A Roundup Of Key Reactions To Trump's Call With Ukraine's President
On Wednesday — less than a day after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced a formal impeachment inquiry into President Trump over allegations that he pressured the President of Ukraine to open an investigation into Joe Biden in exchange for monetary aid — the White House released a readout* from Trump's call with the Ukrainian leader, Volodymyr Zelensky. In it, Trump appears to pressure Zelensky to open an investigation into Biden, while also appearing to hint that future military aid is contingent upon Zelensky's cooperation.
*It's worth noting that the transcript is not a verbatim transcript, but rather the "notes and recollections" of notetakers present for the call.
Legal Analysts And Pundits
Writing at The Atlantic, David Graham parses the "quid pro quo" involved:
Trump appears—as has been alleged—to be engaging in a quid pro quo, asking Zelensky to assist him in pursuing those conspiracy theories, in exchange for help to Ukraine. Trump never puts it in plain terms—he's too smart, and too experienced in shady business, to do that—but it requires willful blindness to miss what Trump is asking.
Trump begins by complaining that things are not "reciprocal" between the United States and Ukraine. Zelensky agrees, and then asks about buying Javelin missiles from the U.S. Trump responds, "I would like you to do us a favor," and then asks about CrowdStrike. Zelensky says he will, and then Trump requests that he look into Biden. Zelensky, desperate for defense help, seems to have understood precisely what Trump meant.
On Twitter, @nycsouthpaw draws attention to the key portion:
As the New York Times points out, it's worth remembering that at the time of the call, Trump had frozen military aid to Ukraine:
At the time of this call, Mr. Trump was holding back hundreds of millions of dollars in military assistance to Ukraine that Congress had appropriated to help that country fend off Russian aggression. The two leaders did not directly refer to Mr. Trump's freezing of the aid or whether he would unfreeze it. However, Mr. Trump referred to large-scale American assistance to Ukraine in this passage….
[Read more at the New York Times]
Over at the National Review, on the other hand, Kyle Smith argues that there's no smoking gun and that the new details won't move voters' opinion:
The transcript shows Trump being Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky trying to ingratiate himself with the big dog by, for instance, mentioning that he stays at Trump hotels. Trump's conversation is typically scattershot, wandering all over the field, leaving a reasonable listener puzzled about what the takeaways are supposed to be. If I were a major foreign leader and I had such a conversation with Trump, I'd be sure to follow it up by talking to someone with a more linear and lawyerly way of approaching matters.
[Read more at the National Review]
Vox also has a helpful explainer on the context for Trump's reference to Crowdstrike in the call:
CrowdStrike, for those who may not remember, was the cybersecurity firm that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) used to investigate hacks against it back in 2016. It concluded that Russia was responsible, a finding later backed up by the US intelligence communities and special counsel Robert Mueller. But Trump apparently still believes that his own intelligence agencies have it wrong.
CrowdStrike cooperated with the FBI's investigation of the hacks but Trump has nonetheless repeatedly pushed baseless conspiracy theories suggesting that information was somehow withheld from the bureau because CrowdStrike didn't turn over a physical server to the FBI, and was therefore involved in a cover-up that resulted in the Russia investigation. (This isn't how the relevant technology works, but more on that later.)
Republican Leaders
Trump and Republican leaders are sticking to the the "no quid pro quo" defense:
So far, Mitt Romney is the first prominent GOP Senator to express serious concern:
"It remains troubling in the extreme. It's deeply troubling," Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) told reporters Wednesday, when asked about the transcript.
Senator Ben Sasse, meanwhile, spoke at length to the National Review:
"I want any and all relevant information," Sasse tells National Review. "That's not to deny that certain pieces of this probably are susceptible to a claim of [executive] privilege, but I think it's in the country's interest, and I think it's in the president's interest, and the interest of public and civil health" for Congress to receive all relevant information.
[Read more at the National Review]
Democratic Leaders
Democratic leaders — particularly those who have championed impeachment — have seized on the details of the call. Politico got reactions from a bunch of Democrats in Congress:
"The release of the memo is devastating for the president's defenders," said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), a longtime impeachment advocate who sits on the Judiciary Committee.
The call with Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky is just one piece of a whistleblower's complaint that the Trump administration has been withholding from Congress — a move that prompted Speaker Nancy Pelosi and dozens of House Democrats to call for formal impeachment proceedings on Tuesday.
"This should shock the conscience of every American — and we still don't have the full story," added Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), a member of the Intelligence and Judiciary Committees. "The administration continues to illegally withhold the full whistleblower complaint."
[Politico]
Senator Joe Manchin, from Trump-friendly West Virginia, took a much more cautious line: