Transcript details call between Trump, Ukraine’s president
UNITED NATIONS — President Donald Trump asked newly elected Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden during a July 25 phone call between the two leaders, according to a rough transcript released Wednesday by the White House.
The conversation occurred after Trump had suspended millions in military aid to the beleaguered nation — which prompted critics to charge that Trump was using military aid to leverage a quid pro quo against a 2020 campaign rival.
“The call summary clearly shows that President Trump asked the leader of a foreign government to interfere in our election,” said Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev. “This profoundly un-American and lawless action demands an impeachment inquiry.”
News reports of a whistleblower complaint about the conversation between the two leaders led House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to announce Tuesday that the House would conduct a formal impeachment inquiry.
Wednesday after blocking the release of the whistleblower complaint, the administration forwarded the document to Congress and posted it on Twitter.
Zelenskiy: ‘Nobody pushed me’
Also Wednesday, while in town for the U.N. General Assembly, Trump met with Zelenskiy, and the two leaders took questions from the media. When a reporter asked the Ukraine president if he felt any pressure from Trump to investigate Biden and his son Hunter, Zelenskiy responded, “I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be involved” in U.S. elections.
Then he added it was a “good phone call” and “nobody pushed me.”
“In other words,” Trump interjected, “no pressure.”
Trump eventually released the funds on Sept. 11.
Trump had resisted Democrats’ calls to release the rough transcript as he attended meetings in Turtle Bay. But then Tuesday afternoon Trump tweeted that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had obtained Zelenskiy’s permission to release the transcript.
Trump asks about Bidens
According to the document, based on the notes of Situation Room duty officers and National Security Council staff who monitored the call, Trump asked Zelenskiy to look into Joe Biden’s claim that he got a Ukraine prosecutor fired by threatening to withold a $1 billion loan guarantee.
“There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution, and a lot of people want to find out about that,” Trump told Zelenskiy in July.
“Among those who had a stake in the outcome was Hunter Biden, Mr. Biden’s younger son, who at the time was on the board of an energy company owned by a Ukrainian oligarch who had been in the sights of the fired prosecutor general,” the New York Times reported in May.
In a statement after the transcript’s release, Pelosi maintained, “It is not part of his job to use taxpayer money to shake down other countries for the benefit of his campaign. Either the president does not know the weight of his words, or he does not care about ethics or his constitutional responsibilities.”
At a news conference after the close of the United Nations confab, Trump refused to admit wrongdoing as he scolded the media for scant reporting on a trade deal with Japan and his many meetings with foreign leaders “because you waste your time on nonsense.”
Trump: ‘It’s a joke’
“It’s a joke. Impeachment for that?” Trump said as he maintained that he did not use U.S. aid to pressure Zelenskiy to investigate Biden. “I didn’t do it,” Trump said.
Then flanked by Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Trump tried to turn the tables on Biden and Senate Democrats as he demanded “transparency by the Democrats.”
Trump cited a 2018 CNN report that Sens. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., had urged a Ukraine prosecutor to provide dirt on Trump and his campaign to special counsel Robert Mueller while hinting that America’s “close relationship with Ukraine” could be at stake.
In Washington, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler focused on Trump’s suggestion that Zelenskiy talk with Attorney General William Barr and Trump’s private attorney, Rudy Giuliani.
“The president dragged the attorney general into this mess. At a minimum, AG Barr must recuse himself until we get to the bottom of this matter,” Nadler tweeted.
Department of Justice spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said that Trump did not discuss investigating Biden or his son with Barr and that Trump did not ask Barr to contact Ukraine. Barr, she said, did not learn about the July 25 conversation until several weeks later when the department learned about the whistleblower’s complaint.
The Justice Department reviewed the complaint and determined that “there was no campaign finance violation” as alleged, thus “no further action was warranted.” Kupec added that the complainant did not have firsthand knowledge of the phone conversation.
Giuliani involved
Trump had urged Zelenskiy to talk with Giuliani. Zelenskiy told Trump that he had tried to arrange a meeting with the former New York mayor in Kyiv.
Giuliani has been a vocal Trump defender on cable TV. On Tuesday night, Giuliani told Fox News that he talked to Ukrainian officials “at the request” of the State Department.
“Rudy Giuliani needs to explain this under oath. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee should call a hearing ASAP,” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., responded on Twitter.
Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com or at 202-662-7391. Follow @DebraJSaunders on Twitter.
