Ahead of the public impeachment hearings, House Republicans have put together a memo outlining their defenses of President Trump that center around four points they claim are “fatal” to the allegations that the president tried to pressure Ukraine into investigating his political rivals. In reality, none of them are fatal.
The memo, published by Axios, specifically names the following four points as “fatal”:
“The July 25 call summary — the best evidence of the conversation — shows no conditionality or evidence of pressure,”
“President [Volodymyr] Zelensky and President Trump have both said there was no pressure on the call,”
“The Ukrainian government was not aware of a hold on U.S. security assistance at the time of the July 25 call,”
and “President Trump met with President Zelensky and U.S. security assistance flowed to Ukraine in September 2019 — both of which occurred without Ukraine investigating President Trump’s political rivals.”
In reality, however, none of these are fatal.
— The transcript clearly showed Trump reminding Zelensky of all the support the U.S. gives to Ukraine, before pivoting to two specific asks — investigations into 2016 matters and Joe and Hunter Biden (stemming from the latter’s sweetheart deal with Ukrainian energy firm Burisma). Even so, the call was not the only part of the effort. From texts and testimony, we know that there were additional diplomatic communications with Ukraine in which the message was communicated that if Ukraine wanted a White House visit (and later aid) the government would have to publicly commit to the investigations. We also know that Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who was pushing for the investigations, was also meeting and speaking with representatives of Ukraine.
— The fact that Zelensky said there was no pressure in the call also does not exonerate Trump. To start, as noted above, the call was not the only part of the pressure campaign. But beyond that, of course Zelensky, who is desperate for U.S. help, isn’t going to publicly invite the wrath of a president he has to deal with for more than a year at a minimum and inject himself into U.S. politics by complaining Trump pressured him.
— The Ukrainian government may not have known about the security assistance hold on July 25, but texts and testimony have shown that the Trump administration spent August dangling a White House visit in front of Zelensky to extract a commitment to investigations, and then, in late August, the issue of aid started coming up. In revised testimony, Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union and a major donor who was in contact with Trump, acknowledged that on Sept. 1, he told an aide to Zelensky “that resumption of U.S. aid would likely not occur until Ukraine provided the public anti-corruption statement that we had been discussing for many weeks.” From other evidence, we know that the statement would mention both 2016 and an investigation into Burisma, where Hunter Biden got his sweetheart deal. Either way, the case against Trump does not hinge on whether or not security assistance came up in the July 25 call.
— The fact that in September, Trump met with Zelensky at a United Nations summit in New York and that security assistance was released does not prove anything either. Both events happened after the whistleblower report and after Democrats announced a “wide-ranging investigation into Trump-Giuliani Ukraine Scheme.” If the facts otherwise show that Trump abused power by trying to pressure Ukraine into investigating the Bidens, the fact that he got caught in the middle of his effort and didn’t see it through doesn’t absolve him.
Republicans are clearly trying to latch on to one set of talking points ahead of public hearings that will include damaging testimony, but in terms of substance, these core defenses don’t hold up to much scrutiny.
