The Ukraine Bargain and President Trump's Impeachment Threat
(Baonghean) - Trump is currently accused of illegal behavior when using $400 million in military aid to pressure Ukraine to investigate his political rival in the 2020 White House race, Joe Biden.
45 years after Watergate, 20 years after the Bill Clinton scandal, the impeachment mechanism is once again "revived" in Washington.
Aside from the deep inherent divisions, the Democratic Party's effort to "oust" US President Donald Trump seems to have the potential to "poison" the political life of the United States to a greater extent than previous impeachments in the country's history.
The situation changed in the blink of an eye.
On Monday, Washington got into the swing of things, looking forward to the week's dramatic news that unfolded around their president at the 74th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
But seemingly in the blink of an eye, everything changed quickly for Mr. Trump, the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives and the Republicans in the Senate.
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| The US President answered the press interview on September 26. Photo: AP |
In the coming weeks, the story of the content of Trump's conversations with his Ukrainian counterpart, and whether he broke the law and violated the most basic principles of the Constitution, will be dissected and even distorted in a political "matrix".
But anyway, after a week of leaks, deadlock between Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, shocking revelations, and betting by key power brokers, the truth is beginning to emerge.
Trump is currently accused of illegal behavior when using $400 million in military aid to pressure Ukraine to investigate his political rival in the 2020 White House race, Joe Biden.
It seems that Mr. Trump thinks he can prove his innocence by making public the content of his phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky on September 25.
But it turns out that his move made the situation worse. Although Republicans insist that there was no “quid pro quo,” according to CNN, the document shows that Trump asked Zelensky for “help.”
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| US and Ukraine leaders met on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. Photo: AFP |
In 2016, Mr. Trump was accused of knowingly profiting from Russia’s plan to interfere in the US election. According to the most recent accusations, he has put the name of “election interference” in 2020 on his own hands.
Matters took a significantly darker turn with the release on September 26 of the allegations, which the White House has sought to suppress in an effort to contain what could be the most serious crisis of Mr. Trump’s presidency.
The whistleblower – whose identity remains unknown – has accused President Trump of “using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 US election”.
In a significant twist, the whistleblower also accused the White House of trying to cover up evidence of Trump’s conduct. The report claims officials were asked to retrieve the transcript of the Trump-Zelensky conversation from a classified computer system reserved for the most sensitive national security information.
Roadmap to impeachment
Democrats now believe they have a “roadmap” for impeachment, which Pelosi announced on September 25, after months of trying to stem the tide of liberalism.
Her hesitation may now strengthen Democrats, who can now argue that it was the fresh evidence of wrongdoing, not the disputed facts presented by special counsel Mueller, that forced their hand.
On Thursday, Pelosi assigned Intelligence Committee member Adam Schiff to lead the impeachment inquiry. Schiff's first move was to release the whistleblower's complaint ahead of a hearing with acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire, whom Democrats have accused of obstructing the complaint from reaching Congress.
According to him, the content of this important document will provide a “roadmap” to motivate the committee to conduct interviews with witnesses and request documents related to the case.
For its part, after the initial shock of the sudden turn of events, the White House has now gone on the defensive.
“I want to know who it was, who gave the whistleblower the information? Because that is no different from espionage.”
“We saw many Democrats waste the last two and a half years on baseless accusations and they kept trying to reverse the will of the American people in the recent presidential election.”
So how did the person who was also named in this incident - Vice President under President Obama, Mr. Biden - react? Of course, the veteran politician made statements aimed at the central theme of his election campaign, which is that Mr. Trump is not fit for the Oval Office.
But in all fairness, Trump's assertions that Biden and his son Hunter were corrupt in Ukraine and China - though currently without evidence - are enough to threaten the former US vice president's political future.
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| A crowd supporting the impeachment of Mr. Trump in Washington, USA on September 26. Photo: AP |
In response to Biden's statement at a campaign fundraiser in California that Trump "likes to ask for foreign help to win the election," many people spoke out about the "Trump faction."
For example, Texas congressman Mike Conaway argued that Trump had every right to ask a foreign counterpart to investigate corruption, borrowing the White House's explanation of the phone call with Zelensky: "It is entirely appropriate for a president to ask another president to assist in law enforcement in a case of suspected wrongdoing."
So, after a week of ups and downs, America is facing the reality that the new nightmare of the impeachment of their commander-in-chief seems to have just begun. And its development, although difficult to predict, will have a profound impact on political life, as well as the upcoming important election in the land of the stars and stripes.
