Category Archives: Donald Trump

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Opinion

By RICH LOWRY

October 02, 2019

Rich Lowry is editor of National Review and a contributing editor with Politico Magazine.

After three years, were still on the Russia story.

To be sure, the locus has shifted 500 miles west from Moscow to Kiev, and now we are consumed with the Ukraine controversy rather than the Russia investigation, although its essentially the same thinga battle over President Donald Trumps legitimacy fought out with allegations of foreign interference.

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The effort to widen the Ukraine controversy, from the core itTrumps mention of the Bidens on his call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyto his urging Ukraine, Australia and others to cooperate with William Barrs investigation of the origins of the Russia probe illustrates the point nicely.

Theres nothing wrong or unusual about a U.S. president asking foreign leaders to provide information useful to his attorney general in a duly constituted investigation. Why would there be? Except the presidents detractors dont consider Barrs investigation above-board, in fact consider it another form of Trumps perfidy.

In its report on Trumps call with the Australian prime minister, the New York Times saysin a news report, mind youthat the call shows the president using high-level diplomacy to advance his personal political interests. Trump is pleased with Barrs investigation, and would be even more pleased if it unearthed anything untoward. That doesnt make it merely a pet political project, or mean that there isnt a genuine public interest in knowing in greater detail how and why the Russia story got started.

The Times of London reported of Trumps call to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson that he wanted to gather evidence to undermine the investigation into his campaigns links to Russia. Theres not really anything to undermine, though, since the investigation has been over for months.

Trump is basically being accused of the entirely new offense of obstruction after the fact. There were many novel theories of obstruction advanced during the Mueller probe, but this is the most creative.

The Russia investigation figures into the Ukraine story in another way. Its not clear that even Democrats would consider his Ukraine call impeachable if it werent for their belief that Trump has gotten away with so much previously, as cataloged in the Mueller report. There was already significant backing in the House for impeachment prior to the news of the Ukraine whistleblower complaint, and Judiciary Chair Jerry Nadler already said he was conducting an impeachment inquiry.

Even the framework of the Ukraine matter reflects the Russia story. Trumps critics say he was asking for Ukrainian interference in our elections, when what was really going on was that he and Rudy Giuliani were interfering in Ukrainian politics. They were pushing the Ukrainians to undertake investigations, including, of course, into Joe Bidens actions in the country.

If you accept the premise that any information developed in a foreign country and used in American politics is election interference, then Trumps opponents themselves were masters at leveraging Ukrainian interference during the 2016 election. As POLITICO reported in 2017, Ukrainian government officials helped Clintons allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers.

Giulianis Ukraine adventure was motivated, in large part, by the desire to get to the bottom of this activity in 2016, and turn the tables on Trumps critics. (Instead, he appears to have turned the tables on himself.)

There will be lots of comparisons with the 1990s as the House moves toward impeachment. Yet, the 1790s might be the more apt comparison. Back then, at the outset of the republic, each nascent political party was consumed with the idea that the other was a tool of a foreign power (either France or Britain), and believed that the other was a fundamental threat to American democracy. It made for particularly vitriolic politics.

Today, the Democrats still have not gotten beyond the idea that Trump is somehow a a tool of Russia, while Republicans point to Democratic coordination with shadowy foreign forces to get the Russia investigation rolling. Books fly off the shelves about Trump being an alleged fascist, and Republicans are gripped by a Flight 93 mentality that fears if they lose a presidential election, they will never win another one again.

The Russian story contributed to and fed off this feverish atmosphere. For the longest time, it offered Democrats the hope of deliverance from a president whose election they never truly accepted. When Mueller didnt have the goods, House Democrats were at sea for a while, until Trumps call and the whistleblower complaint brought impeachment deliciously back into play.

Ukraine is more an epilogue of the Russian investigation than the beginning of a new book.

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Trump Is Still Getting Impeached Over Russia - POLITICO

The White House said President Trump's outreach on William Barr's behalf was a legitimate effort to assist the inquiry into the Mueller investigation. USA TODAY

WASHINGTON President Donald Trump has asked multiple countries, including Australia, to helpAttorney General William Barr's ongoing inquiry into the origins of special counsel Robert Mueller's examination of Russian interference in the 2016 election investigation, White House and Justice Department officials said Monday.

Trump has sought the assistance most recentlywithAustralianPrime Minister Scott Morrison on behalf of his attorney general who is leading a politically charged internal inquiry to determine whether U.S. officials abused their authority in the now-concludedRussia investigation.

As the Department of Justice has previously announced, a team led by U.S. Attorney John Durham is investigating the origins of the U.S. counterintelligence probe of the Trump 2016 presidential campaign," Justice spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said. "Mr. Durham is gathering information from numerous sources, including a number of foreign countries. At Attorney General Barrs request, the president has contacted other countries to ask them to introduce the attorney general and Mr. Durham to appropriate officials.

It was not immediately clear how many countries Trump has contacted on Barr's behalf.

The disclosure, first reported by The New York Times, comes as Congress is examining a July 25 telephone call in which Trump pressed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate his political rival Joe Biden.

Whistleblowers have been at time essential and detrimental to a country's democracy, but what makes them different than a leaker? We explain. Just the FAQs, USA TODAY

Barr's role in Ukraine?: Trump inserts AGBarr into political firestorm in call with Ukraine president

During that call, which has prompted a House impeachment inquiry, the president invoked Barr's name, repeatedly indicating that Barr would be calling to assist in reviving a then-dormant inquiry into a Ukrainian energy company, where Biden's son, Hunter Biden, served as a board member.

Neither the former vice president nor his son have been accused of wrongdoing by the Ukrainian government.

Justice officials said Barr had no prior knowledge that Trump had suggested the Ukrainian president work with the attorney general.

Australia, however, played a pivotal role in the FBI's decision to launch the initial investigation into Russia interference in 2016. At the time, Australia's top diplomat in the United Kingdompassed information to U.S. authorities after a meeting with George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser. The diplomat saidPapadopoulosconfided that Russians were offering up damaging information on then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Papadopoulos later served served two weeks in prison for lying to FBI agents about his interactions with a Russian national while working for the Trump campaign. Trump has dismissed Papadopoulos as a low-level campaign aide.

Hewas the first former Trump aide to be sentenced in Mueller'sinvestigation of Moscow's interference operation.

President Donald Trump, right, and Prime Minister of Australia Scott Morrison toast as they speak in the Rose Garden outside the White House for a state dinner in Washington on Sept. 20, 2019.(Photo: ERIK S. LESSER, EPA-EFE)

Papadopoulosadmitted that he lied to the FBIabout interactions in which people he thought were linked to the Russian government described Moscow having thousands of emails containingdamaging information about Hillary Clinton.

An Australian government spokesman Monday acknowledged Trump's recent entreaties.

"The Australian government has always been ready to assist and cooperate with efforts that help shed further light on the matters under investigation," the government said in a written statement. "The (prime minister) confirmed this readiness once again in conversation with the president."

'A nothing call' or abuse of power?: Trump's Ukraine call becomes instant political fodder for Democrats, GOP

'Horrific and chilling': Whistleblower advocates complain as Trump tries to identify source of Ukraine complaint

Earlier this year, Trump appeared to offer a preview of the attorney general's expected efforts to pursue contacts with other governments in the Mueller examination.

"He can look, and I hope he looks at the UK, and I hope he looks at Australia, and I hope he looks at Ukraine," Trump said in a May 24 exchange with reporters on the South Lawn of the White House.

"I hope he looks at everything, because there was a hoax that was perpetrated on our country. It's the greatest hoax in the history of our country, and somebody has to get to the bottom of it."

White House spokesman Hogan Gidley characterized Trump's outreach on Barr's behalf a legitimate effort to assist the inquiry into the Mueller investigation.

Im old enough to remember when Democrats actually wanted to find out what happened in the 2016 election," Gidley said. "The Democrats clearly don't want the truth to come out anymore as it might hurt them politically, but this call relates to a DOJ inquiry publicly announced months ago to uncover exactly what happened. The DOJ simply requested that the resident provide introductions to facilitate that ongoing inquiry, and he did so, that's all."

But Mary McCord, former acting assistant attorney general for Justice's National Security Division, said there are other existing means of seeking introductions to foreign counterparts, including through law enforcement, intelligence and diplomatic channels.

"As the attorney general of the United States, he almost certainly would have his calls returned even without an introduction," McCord said. "I am not surprised that the attorney general is involved in the Durham investigation, as he is the one who directed Durham to conduct the investigation and Durham reports to him.It is more concerning if the president is involved, given his attacks on the FBI and others involved in the Russia investigation, and the potential for him to benefit politically from the investigation."

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President Trump asked Australia, other countries to help AG Barr investigate origins of Mueller inquiry - USA TODAY

Add the word investigate to the list of victims of the war on language. It joins the likes of witch hunt, fake news, and tremendous in the gallery of terms that had a widely understood meaning before the Trump Presidency but have since devolved to mean the opposite of what they used to mean, or nothing at all.

The American dictionaries define investigation as a close study or a systematic inquiry; the British add that it is a quest for truth. Somethingsay, a found objectmay not be immediately understandable and may need to be investigated. Though another thingsuch as a crime or an accidentmay be known to occur, its circumstances may need to be investigated. Something else may be merely a hypothesisthat a condition is contagious, or a remedy is effectiveand also may need to be investigated. The general meaning and purpose of an investigation is to learn more than is already known, and then, it is implied, to act on the results.

Since the story of Donald Trumps telephone conversation with the Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, hit the front pages last week, the meaning of the word investigate has seemed to shift. President Trump repeatedly urged the Ukrainian president to investigate Joe Biden, the lead of a Washington Post story last Thursday read. The call turned into a bid by Mr. Trump to press a Ukrainian leader in need of additional American aid to do us a favor and investigate Democrats, a Times story from the same day read. Trump did not appear to be asking for a systematic study or to learn something he didnt know: he was looking to use the investigation as a cudgel. Indeed, a cudgel is what Trump seems to think an investigation is: his countless tweets and rants about Robert Muellers investigation of Russian interference in the Presidential election told us as much.

This week has brought a new crop of investigation headlines. Trump Pressed Australian Leader to Help Barr Investigate Mueller Inquirys Origins was the title of a Times story. President Donald Trump recently asked the Australian prime minister and other foreign leaders to help Attorney General William Barr with an investigation into the origins of the Russia probe that shadowed his administration for more than two years, the Justice Department said Monday, was the lead of a Post article from Tuesday. An Australian diplomat was an initial source of information about contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives (or, to be more accurate, between two blowhards, one of whom appears to have exaggerated his connection to Russia while the other, George Papadopoulos, oversold his role in the Trump campaign). Because Trump views all investigations as instrumental, he believes that something largeror someone who is after himhad to be behind that early tip. This is why Investigate the investigators has become a slogan of Trumps relection campaign. In countries run by the men Trump most admiresthe Putins, Erdoans, and Dutertes of the worldall investigations have a predetermined outcome. Trump seems to share this world view, which explains his obsession with the people he imagines to be behind an investigation.

As is often the case with Trump, his word usage both amplifies ideas ambient in the culture and takes advantage of gaps in the language. Long before Trump started alleging that any investigation into his actions was the result of a conspiracy aimed at removing him from office, Hillary Clinton said the same thing, in so many words, about investigations into her husbands actions: the great story here, for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it, is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for President, she said, on the Today show, in 1998. Half a decade later, she wrote that she stands by her assessment of the investigation that led to her husbands impeachment. Informed, it seems, in large part by the experience of serving in Congress during the Clinton-impeachment hearings, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has deployed the threat of an investigation as a strategic weaponfollowing the conclusion of the special counsel Robert Muellers investigation, she allowed congressional investigations to proceed, but she resisted calls for an official impeachment inquiry until the Ukraine story broke. The Mueller report enumerated several clear-cut instances of obstruction of justice by Trump; one could argue that an additional investigation, in the sense of a quest for truth, was entirely unnecessary, and this too has served to fog up the meaning of the word investigation. The Times story on Pelosis announcement of the impeachment inquiry uses a form of the word investigate nine times, to mean vastly different things: the Mueller probe, the impeachment proceedings, the process that Trump tried to get Ukraine to carry out, and the ongoing post-Mueller congressional inquiry.

Language, of course, is always evolving. But a word made so flexible that anyone can use it to mean anything is a political problem. It doesnt aid communication across differences; in fact, it hinders it. The word investigation, which is certain to appear ever more frequently in political conversations in the next month, now means resistance at one extreme and digging up dirt at the other. Such a disparity doesnt bode well for words that are or ought to be related to investigation, such as trial, testimony, or truth.

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The Changing Definition of Investigating Donald Trump - The New Yorker

SAN FRANCISCO The Trump administration ratcheted up its feud with California on Wednesday as the Environmental Protection Agency issued a notice accusing San Francisco of violating the federal Clean Water Act.

Last month, President Donald Trump warned of a potential violation notice, saying the city was allowing needles and human waste to go through storm drains to the Pacific Ocean an allegation fervently denied by city officials.

The violation notice came in the form of a letter to Harlan Kelly, Jr., general manager of the citys Public Utilities Commission.

It said the EPA had identified violations in the city and county wastewater treatment and sewer system, including lack of proper operation and maintenance that has allowed raw and partially-treated sewage to flow onto beaches into the ocean and sometimes into streets and homes.

The letter alleged that some discharges contained heavy metals and bacteria and said the city hasnt kept up proper cleaning, inspection and repair schedules for the system nor properly reported or issued public warnings for sewage diversions.

Its the latest salvo in a feud between the administration and Democrat-controlled California, which has filed more than 50 lawsuits opposing Trump initiatives on the environment, immigration and health care.

EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler sent a letter to Gov. Gavin Newsom last week alleging waste left by the homeless in big cities such as San Francisco and Los Angeles was being improperly handled.

Mayor London Breed said the violation notice contains mischaracterizations, inaccuracies and falsehoods and the citys sewer system is one of the most effective in the country.

"No debris flow out into the (San Francisco) Bay or the ocean," Breed said in a statement, adding that San Francisco has a multibillion-dollar program to upgrade its sewage treatment system.

"The same Trump EPA that is dismantling environmental protections around the country is now making fraudulent claims about San Franciscos combined sewer system, state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, said in a statement. He called the notice a fraudulent political attack on San Francisco by a collapsing administration desperate to rile up its base.

The EPA notice contained a veiled warning that it retains the option of seeking fines and penalties through administrative, civil or criminal actions over the violations.

Wheeler's letter to the governor last week didnt lay out any specifics on possible disciplinary actions, although they could include withholding funds or revoking California's authority to administer federal laws such as the Clean Water Act. The latter would seem highly unlikely, however, because EPA would have to assume the expense of running the programs itself.

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EPA follows up on Trump threat, issues violation notice to San Francisco - NBCNews.com

Impeaching a U.S. president might not be the be-all-end-allfor their career. We explain why this is the case. Just the FAQs, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON As the White House sought to convey a semblance of normalcy in the face of a growing crisis Thursday, President Donald Trump again attacked a new impeachment inquiry as a"disgrace" and a "terrible thing for our country."

It shouldnt be allowed there should be a way of stopping it,maybe legally through the courts,"Trump said as he returned to Washington after a week of activities with the United Nations in New York.

The whistleblower's complaint that sparked an impeachment inquiry into President Trump has been released. USA TODAY

Trump and his aides moved into communication overdrive in response to the threat of impeachment. They seekto counter the newly released complaint from an unidentified whistleblower andclaims that Trump improperly pressured Ukraine's president to investigate Democratic political rival Joe Biden.

After a high-profile House Intelligence Committee hearing on the whistleblower's allegations, Trump attacked the committee chairman, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and his colleagues.

"Here we go again," Trump said. "It's Adam Schiff and his crew making up stories and sitting there like pious, whatever you want to call them."

Schiff mocked the complaints:Im always flattered when Im attacked by someone of the presidents character."

As some White House aides tried to move the conversation back to other issues, Trump operating as his own communicationdirector hammered Democrats, the whistleblower and the media.

Some of his aides, privately,expressed anxiety about the furor.While televisions throughout the West Wing were tuned to the House Intelligence Committee hearing, they said they tryto stay focused on doing their jobs, part of which involves defending the president.

In statements and emails throughout the day, atthe White House and within Trump's reelection campaign, aides argued that the complaint doesn't go much beyond what wasn't already known.Butthe whistleblower'sreport alleged Ukraine officials were aware that Trump wanted to discuss the issue before the July 25 call at the center of the controversy and said aides tried to "lock down" notes from Trump's call to Ukraine.

President Donald Trump accuses the news media of blowing up a "nothing" call.(Photo: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)

Nothing has changed with the release of this complaint, which is nothing more than a collection of third-hand accounts of events and cobbled-together press clippings all of which show nothing improper,"White House spokeswomanStephanie Grisham said in a statement less than a half-hour after the whistleblower document was released.

Some White House aides expressed frustration that reporters were focused on Ukraine and impeachment rather than the economy and immigration.

"I know theres a big hullabaloo, White House economic adviserLarry Kudlow said as he faced a litany of questions about theimpeachment inquiry. I dont see anything.

Trump declined to take questions throughout the day. White House reporters were summoned to the South Lawn for an unscheduled event Thursday evening that turned out to be a photo-op with the president and law enforcement officials.The officers broke out into applause and chants of "U-S-A" asTrump waved to reporters, who shouted unanswered questions about the whistleblower.

Later,administration officials announced the U.S. will dramatically reduce the number of refugees allowed to resettle in the country next year permitting no more than 18,000peoplefleeing war, violence and persecution.

And Trump's campaign announced a rally in Minneapolis next month.

Refugees: Trump sets lowest cap ever on refugees

'I thought it was dead': Trump says he thought threat ended with Mueller report

Grisham and other aidesstressed that the whistlebloweracknowledged he did not witness most of the events described, relying on statements from unidentified White House officials.

Aides noted that Trump released a summary of thephone call between him and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

The whistleblower complaint provides moredetails of Trump's interactions with the Ukrainianleaderand suggests that Trump and aides tried to cover up his pushfora foreign country to investigate a rival before the 2020 election by storing the notes of the call in a separate computer system reserved for highly sensitive material.

The whistleblower said some administration officials expressed concern that Trump "used the power of his office" to benefit himselfand his reelection campaign.

Some officials were "deeply disturbed" by Trump's actions and discussed how to treat details of the call because they feared "they had witnessed the president abuse his office for personal gain," the whistleblower said.

President Donald Trump says there was nothing improper in his discussions with Ukraine's president.(Photo: SAUL LOEB, AFP/Getty Images)

Team Trump pushed back on these contentions in a variety of ways, including bombarding reporters and voters with emails, commentsand social media postings.

"The president released the full transcript of his phone call yesterday. It showed nothing inappropriate, despite false media reports to the contrary," tweeted Matt Wolking, deputy director of communicationfor rapid response with Trump's reelection campaign.

In addition to his brief remarks to reporters,Trump used his standard method of communication: Twitter.

Though not directly addressing the whistleblower's claims, Trump sent out a string of tweets and retweets defending himself and denouncing the impeachment drive.

He wrote,"THE DEMOCRATS ARE TRYING TO DESTROY THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND ALL THAT IT STANDS FOR. STICK TOGETHER, PLAY THEIR GAME, AND FIGHT HARD REPUBLICANS. OUR COUNTRY IS AT STAKE!"

At Joint Base Andrews after returning from New York, Trump said the phone call to Ukraine "was perfect," and "the president yesterday of Ukraine said there was no pressure put on him whatsoever, none whatsoever."

Skeptics said Trump and his communicationteam have their work cut out for them.

"They are just going after the process and the messenger," said Mimi Rocah, a former federal prosecutor in New York. "Because if the message in the complaint is accurate and everything suggests it is, including the White House call summaryits devastating."

Trump and other administration officials sought to project the idea of business as usual, from presidential fundraisers in New York to an immigration briefing at the White House though Trump said Democrats are getting in the way.

"They're going to tie up our country," he said. "We can't talk about gun regulation. We can't talk about anything, because frankly they're so tied up."

As Washington was glued to the testimony of acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire, the White House trotted out nearly a dozen federal and local law enforcement and immigration officials to discuss a favorite topic: immigration and so-called sanctuary city policies.

Flanked by county sheriffs, acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Matthew Albence blasted cities and counties that ignore federal requests to hold in jail immigrants in the country illegally.

Trump and other Republicans pointed to crimes committed by immigrants released by cities. The federal requests are the subject of litigation, and leaders of sanctuary jurisdictions noted their power to hold a person in jail for a civil immigration violation is murky.

Its time to publicly call out those who would put politics over public safety, Albence told a sparsely populated briefing room in the White House.

Albence dismissed questions about the timing of the news conference, given the other news story consuming Washington.

We started planning this several weeks ago, he said.

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Donald Trump's wary White House deals with the threat of impeachment - USA TODAY

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

By Dan Alexander and Chase Peterson-Withorn

After months of scouring property records, inspecting financial disclosures and interviewing 62 of the presidents colleagues, partners and industry observers, Forbes estimates that Donald Trump is still worth $3.1 billion. Its the second straight year the presidents fortune has remained flat on our annual ranking of Americas 400 wealthiest people, even as many of Trumps billionaire peers have gotten richer.

He is now the 275th-richest person in America, by our count. Thats 16 spots lower than where he ranked a year ago and 119 places lower than where we had him before he became president.

Not that Trumps fortune is static. His branding businesses, for instance, are in steep decline. Real estate developers are no longer signing up to put the Trump name on their properties, and existing customers have scraped the brand from projects in places like Toronto and Panama. Forbes estimates that Trumps real estate licensing business, which is further limited by his pledge not to do foreign deals while in office, is worth about $80 million today, down from $170 million a year ago. Meanwhile, the value of the presidents product licensing operationwhich earns money by putting the Trump name on goods such as shirts, ties and mattressesis approaching zero. In 2016, before Trump became president, it was worth an estimated $14 million.

Luckily for Trump, not everything he owns has his name on it. The value of his 30% stake in two nondescript office towers managed by billionaire Steven Roths publicly traded Vornado Realty Trust continues to soar. His share of those properties, 1290 Avenue of the Americas in Manhattan and 555 California Street in San Francisco, are worth a combined $928 millionup $77 million from a year agothanks to timely renovations and strong markets for office space. The two buildings, which Trump did not want in the first place, remain his two most valuable holdings.

Trumps Washington, D.C., hotel also continues to be a bright spot in his portfolio. Popular with Trump fans and those apparently looking to curry favor with his administration, the hotel had a slight 1% uptick in revenue last year, despite a sluggish local hotel market. That helped push the value of the presidents 77.5% stake in the property up by an estimated $11 million.

Things appear to be leveling off in Miami, where the Trump National Doral golf resort had been bleeding business, particularly from the customers traveling down from the liberal-leaning northeast. Revenues fell an estimated 26% from 2015 to 2017 but rose by 1.5% last year, helping lift the value of the resort by nearly $20 million. Forbes also nudged up the value of the presidents Mar-a-Lago club by $10 million, after a pair of nearby properties sold for record prices.

In addition, the president added an estimated $10 million to his cash pile last year, the result of his sons un-Trumpian strategy of conservatively managing their fathers fortune while hes in office. Eric and Don Jr. have sold more than $100 million of Trumps real estate portfolio since his inauguration, through more than 100 tiny transactions that have mostly flown under the radar. Last year, they sold real estate in Manhattan, Chicago, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and the Dominican Republicbrushing away potential ethics concerns as they paid down debt.

At $3.1 billion, Trump is the richest person running for president in 2020. His only billionaire challenger, hedge fund tycoon Tom Steyer, did not make the $2.1 billion cutoff for The Forbes 400 list. Steyers estimated $1.6 billion fortune makes him eight times wealthier than fellow candidate John Delaney but barely half as rich as Donald Trump.

See the full breakdown of the presidents fortune here.

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Donald Trump Falls Another 16 Spots On The Forbes 400 List - Forbes

Shortly after eight on Monday morning, the President of the United States, making maximal use of his executive time, wielded his smartphone to issue a legal threat against the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. It is worth reading the missive from @realDonaldTrump in full:

Rep. Adam Schiff illegally made up a FAKE & terrible statement, pretended it to be mine as the most important part of my call to the Ukrainian President, and read it aloud to Congress and the American people. It bore NO relationship to what I said on the call. Arrest for Treason?

Were the collective nerve endings of the electorate not so frayed and numbed by now, we might be even more alive to the ugliness of this message from the White House. One of the consequences of the Trump Presidency is the way that it constantly diminishes our expectations of anything other than hideous rhetoric and action. But there are those who are intensely aware of the potential consequences of such a threat. Sources close to Schiff told The New Yorker on Monday that Democrats in Congress are deeply worried about the President using Twitter to incite violence and to direct it at specific members.

The threat to Schiff via Twitter came just a few days after the President, speaking at the United States Mission to the United Nations, said that whoever provided information to the whistle-blower about his July 25th telephone call with the President of Ukraine was close to a spy. Trump went on to wax nostalgic about how spies were dealt with in the old dayswith the death penalty, in other words. As soon as I heard that, I thought, He has the soul and the mind of an authoritarian, Nicholas Burns, a former high-ranking diplomat who has served in Republican and Democratic Administrations, told me. What other President in American history would say that?

The offhanded encouragement of vengeance, even violence, is hardly new or unusual for Trump. Some selections from the anthology of incitement:

If you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of them, would ya? he told the crowd at a February, 2016, rally in Iowa. I promise you, I will pay the legal fees.

In the good old days, theyd rip him out of that seat so fast. But, today, everybodys politically correct, Trump said at a rally in Oklahoma. Our countrys going to Hell with being politically correct.

In Wilmington, North Carolina, Trump issued a winking endorsement of violence against his opponent, Hillary Clinton, who, he said, might go so far as to appoint judges who favor gun-control laws. If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks, Trump said. Although the Second Amendment peoplemaybe there is, I dont know.

More than three years later, Trump has intensified the search into his singular obsession: Hillary Clintons e-mails. Details seem to emerge almost hourly about the extent of his corruption and subterfuge. On Monday, the Times reported that Trump behaved with the Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, much as he had with the Ukrainian leader, pressing Morrison in a recent telephone call to assist Attorney General William Barr and the Justice Department in an attempt to undermine the findings of the Mueller report. The Washington Post then added to the miserable picture, reporting that Barr had held private meetings overseas with various foreign-intelligence officials to get them to investigate and ultimately help to discredit the findings of the C.I.A. and other U.S. intelligence agencies about Russian interference in the last Presidential election.

The onset of an impeachment inquiry in the House of Representativesan initiative that is gathering increasing public support during an election seasonis sure to elicit more, and increasingly lurid, threats of retribution from the President. As a result, anxiety throughout the federal government has deepened. This is a time of real fear inside the State Department, Burns, a former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, told me. Diplomats throughout the foreign service became particularly concerned when, in May, the Administration recalled the Ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch. Widely considered a deeply knowledgeable, experienced, and nonpartisan diplomat, Yovanovitch had wound up on the wrong side of the Trump circle, including Rudolph Giuliani and Donald Trump, Jr., who referred to her on Twitter as a joker. According to the government account of his call with the Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump said ominously that Yovanovitch was going to go through some things.

Burns, who is now an informal and unpaid adviser to Joe Biden on foreign-policy issues, told me that Trumps disregard of democratic norms has reached such a point of crisis that the floodgates are now going to open, and people inside the White House and the federal government may now come forward to the inspector generals inside the system. This President has overturned much of what has made us great. And that, I think, is appalling to career people.

Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, told me that the Administration is propagating a long-held conspiracy theory to justify its behavior. My understanding is that Trump, Giuliani, and others in the Administration believe that there is a deep-state conspiracy in the State Department against the President and that Masha Yovanovitch was part of this. Her recall from Kiev, he said, was a consequence of that conspiracy theory.

The Deep State conspiracy theory is hardly confined to the West Wing, Murphy went on: I hear this, too, from my Republican Senate colleagues. There is a belief that there is a group in every corner of the government that is out to get Trump. There really are morally centered people who find him deeply distasteful, and it is required of them to raise questions of corruption if they see it. The Trump Administration sees that as a conspiracy.

Murphy is hardly revealing a deeply held Republican secret. On Fox News, Stephen Miller, Trumps senior policy adviser, told Chris Wallace that the whistle-blower was a deep-state operative, pure and simple. The whistle-blowers report, he added, was little more than a seven-page Nancy Drew novel.

Wallace pushed back against these talking points, calling Millers answers obfuscation. Then Wallace played a video of Joseph Maguire, the acting director of National Intelligence, testifying before the House Intelligence Committee last week that the whistle-blower and the inspector general who brought the report forward had acted by the book and followed the law.

Among the most pressing questions being discussed now in Washington is how long Republican members of Congress and former White House officials will continue to show fealty to Trump. I am still stunned that Republicans are circling the wagons in the way that they are, Murphy said. They may just decide to ride this out. It may be that they are so entwined around the President, they are so stuck to him with Super Glue, that they can never come unbound.

The testimony of the whistle-blower could be a dramatic chapter in this unfolding drama. But who else might come forward to testify? One person might be Yovanovitch, who has so far steered clear of speaking publicly about her dismal, and deeply unjust, fate at the hands of the Administration. Others might include Kurt Volker, who just resigned his post as special representative for Ukraine; lawyers in the White House counsels office; and other high-ranking officialsincluding former Cabinet secretaries, national-security advisers, and chiefs of staffwho may finally see no point in reserving their soured descriptions of Trump for deep-background sessions with reporters and authors. They may soon decide it is time to speak in their own names, for the sake of history, decency, and their reputations. And finally: What level of perfidy in the White House, what permutation of public opinion, will it take before Mitch McConnell decides he can no longer continue his cynical marriage to Trump?

It can be assumed that the President will go on using the weapons he learned at the feet of Roy Cohn: constant attack, ruthless threats, the shameless propagation of conspiracy theories. John Dean, whose testimony helped to tip the scales against Richard Nixon in the Watergate affair, told me that the character of Donald Trump insures that this story could get far uglier than it already is.

Even Nixon would be offended by this effort to use foreign assistance for a very personal, political reason, which is a very corrupting undertaking, Dean said. I dont think Trump has any morals or shame. He will do anything to get relected before.... Its just the way Trump thinks. He doesnt care. He will destroy anybody. I find him a deeply troubling character. When he first went in, I worried that his ignorance would get us in trouble. Now its his disposition that I find most troubling of all.

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The Floodgates Open on Trump - The New Yorker

President Donald Trump is one of the most controversial world leaders in modern times, igniting the ire of Americas staunchest allies.

Whether its the proposed Muslim ban, the US border wall and immigration, or his praise of authoritarian leaders, Trump is deft at inciting deep divisions among the public.

In 2018, political scientist Daniel Drezner summarized this consensus in The Washington Post: The world hates President Trump.

Data from the Pew Research Center illustrates Drezners thinking. For the residents of US allies, their confidence in the US president dropped substantially from the last year of Obamas presidency to the beginning of Trumps time in office.

So, where might Trump be popular overseas, and just where might he be electable? As a political scientist who has written about the US image abroad, this question fascinates me.

Most of the world might hate Trump, but in some places, based largely on his policies, there is hope and even admiration.

In 2016 and 2017, Gallup asked respondents in more than 100 countries, Do you approve or disapprove of the job performance of the leadership of the United States? In 29 countries, Trump outdid Obama in terms of job performance.

When I look at these countries and compare them with data from Freedom House on which countries are democracies and nondemocracies, a pattern emerges. Trump is more popular than Obama among people in authoritarian nations.

Among regions around the world that seem to feel the most pro-Trump, Africa stands out.

In January 2018, The Washington Post reported that Trump derided immigrants coming from Haiti, El Salvador, and African countries. Trump said, Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here? He added, We need more people from Norway.

The African Union issued an immediate response: Given the historical reality of how many Africans arrived in the United States as slaves, this statement flies in the face of all accepted behavior and practice.

Nigerias response, however, was more tepid. A few months later, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari was the first head of state from sub-Saharan Africa to visit the White House. When pressed on the matter of Trumps remarks at a joint press conference, Buhari remarked, Im not sure about, you know, the validity or whether that allegation against the president was true or not, adding, So, the best thing for me is to keep quiet.

What could explain this turn of events? One explanation may be that Nigerians like Trump. According to data from the Pew Research Center, Nigerian confidence in Trump to do the right thing regarding world affairs was at 59% in 2018, higher than some points during the Obama administration.

Data on Trumps total followers on Twitter may also shed some light. As of this writing, among those active Twitter accounts that follow Trump, those based in Nigeria rank in the top five. But this is notwithstanding the fact that more and more Twitter accounts are hacked and sometimes controlled by bots.

Some of Trumps foreign policies in Nigeria might explain his relative popularity. In February 2017, President Trump approved the sale of jet fighters to the Nigerian government, reversing a policy from the Obama administration. This aided the Nigerian government in its campaign against Boko Haram.

South Korea is another country where the public is warming to Trumps approachparticularly with North Korea.

Trump has made it a major priority of his administration to develop a personal relationship with North Koreas reclusive leader, Kim Jong Un. To date, Trump has had three face-to-face meetings with Kim.

Until Trump, a sitting American president had never visited with a North Korean head of state while in office. Prior to Trumps tenure, the highest-level visit between these two countries ever was former President Bill Clintons trip to Pyongyang in 2009.

Although Trump is still far from being beloved among South Koreans, they see his meetings with Kim as a good thing overall for the Korean peninsula. Confidence in Trump has risen, from 17% in 2017 to 44% in 2018 among people in South Korea.

And data from Gallups Korean headquarters illustrate that favorability toward Trump among South Koreans has more than doubled, from a paltry 9% in 2017 to a high of 32% in 2018.

Part of the reason for Trumps relative success with North Korea to date is South Koreas concurrent interest in fostering more high-profile diplomatic talks between Washington and Pyongyang.

If theres one place in the world where Trumps policies seem to be enjoying the most public support, it would be Israel.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu strongly praised Trumps withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal in May 2018.

That same month, after Trump pledged to move the capital of Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, Netanyahu compared Trump to King Cyrus the Great, from 2,500 years ago, who proclaimed that the Jewish exiles in Babylon could come back and rebuild our Temple in Jerusalem.

As in the case of Nigeria and South Korea, Trumps popularity in Israel seems to be a reversal of his predecessor. Frosty personal relations plagued Obama and Netanyahu, beginning with Obamas first major foreign policy address to the Arab world in Cairo in 2009. This culminated in Netanyahus visit to Congress in 2015, when he urged Congress to oppose the Iran nuclear agreement.

In 2016, prior to the rise of Trump, Israelis ranked Obama as the worst US president for Israel in the last 30 years.

Trump, in the meantime, has surpassed Obama and is far more beloved in Israel. In July 2018, a poll found that since the election of Donald Trump, 53% of Israelis felt US standing in the world had gotten stronger, compared to just 14% who felt it had stayed the same, and 21% who felt it was weakened.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Why Donald Trump is popular in Nigeria, Israel, and South Korea - Quartz

Ukraines President Volodymyr Zelenskiy listens during a bilateral meeting with President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the 74th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City, September 25, 2019. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)Theres no longer any difference between Twitter Trump and the man himself and his advisers may not be able to save him from his worst instincts.

Yesterday and again this morning, the president of the United States tweeted that Representative Adam Schiff should be questioned for treason and possibly arrested. He also approvingly quoted an absurd statement from an increasingly unhinged Trumpist pastor named Robert Jeffress that threatened a Civil War like fracture (led by Evangelicals!) if he is impeached and removed.

Given the lack of serious grounds on which to defend these statements, Trumps apologists fell back to the claim that they were just tweets, and that we should instead always focus on his actions. If he doesnt actually attempt to have Schiff arrested, they said, then we need to stop our pearl-clutching, and if he doesnt actually attempt to start a civil war, then all were dealing with is a metaphor no worse than the war rhetoric we see all the time in politics and public controversies.

These arguments dont hold water. One of the reasons why the Ukraine scandal is starting to have legs is that it demonstrates that the Trump you see on Twitter is not some virtual persona distinct from the man himself; they are one and the same. There is no just Twitter. There is just Trump, and Trump can and will operationalize his vendettas and conspiracy theories, including by running unofficial diplomatic operations through his personal legal team. He can and will break through the safeguards erected around him, even in matters of grave national importance.

We know from Twitter and other public statements that Trump obsesses over various conspiracy theories, especially when they have the potential to magnify his 2016 victory. He has repeatedly claimed that millions and millions of people (including illegal aliens) voted unlawfully for Hillary Clinton, and time and again expressed doubts that Russia interfered in the 2016 election. This, above and beyond the evidence of a quid pro quo and the calls for a dependent, desperate foreign nation to investigate a domestic political opponent based on mischaracterized facts, is what makes the summary of Trumps call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky so jolting: Trump was attempting to enlist a foreign leader in the private investigation, led by his personal counsel, of a debunked conspiracy theory.

In fact, his commitment to this absurd theory is so complete that he apparently tossed aside his advisers repeated warnings that it had been debunked and allowed it to taint American diplomacy. This weekend, former Trump homeland-security adviser Thomas Bossert spoke on the record to ABC News and the New York Times and noted that members of the administration had repeatedly tried to convince Trump that there was nothing to the notion that a Crowdstrike server in Ukraine held the key to questioning the reality of Russian election interference.

In my initial post about the conversation with Zelensky, I gave Trump a pass for his request for assistance in investigating 2016 election interference. I did so because it is, in theory, entirely proper to ask for foreign help in tracking down any valid leads that could help determine if another nation or an American engaged in inappropriate or unlawful conduct to influence the outcome of an American presidential election. But Trumps actual ask was tainted by his conspiratorial obsessions.

Think of Zelenskys position. His nation desperately needs American military assistance, and so he makes a direct ask for a key weapons system. Trump responds not with a reasonable request but rather with a question about a conspiracy theory, and then he urges Zelensky to work not just with the proper conduit for investigations of election interference, Attorney General Bill Barr, but also with his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani the same man who Bossert said would feed him all kinds of garbage, including that conspiracy theory.

Trump was thus placing immense pressure on the government of Ukraine to validate a thoroughly debunked theory, and in so doing to place an even greater strain on American politics. And from Ukraines perspective, obtaining access to a supply of American weapons that can deter further Russian aggression might well have been worth (in the short term, at least) the cost of sowing political chaos in the United States. Could any reasonable person trust a pro-Trump Ukrainian investigation when Ukrainian lives and territorial integrity were on the line?

Indeed, the entire sordid affair demonstrates how ultimately even Trumps most loyal aides cant always prevent him from abusing the vast powers of his office. Trumps first term has been marked by repeated moments when presidential friends or advisers either ignored or slow-walked his most problematic commands. As the Mueller Report indicates, Don McGahns defiance and Corey Lewandowskis delays in carrying out presidential edicts may well have saved Trumps presidency once already. But here a determined Trump used his own counsel to conduct his own diplomatic initiative according to the dictates of a conspiracy-obsessed mind.

Americans have always paid close attention to their presidents words for a simple and profound reason: Words convey beliefs and intentions. For four years, Trumps defenders have persuaded tens of millions of Americans that his words matter less than the words of other presidents, that there exists some kind of unbreachable firewall between bad tweets and bad acts. The Ukraine scandal shows that this is not true. Trump is like any other president in one key respect: His words matter, and when, as is so often the case, theyre irresponsible, irresponsible actions can and will follow.

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The Ukraine Scandal Shows That the Safeguards around Donald Trump Are Breaking Down - National Review

President Donald Trump is embroiled in a major scandal that stretches from Ukraine to Australia all stemming from his belief in long-debunked right-wing conspiracy theories.

Last week, the White House released a readout of a phone call showing the president pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to look into a missing computer server belonging to Democrats that Trump believes is in Ukraine and contains incriminating information about the origins of 2016 election meddling.

The problem is there is no missing physical server; theres no actual reason to suspect Ukraine would have such a server in the first place; and theres no evidence Ukraine interfered in the 2016 vote at all.

This idea stems from a conspiracy theory that has circulated in right-wing media for several years and has been thoroughly debunked. Yet Trump believes it all the same enough that he felt the need to rope a foreign leader into investigating it.

But new reporting this week reveals that this is not the only wacky right-wing internet conspiracy theory that Trump has latched on to and tried to enlist foreign help to investigate.

We now know that a collection of these conspiracy theories has driven Trump to reach out to the governments of Australia, the United Kingdom, and Italy.

Which brings us to an unsettling conclusion: Trumps discussions with foreign leaders a major part of how the US uses its power and conducts foreign policy are steeped in conspiracy theories and other untruths.

In Trumps July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump cryptically asked about a computer server in Ukraine and mentioned the American cybersecurity company CrowdStrike.

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, Trump said.

Trump was referring to a debunked conspiracy theory: Ukraine not Russia interfered in the 2016 election, and CrowdStrike covered it up. Its a belief he continues to hold even though his top aides have repeatedly told him the theory had been debunked.

CrowdStrike was hired by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in 2016 to look into who hacked into their networks during the election. The firm determined that it was two Russian groups with Kremlin ties.

Case closed, right? Not exactly.

Trump seems to believe and has often mentioned that a mysterious DNC server with the real information on it has gone missing, and that CrowdStrike (and the FBI) is somehow involved in its disappearance. He brought the issue up during his Helsinki meeting alongside Putin.

You have groups that are wondering why the FBI never took the server, the president said during the July 2018 press conference. Where is the server? I want to know, where is the server and what is the server saying?

But heres the problem: There is actually no missing physical server associated with the DNC breach to speak of. Instead, the roughly 140 servers most of them cloud-based are already out of use.

Whats more, Trump seems to believe CrowdStrike is a Ukrainian company, not an American one. In a 2017 interview with the Associated Press, for example, Trump said CrowdStrike was Ukraine-based even though its headquarters are in California. I heard its owned by a very rich Ukrainian, thats what I heard, he continued.

Thats incorrect. The companys cofounder, the Russian-born US citizen Dmitri Alperovitch, is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington, which receives funding from Ukrainian oligarch Victor Pinchuk. But that flimsy connection is a far cry from the firm he started being secretly run by an Eastern European billionaire. (Before coming to Vox I worked at the Atlantic Council and interacted with Alperovitch on a few cybersecurity-related events and projects.)

CrowdStrike denies any wrongdoing in a statement to reporters issued last week: With regards to our investigation of the DNC hack in 2016, we provided all forensic evidence and analysis to the FBI. As weve stated before, we stand by our findings and conclusions that have been fully supported by the US intelligence community.

Its still unclear just where Trump got this idea in his head, but its ingrained enough that he mentioned it on a call with Ukraines president.

Trumps belief in a deep state conspiracy that led to the investigation into his campaigns ties with Russia also seems to have led him to bring up the topic with Scott Morrison, Australias prime minister.

Heres the reality of what happened: The FBI launched a counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaigns contacts with Russian agents in July 2016. That investigation was opened after Australias top diplomat in Britain, Alexander Downer, informed his American counterparts about a conversation hed had two months earlier with George Papadopoulos, then a foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign.

During a night of heavy drinking in London, Papadopoulos bragged to Downer about his knowledge that Russia had political dirt on Hillary Clinton in the form of thousands of emails that would embarrass Mrs. Clinton, apparently stolen in an effort to try to damage her campaign, as the New York Times put it in a December 2017 report.

However, Papadopoulos has alleged that Downer, the Australian diplomat in the UK, was spying on him a belief echoed in many right-wing circles. Many Fox News personalities have pushed the (unproven) idea that the Obama administration sent Downer to keep tabs on the Trump campaign and help Hillary Clinton win the election.

Trump now seems to believe this, too.

Australia, for its part, seems open to working with Washington on Trumps request. The Australian Government has always been ready to assist and cooperate with efforts that help shed further light on the matters under investigation, the government said in a Monday statement. The [prime minister] confirmed this readiness once again in conversation with the President.

Papadopoulos has claimed he was also spied on by a London-based Maltese professor named Josef Mifsud who was working on behalf of the Democrats.

Heres why: On April 26, 2016, Papadopoulos heard a bombshell from Mifsud. Mifsud had just returned from meeting with top Russian officials in Moscow, he said, where hed learned that the Russians had dirt on Clinton. Papadopoulos later told the FBI that Mifsud specifically said Russia had thousands of emails.

The timing of the Papadopoulos-Mifsud meeting is crucial because there was zero public indication that Russia had hacked top Democrats emails at that point. News of the DNC hack wouldnt become public until June of that year, and the hack of Clinton campaign chair John Podestas emails wouldnt leak until October.

(However, Papadopoulos says Mifsud was referring to Hillary Clintons own emails, which were never actually leaked, unless you count those she sent to Podesta.)

Mifsud clearly has ties to Italy, as he was found by reporters at the University of Rome shortly after his meeting with the former Trump aide came to light. I never got any money from the Russians: my conscience is clear, he told Italys La Repubblica newspaper in late 2017. I am not a secret agent.

Thats not how Mueller sees it. In his report, the special counsel noted that Mifsud had connections to Russia and maintained various Russian contacts, including ties to someone who worked with the Kremlin-linked hacking group that infiltrated the DNCs networks.

That hasnt dissuaded Trumps allies who allege Mifsud was a British, Italian, or American intelligence plant sent to speak with Papadopoulos.

Its therefore likely that Attorney General Bill Barrs recent trip to Italy is at least in part an effort to divine how Mifsud got the meeting with Papadopoulos and if the professor is somehow tied to Italian intelligence.

So far, though, theres zero evidence to back up that belief.

Barr also reportedly spoke to British officials recently to inquire about the origins of the Mueller probe. There are two probable reasons why.

First, Trump and his allies have tried to muddy the waters about the origins of the Russia investigation by insisting it actually started with the Steele dossier, an unverified opposition research document compiled by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer. That document includes numerous claims (most of which are still unverified) about Trump-Russian collusion.

Fox News has helped Trump normalize the lie that the Steele dossier is what really sparked the FBI investigation, and Trump backers have continued to push it on TV and elsewhere. But, again, that is not true: the FBI probe was prompted by the Australian diplomats revelations about Papadopolouss sketchy Russia comments.

Its therefore likely that Barr reached out to British intelligence officials to find out more about Steele, particularly to see if his dossier was meant as a Democratic-inspired hit job. (Narrator: it wasnt.)

Second, Trump has promoted a right-wing conspiracy theory that British intelligence helped the Obama administration spy on Trumps presidential campaign. That conspiracy was promoted by former CIA analyst Larry Johnson, whos been known to spread false stories before (such as claiming he has a video of former First Lady Michelle Obama using a slur to disparage white people).

The odd thing about this is that both US and British intelligence officials have denied this persistent narrative for years. As we have previously stated, the allegations that [British intelligence] was asked to conduct wire tapping against the then President Elect are nonsense, reads a UK government statement from April released after Trumps tweet.

In 2017, then-White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer mentioned the conspiracy during a briefing, only to see the White House backtrack from the claim. Even Fox News, which initially ran with the story, has stopped using that talking point.

It therefore doesnt seem like theres much for Barr to actually uncover in the UK. But that clearly hasnt stopped him from trying.

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Ukraine, Australia, Italy, and UK feature in Trump-backed conspiracies - Vox.com