Official Impeachment Trial of President Donald J. Trump

The OP is nonsense. There is very little fact and a lot of "fact."

It is NOT factual that Trump solicited Ukraine to meddle in the election.

It is NOT factual that there was quid pro quo for aid.

It is NOT factual that there was quid pro quo for a White House Meeting.

It is NOT factual that Trump improperly removed Yavonovitch. Diplomats serve at the pleasure of the POTUS.

Listening in on the public hearing toward an impeachment of president Trump, one can only be disgusted at the chairman of this committee and the Democrat members and their flat out lies and utter non-sense.

The lies started with A. Schiff, chairman of this committee, claiming he did not know the identity of the "whistleblower". Excuse me ?????? Schiff started an investigation or hearing for impeachment against Trump and does not even know who the person is on whose "testimony ideas" he is building his entire case ?????

Furthermore, according to a report by the New York Times and the Wadhington Post the "whistleblower" approached the committee inquired where and how he could file his "complaint" against Trump ... Also, his name already has been making it through the press for some time, and the representative Rand Paul even made it publically known. Everyone following this case even a little bit knows ... but Mr. Schiff does not know ??? Schiff is a top liar or top ignorant fool!

Good night, America!

Hmn ..... interesting is that just one day after the testimony of the two witnesses in the hearing for an impeachment of president Trump, the foreign minister of the Ukraine, Wadym Prystajko, stated on Thursday that there was no connection between a military aid from the USA and an investigation against Burisma. He contradicted what the US diplomats Wayleor and Kent testified before the committee, when they stated that they believed in such a connection. Note, they "believed" such hearsay ... they did NOT KNOW. Their testimony is a shot into their own and the Demorats foot.

On the other hand, the Demorats have a bit of a "distinguished" and "unusual" view concerning the value of testimonies ... their representative Mike Quigley proclaimed that sometimes hearsay is a better proof than first hand or direct evidence.

LOL Schiff was not happy Trump released another transcript during the hearing today that blows even more of their narrative out of the water. It keeps getting better and better. Keep sinking that ship Democrats!

Bret Baier on FoxNews called the president's tweet "adding an article of impeachment real-time." It reflected who Mr Trump is - the kind of person, the kind president, we know him to be - so it wasn't surprising; but it was disgusting. Witness intimidation? Consider low level State Department staffers who believe they have relevant information, but then realize that if they testify, they will likely be the target of a tweet from the president of the United States. As Ambassador Yvonovich said in her hearing on Friday, that could be "very intimidating."

In my view, Friday was the worst day yet for President Trump, both in his presidency and the impeachment inquiry. The ambassador's testimony before and after the presidential tweet was unchallenged by Republicans. One, because she spoke the truth and there is no evidence to the contrary - Giuliani and company DID smear her to get her out of her job so they could have a clearer path to pressure Ukraine for the investigations the president wanted. Two, she is by nature and character a soft-spoken, credible, and sympathetic figure - adjectives NONE of which apply to the president, Mayor Giuliani, or his band of henchmen.

But the news for the president got MUCH worse later in the day when a diplomat stationed in Ukraine testified that he was in the restaurant with Gordon Sondland on July 26 - the day after the infamous call - when Sondland received a call from the president over an unsecured line. I encourage you to investigate the diplomat's opening statement. It is devastating to the president and to Sondland. The diplomat said he heard the president's voice on the call because Sondland held the phone away from his ear to account for the president's loud voice, that the president asked whether Zelinsky was going to do the infamous investigations, and when the call ended, Sondland said the president cared more about "big stuff" such as the investigations he sought than stuff such as Ukraine's war with Russia, for example.

And then there was the celebrated summary released on Friday of the first Zelenskyy-Trump phone call in April. Trumpsters tout the call as an effective counter to the narrative that the president pressured Zelenskyy for investigations. @reformed says the summary "blows even more of their narrative out of the water." Of course, we wouldn't expect Trump to ask for investigations the first time he spoke with the newly elected president. He had to establish some form of connection with the new leader before making the ask.

But more important is the fact that the summary includes NO mention of corruption, when the White House's read-out of the call, released at the time of the call, reported that the president declared his commitment to help Ukraine "root out corruption." But he didn't do that. He didn't mention corruption in April, just as in the July 25 call he didn't mention corruption. Trumpsters everywhere have told us the president was simply giving voice to his commitment to fight corruption in Ukraine! But in two phone calls with that country's leader, our president didn't even say the word. We now know he was given talking points to raise with Zelenskyy in April that included corruption, but Mr Trump still didn't mention it. That's how "much" the president cared about corruption.

It was an awful day and this is an awful season for the president. Witness after witness is telling the same basic story, and NO ONE is denying the facts they're asserting. Republicans spend their question times spouting irrelevant and often unfounded assertions about the Bidens rather than defending the president's actions. That might be their best move since there is no defense for what the president did.

This is vile, disgusting conduct. Mr Trump WILL be impeached and the GOP senators who allow him to stay in office after the trial will have and will deserve a stain on their resumes for the rest of their lives.

Yeah, her second-hand testimony that she actually has no information about things that happened and it is all feeling and opinon. Yeah, solid there...

The former ambassador didn't witness impeachable action directly, but the way Giuliani and company treated her is highly suggestive of damnable, if not impeachable, presidential conduct if the president had knowledge of but took no steps to stop Giuliani's smear campaign of lies against Yvonovitch.

Since when do YOU get to decide whether another person felt intimidated by the actions of the president of the United States?

She had testified to the impact of the president's statements about her in the July 25 phone call with Zelenskyy and his removal of her as ambassador when the president issued his attack tweet. It was "needed" because the tweet showed the character of the president who made the statements in the call and issued the tweet, and his willingness to attack her even as she testified before Congress. If he was willing to do that, it's not hard to believe he would have approved of the Giuliani smear campaign against her earlier in the year.

I have the "freedom of speech" to call you all kinds of names. But to do so would be wrong, and likely childish and reflective of a character flaw. Just because you have the "freedom" to do something, doesn't make that something right.

Just because YOU don't think people should feel intimidated when the president they ultimately work for publicly tweets harsh criticism of them for telling the truth while under oath doesn't mean they weren't intimidated.

What "things" did the Democrats say "were to be found on that call"? I am not aware of any Democrat who voiced expectations about what would be found there. Democrats certainly wanted the transcript of the first call, given the content of the second one, but I'm not aware of any who predicted what would be found on that document. Please provide a link to information that backs up your claim.

My point was that the president didn't use the word "corruption" in either call, and, contrary to the talking points given to him before the first call, didn't even reference the concept let alone the term then.

The point of the impeachment inquiry is that there is NO evidence the president mentioned the Bidens or the Crowdstrike conspiracy theory because they were examples of corruption. Had they been examples of Ukrainian corruption, Mr Trump could have said so. In fact, it would have made MUCH more sense for the president to say, "I'm concerned about corruption in your country, Mr President. Two examples I'm aware of - though I'm afraid there are many others - are...." But the president expressed NO concern about the prevalence of Ukrainian corruption in EITHER call, and instead introduced his reference to the Crowdstrike conspiracy theory as a "favor" he wanted from Mr Zelenskyy. Since when is it American foreign policy to ask other countries to fight their domestic corruption as a "favor" to the U.S.?

Your claim that the Burisma investigation was "ongoing" at the time of the July 25 call is false. In May 2019 Ukrainian prosecutor general Yuriy Lutsenko told Bloomberg news that he had found "no wrongdoing" by the Bidens during a review of the case that he had reopened in March 2019.

The Townhall.com article to which linked quotes from the portions of Under Secretary of State David Hale's deposition in which he reports foreign aid to nations other than Ukraine has been withheld pending what Hale called a "foreign affairs review." What Secretary Hale did NOT say in his testimony was that aid to any other nation had been withheld pending that nation's launch of investigations into the president's domestic political rivals.

As you know, @reformed , the issue in this case is NOT that the Ukrainian aid was withheld for a period of time. The issue is WHY the money was withheld for a period of time, then magically restored two days after the Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson by letter notified Intelligence Committee Chair Schiff and Ranking Member Nunes of the whistleblower's complaint.

As has been established in other posts, your definition of "evidence" is "proof." Evidently, your definition of "proof" in this case is the two presidents publicly acknowledging a quid pro quo with Trump as the one asking and Zelenskyy the one pressured to give. I say that because basically EVERY fact witness in this case has testified to the same basic truth: President Trump tied a White House meeting and the release of foreign assistance money to Ukraine to that nation's announcement of investigations into the Crowdstrike conspiracy theory and the Bidens. Now it didn't work - the president got caught and released the money in September - but the failure to complete an act does not prove there was no intention or action toward that act. Witness after witness after witness has said the same basic thing.

Will Trump get infected with a case of truthfulness and fess up? Of course not. Will Zelenskyy (whose government, we now know, felt pressure from the Trump administration to investigate in the spring of this year) acknowledge the pressure he felt? No. He needs the aid and American support. But because the one robbing the bank and the teller with a gun to his or her head won't say there's anything wrong doesn't mean there isn't a robbery underway.

There is MUCH evidence/proof that the money was withheld to apply pressure. Remember, the Ukrainians learned about the hold on August 29. They quickly communicated their concerns to US officials. Did the money get released on August 30 or 31, or in the first week of September? No! It wasn't released until September 11, nearly two weeks after the Ukrainians expressed their concerns. Why then? Because on September 9 the Intelligence Community's Inspector General notified the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee about the whistleblower complaint. And on THAT date two days later (September 11) of all dates: the House IC announced an investigation, the White House released the aid, and a planned Zelenskyy interview on CNN (in which he planned to say the magic words about the two investigations!) was cancelled. Because it's not Donald Trump saying "I did it," for you that's not evidence or proof. So be it. You're wrong.

Again you choose to overlook evidence.

• There wasn't an investigation because the money was released on September 11.
• The money was released on September 11, it seems clear to me, because on September 9 the ICIG informed Intelligence Committee ranking member Nunes (as well as Chairman Schiff) of the whistleblower's complaint, which the White House had to know would put the money hold under scrutiny.
• The transcript DOES show a connection between the two when in response to Zelenskyy's mention of anti-tank weapons, Mr Trump's FIRST response is "But I want you to do us a favor, though." That is: "Mr President, we need those weapons." "Well then, Mr President, do us a favor." What was the favor? According to the transcript, Crowdstrike and the Bidens.
• Listen to this morning's Sondland testimony. He says key leaders at State and the NSC knew - were "in the loop," as he states it - about what he calls in his opening statement the "quid pro quo."
• And one more time: The fact that the money was released on September 11 DOES NOT MEAN that BEFORE September 11 the money wasn't held up as part of a quid pro quo: The Ukrainians would make a statement about the investigations (as agreed to, Zelenskyy planned to go on CNN) then they would get the money. The failure to complete an act does not prove there was no intention or action toward that act. The fact that would-be bank robbers get caught while planning their next heist DOES NOT MEAN they weren't planning to rob a bank before they got caught!

Exactly this type of stuff happened with Mr. Biden sen. in his influence taking on Ukrain while vice-president and his son being in a high paid job in a Ukraine company etc ... but then I guess, there is a difference if Mr. A does something and Mr. B does the same ... in Mr. A's case it is commendable "democracy foreign poiicy", in Mr. B's case it is a crime ?