italics seems to indicate that President Zelensky already had investigation plans, and wanted US cooperation. This is the opposite of Trump demanding or coercing cooperation with a threat to withhold military aid or supply any positive or negative incentive.  

https://thefederalist.com/2019/09/25/doj-bureaucrats-trump-complaint-was-neither-urgent-nor-needing-congressional-referral/

The Department of Justice’s criminal division reviewed a bureaucrat’s complaint about President Donald Trump’s phone call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky and found it neither urgent nor requiring referral to congressional committees. All relevant components of the department agreed with the legal conclusion, and the matter was concluded, a DOJ spokesman announced.

The complaint was leaked to the media and other Democratic officials who have used it to call for the immediate impeachment of President Trump. A transcript of the call was released to the public. In the wide-ranging phone call, the transcript shows the two leaders discussing Ukraine’s meddling on behalf of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, which the Justice Department today confirmed is now being investigated by a team led by U.S. Attorney John Durham.

The Ukrainian president asked that former New York City Mayor Rudy Guiliani, who is the president’s attorney, come to Ukraine. “We are hoping very much that Mr. Guiliani will be able to travel to Ukraine and we will meet once he comes to Ukraine,” Zelensky said.

The legal opinion rests mostly on the idea of whether the foreign policy role of the president of the United States is subject to unelected bureaucrats’ complaints. It is not, they found.