This week’s White House Report Card finds President Trump struggling through another controversy of his own making, this time from an insider and whistleblower who reports say alleges that the West Wing pressured Ukraine to investigate the dealings of Joe Biden’s son with that country.
The president has shrugged off the criticism of such a move but added that Biden’s own interference in Ukraine and effort to oust the country’s prosecutor general as vice president should be looked into. “Somebody ought to look into that,” he told reporters Friday.
This is the real and only story! pic.twitter.com/4z8eOcm6PA
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 21, 2019
Conservative grader Jed Babbin called it an up and down week, with the positives being Trump’s move to stop California from setting its own fuel standard and the death of Osama bin Laden’s son. Our other grader, Democratic pollster John Zogby, was on travel this week.
Jed Babbin
Grade C+
It was a week of ups and downs — and a slide sideways — for President Trump with the killing of a key terrorist, his action against California’s ability to set car emission standards, and a late-week controversy over a whistleblower complaint in the intelligence community.
If these reports are true, then there is truly no bottom to President Trump’s willingness to abuse his power and abase our country. pic.twitter.com/PblNGDarXU
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) September 20, 2019
The killing of Osama bin Laden’s son, Hamza, was very good news. He was being groomed to take his father’s place as the head of al Qaeda.
On Iran’s threat, Trump said we were “locked and loaded” to respond to the Iranian drone and cruise missile strike on a major Saudi oil facility but backed down from there. U.S. bases in Qatar and Bahrain are in range of similar Iranian attacks, so the president chose more sanctions over the risks of war. Trump settled for planning to open the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to, if necessary, replace Saudi oil production.
???? Thank you @realDonaldTrump and @FLOTUS for a wonderful evening. https://t.co/QM15sIAlHR
— Scott Morrison (@ScottMorrisonMP) September 21, 2019
Trump’s boast that he had rebuilt the U.S. military and it is stronger than ever is demonstrably untrue. For example, this week the USS Harry S. Truman’s carrier battle group sailed to a new deployment without its centerpiece, the Truman itself. The carrier is undergoing a substantial repair and leaves a gap where it should be.
Attorney General William Barr presented Congress with an administration proposal on gun control, reportedly dealing only with increased background checks. It’s unlikely that anything that doesn’t go much farther will get House support.
GREAT progress on the Border Wall! pic.twitter.com/TvOYxgsBSv
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 19, 2019
And the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence held a closed-door session with the intelligence community’s inspector general on Thursday seeking information on a whistleblower’s complaint that Trump had made some improper communications with the unnamed head of a foreign country. The IG had found the complaint “urgent and credible,” but the administration refused to turn over the complaint to Congress as the law may provide. The Democrats hope this to become more ammunition to impeach Trump, but they’re a long way from there. There will, inevitably, be more leaking out about this matter over the next week. Next week will be very interesting.
Jed Babbin is a Washington Examiner contributor and former deputy undersecretary of defense in the administration of former President George H.W. Bush. Follow him on Twitter @jedbabbin
