Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
White House Fighting Impeachment by Stalling and Attacking
gvw_ap_news
By Associated Press
Published 4 years ago on
October 8, 2019

Share

WASHINGTON — As House Democrats fire off more subpoenas, the White House has launched a high-stakes strategy to counter the impeachment threat to President Donald Trump: Stall. Obfuscate. Attack. Repeat.
One of the administration’s first moves: the State Department on Tuesday barred Gordon Sondland, the U.S. European Union ambassador, from appearing before a House panel conducting the impeachment inquiry into Trump.
“I would love to send Ambassador Sondland, a really good man and great American, to testify, but unfortunately he would be testifying before a totally compromised kangaroo court, where Republican’s rights have been taken away, and true facts are not allowed out for the public to see,” Trump wrote on Twitter.


Sondland’s attorney, Robert Luskin, said his client was “profoundly disappointed” that he wouldn’t be able to testify. A whistleblower’s complaint and text messages released by another envoy portray Sondland as a potentially important witness to allegations that the Republican president sought to dig up dirt on a Democratic rival in the name of foreign policy.
Trump aides are honing their approach after two weeks of what allies have described as a listless and unfocused response to the impeachment probe. One expected step is a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejecting the inquiry because Democrats haven’t held a vote on the matter and moving to all but ceasing cooperation with Capitol Hill on key oversight matters.
The strategy risks further provoking Democrats in the impeachment probe, setting up court challenges and the potential for lawmakers to draw up an article of impeachment accusing Trump of obstructing their investigations. Rep. Adam Schiff, chairman of the House intelligence committee, said that Sondland’s no-show would be grounds for obstruction of justice and could give a preview of what some of the articles of impeachment against Trump would entail.
But as lawmakers seek to amass ammunition to be used in an impeachment trial, the White House increasingly believes all-out warfare is its best course of action.

House Democrats Issued New Round of Subpoenas on Monday

“What they did to this country is unthinkable. It’s lucky that I’m the president. A lot of people said very few people could handle it. I sort of thrive on it,” Trump said Monday at the White House. “You can’t impeach a president for doing a great job. This is a scam.”
House Democrats, for their part, issued a new round of subpoenas on Monday, this time to Defense Secretary Mark Esper and acting White House budget director Russell Vought. Pelosi’s office also released an open letter signed by 90 former national security officials who served in both Democratic and Republican administrations, voicing support for the whistleblower who raised concerns about Trump’s efforts to get Ukraine to investigate political foe Joe Biden.
“A responsible whistleblower makes all Americans safer by ensuring that serious wrongdoing can be investigated and addressed, thus advancing the cause of national security to which we have devoted our careers,” they wrote. “Whatever one’s view of the matters discussed in the whistleblower’s complaint, all Americans should be united in demanding that all branches of our government and all outlets of our media protect this whistleblower and his or her identity. Simply put, he or she has done what our law demands; now he or she deserves our protection.”
The House Intelligence, Oversight and Foreign Affairs committees are investigating Trump’s actions pressing Ukraine to investigate Biden and his son, potentially interfering in the 2020 election. The former vice president, for his part, has accused Trump of “frantically pushing flat-out lies, debunked conspiracy theories and smears against me.” Trump also withheld hundreds of millions of dollars in military assistance to Ukraine.
Trump and his team’s initial strategy had been to try to undermine the credibility of the intelligence community whistleblower who first raised questions about Trump’s conduct with Ukraine, just as they tried to undercut special counsel Robert Mueller and his team. They stressed that the whistleblower had only second- or third-hand information and alleged that the person misrepresented the president’s efforts. But now a second whistleblower has come forward to corroborate the information, and a cache of text messages echoes the concerns that have been laid out.

President’s Aides Have Ignored Document Requests and Subpoena

The White House has struggled to communicate its message beyond Trump’s angry public proclamations and an endless stream of tweets.
Indeed, top officials were absent from the Sunday talk shows, and the sole White House official to appear in public on Monday dodged questions on the inquiry.

“I think Trump allies need a much better approach and aggressive approach to what we currently have. We need to be making the argument on TV with legal scholars that impeachment is going nowhere and is just a political act.” — Jason Miller, who served as senior communications adviser on Trump’s 2016 campaign
Jason Miller, who served as senior communications adviser on Trump’s 2016 campaign and worked with outside allies on the response to the Mueller investigation, said allies need to be doing a better job defending the president on the airwaves and painting the impeachment inquiry as nothing but a politically-motivated, losing endeavor.
“I think Trump allies need a much better approach and aggressive approach to what we currently have,” Miller said. “We need to be making the argument on TV with legal scholars that impeachment is going nowhere and is just a political act.”
The president’s aides have ignored document requests and subpoenas, invoked executive privilege — going so far as to argue that the privilege extends to informal presidential advisers who have never held White House jobs — and all but dared Democrats to hold them in contempt.
At the same time, Trump’s campaign, which has reported a fundraising surge since the impeachment inquiry, held a curiously timed briefing call with reporters Monday to trumpet its efforts to overhaul the delegate selection process to ensure there is no drama at the Republican National Convention. Trump campaign officials said the effort had nothing to do with concerns about fending off a primary challenge.

DON'T MISS

Caitlin Clark and Iowa Draw Nearly 5 Million Viewers for Second-Round NCAA Win

DON'T MISS

Canadian School Boards Sue Snapchat, TikTok and Meta for Disrupting Students’ Education

DON'T MISS

California Law Enforcement Agencies Obstruct Transparency Efforts in Use-of-Force Cases

DON'T MISS

No Police Charges for Taylor Swift’s Dad Over Paparazzi Incident in Sydney

DON'T MISS

Biden Administration to Lend $1.5B to Restart Michigan Nuclear Power Plant, a First in the US

DON'T MISS

Tonight’s Biden Fundraiser With Obama and Clinton Already Nets a Record $25 Million

DON'T MISS

Former Sen. Joe Lieberman, Democrats’ VP Pick in 2000, Dead at 82

DON'T MISS

Trump Criticizes Judge and His Daughter After Gag Order in Hush-Money Case

DON'T MISS

Police Had About 90 Seconds to Stop Traffic Before Baltimore Bridge Fell. 6 Workers Are Feared Dead

DON'T MISS

NBC Has Cut Ties With Former RNC Head Ronna McDaniel After Employee Objections, Some on the Air

No data was found

Facebook News Tab Will Soon Be Unavailable as Meta Scales Back News and Political Content

11 hours ago

Stock Market Today: Wall Street Rises to More Records to Close Out Its Latest Winning Month

11 hours ago

A Fresno County First: Kerman Council Passes Amended Gaza Cease-Fire Resolution

11 hours ago

UN Top Court Orders Israel to Open More Land Crossings for Aid into Gaza

11 hours ago

How Involved Is Southern California Consulting Firm in FUSD Executive Dealings?

12 hours ago

Biden’s Fundraiser with Obama and Clinton Nets a Record $25 Million, His Campaign Says

12 hours ago

Fresno Unified’s Self-Protection Racket Is Hurting Our Kids

13 hours ago

Rockin’ Out or Laughing, the Valley Has Its Pick of Weekend Events

13 hours ago

Ex-Correctional Officer at Women’s Prison in California Sentenced for Sexually Abusing Inmates

16 hours ago

Caitlin Clark and Iowa Draw Nearly 5 Million Viewers for Second-Round NCAA Win

16 hours ago

PGA HOPE at Riverside Golf Course Introduces Military Veterans to the Game

PGA HOPE, now underway at Fresno’s Riverside Golf Course, is designed to introduce golf to veterans and active duty military members t...

9 hours ago

PGA HOPE at Fresno's Riverside Golf Course
9 hours ago

PGA HOPE at Riverside Golf Course Introduces Military Veterans to the Game

11 hours ago

Cronenworth’s Big Hit Helps Lift the Padres to a 6-4 Win Over Melvin’s Giants

11 hours ago

Shohei Ohtani Reaches 3 Times in Home Debut as the Dodgers Rout the Cardinals 7-1

11 hours ago

Facebook News Tab Will Soon Be Unavailable as Meta Scales Back News and Political Content

11 hours ago

Stock Market Today: Wall Street Rises to More Records to Close Out Its Latest Winning Month

11 hours ago

A Fresno County First: Kerman Council Passes Amended Gaza Cease-Fire Resolution

11 hours ago

UN Top Court Orders Israel to Open More Land Crossings for Aid into Gaza

12 hours ago

How Involved Is Southern California Consulting Firm in FUSD Executive Dealings?

MENU

CONNECT WITH US

Search

Send this to a friend