Last night, Daily Wire Editor-at-Large Josh Hammer, a constitutional attorney by training who has been a <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/11/19/alexander-vindman-condemned-himself-in-his-impeachment-testimony/">frequent</a> <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/11/26/why-trumps-ukraine-demands-werent-remotely-illegal/">commentator</a> on Democrats’ current partisan <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/12/13/obstruction-of-congress-is-an-utterly-ridiculous-impeachment-charge/">impeachment</a> <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/12/19/pelosis-newest-dirty-trick-putting-trumps-senate-trial-on-hold/">effort</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR6O_a8m-8A">joined</a> “Tipping Point With Liz Wheeler” on One America News Network (OANN) to discuss the Democrats&#8217; increasingly hard push to ensure that <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-bad-trump-presidents-dismissal-john-bolton-josh-hammer">former</a> National Security Advisor John Bolton is called to testify during the Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.
&#8220;Democrats may decide to call Bolton to testify about a possible quid pro quo between Trump and Ukrainian officials regarding an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, even though the articles of impeachment are already published.&#8221; The Daily Wire&#8217;s Emily Zanotti <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/pelosi-threatens-to-call-john-bolton-to-testify-in-house-even-as-dems-vote-to-send-impeachment-articles-to-senate">reported</a> earlier this month. &#8220;Senior Democrats raised the possibility of subpoenaing Bolton last week, after Bolton himself admitted that, if asked to testify by the Senate, he would comply (though he did not speak on whether he would do the same for a House subpoena, and referenced Republicans specifically).&#8221;
&#8220;The theory seems to be, according to a plan of action outlined by former advisors of President Barack Obama on the left-leaning site, <a href="https://crooked.com/articles/subpoena-john-bolton-democrats/">Crooked</a>, if Bolton is called to testify in the House and provides information critical to the case against the President, that Senate Republicans will have no choice but to allow witnesses at Trump’s Senate impeachment trial,&#8221; Zanotti continued.
Last week, The Federalist&#8217;s David Marcus <a href="https://thefederalist.com/2020/01/14/john-boltons-testimony-would-not-be-the-smoking-gun-democrats-need/">argued</a> that even if Bolton testified, his testimony would hardly be the smoking gun that Democrats seem to think it would be. &#8220;[W]hat can John Bolton possibly say that would prove Trump’s intent was malicious, and not genuine concern about taxpayer dollars falling into corrupt hands?&#8221; Marcus asked rhetorically. &#8220;Is he really going to say, &#8216;The president told me he doesn’t care about corruption, he just wanted to get that pesky Joe Biden and get him good?&#8217; Is there anyone on the face of the planet who thinks that such a conversation could have taken place?&#8221;
Hammer joined Wheeler&#8217;s OANN program to discuss the same topic. Hammer agreed with Marcus that there is no plausible scenario in which Bolton&#8217;s Senate testimony would be a smoking gun.
<blockquote>[Bolton] is clearly not going to provide any kind of smoking gun testimony for the reasons that you just outlined. &#8230; [M]y boss at The Daily Wire, Ben Shapiro, had a good, pretty lengthy <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/the-two-theories-of-trumps-actions-in-the-ukraine-affair/">column for National Review</a> back in October [on this]. There are two theories as to what happened on the now-infamous July 25th phone call between Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky. The first theory Ben calls the &#8220;Get Biden Theory&#8221;; the second theory is what Ben calls the &#8220;Miasma of Corruption Theory.&#8221;
So on the first hand, Trump is just trying to politically &#8230; get his opponent, Joe Biden. The second hand, he&#8217;s actually trying to attach corruption-related strings to the doling out of taxpayer aid. My reading of everything that&#8217;s happened so far is that this second theory, the &#8220;Miasma of Corruption Theory,&#8221; is more likely. Possibly, the &#8220;Get Biden Theory&#8221; is right, but as you say, the only reason — or the only way that we would ever be shown that is right — is if John Bolton was literally told by Donald J. Trump, president of the United States, &#8220;I am doing this to get Joe Biden.&#8221; That&#8217;s not going to happen.</blockquote>
Hammer also elaborated on Twitter earlier today.
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Schiff is gaslighting us. What “evidence” is being hidden?<a href="https://twitter.com/benshapiro?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@benshapiro</a> laid it out well at <a href="https://twitter.com/NRO?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@NRO</a> in Oct. There is the “Get Biden Theory” and the “Miasma of Corruption Theory.” There is one thing and one thing only distinguishing the two: Subjective intent. <a href="https://t.co/0wPsbGalBv">https://t.co/0wPsbGalBv</a>
&mdash; Josh Hammer (@josh_hammer) <a href="https://twitter.com/josh_hammer/status/1219692018668130304?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 21, 2020</a></blockquote>
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Any purported “evidence” that does not directly speak to that subjective intent — what lawyers call mens rea — is, in actuality, no evidence at all.
&mdash; Josh Hammer (@josh_hammer) <a href="https://twitter.com/josh_hammer/status/1219692427335950343?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 21, 2020</a></blockquote>
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WATCH:
<iframe title="John Bolton is no Smoking Gun" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fR6O_a8m-8A?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Hammer OANN 1.20.10

WATCH: Hammer On ‘Tipping Point With Liz Wheeler’: John Bolton Is No Smoking Gun

Democratic Party

Donald Trump

Impeachment

John Bolton

U.S. Senate

Ukraine

Volodymyr Zelensky

Tomorrow will commence the third presidential impeachment trial in the history of the United States Senate. And on the eve of such a rare and solemn institutional undertaking, it is still not entirely clear what exactly President Donald Trump has done to deserve such a fate.
At the outset of this saga, House Democrats spent weeks promoting an oh-so nefarious &#8220;quid pro quo&#8221; that transpired during Trump&#8217;s now-infamous July 25 phone call last summer with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. It turns out that abstruse Latinate didn&#8217;t poll-test well — and never mind that such a &#8220;quid pro quo,&#8221; when cabined to a public official&#8217;s lawful exercise of his <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-trumps-alleged-impoundment-of-ukraine-money-doesnt-make-for-an-impeachable-offense">constitutional authority</a>, amounts to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-there-is-one-terrific-impeachment-defense-that-the-white-house-is-not-making">constitutionally protected free speech</a>. Democrats next engaged in the hilariously public floating of bribery — which is actually enumerated as a presidential impeachment criterion in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleii">Article II, Section 4</a> of the Constitution — before deciding that they simply lacked the grist to advance such a claim. Democrats ultimately settled on the mealy-mouthed, amorphous gibberish of &#8220;abuse of power&#8221; and the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-obstruction-of-congress-is-an-utterly-ridiculous-impeachment-charge">utterly nonsensical</a>, constitutionally illiterate &#8220;obstruction of Congress&#8221; as their charges of choice.
As Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro and I have each <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-todays-judiciary-committee-impeachment-hearing-is-yet-another-waste-of-time">observed</a> countless times since Democrats first glommed onto the Ukraine phone call as possible grounds for impeachment, it is true that actually committing a black-letter crime is not a constitutional requirement to impeach a sitting president. &#8220;High crimes and misdemeanors,&#8221; the catch-all presidential impeachment criterion enumerated in the Constitution after treason and bribery, was a well-known term of art in the English common law. Alexander Hamilton <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed65.asp">explained</a> in <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed65.asp">The Federalist No. 65</a> that it encompasses &#8220;offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust.&#8221;
True, the Hamiltonian language presents a necessarily political and malleable standard. But it is also true that the Constitution&#8217;s Framers did not view everything as a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-stop-calling-everything-impeachable-offense-josh-hammer">potentially impeachable offense</a>. To wit, the Framers <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/inside-founding-fathers-debate-over-what-constituted-impeachable-offense-180965083/">expressly deliberated</a> whether to make the far lesser &#8220;maladministration&#8221; an impeachment criterion before rejecting it out of fear that it could lead to highly partisan impeachment proceedings motivated by either a mere policy disagreement or the raw pursuit of political power. Hamilton certainly understood that, writing in the same Federalist that impeachment would &#8220;seldom fail to agitate the passions of the whole community, and to divide it into parties more or less friendly or inimical to the accused.&#8221;
Accordingly, even though the actual violation of a law is not constitutionally required, Democrats&#8217; current partisan gambit represents the first time in the history of the republic that an impeachment has nonetheless been attempted without the undergirding of a legally violative act. President Andrew Johnson violated the Tenure of Office Act — an unambiguously unconstitutional statute, but technically a statutory violation nonetheless. President Bill Clinton, investigated for years by former independent counsel Ken Starr, committed perjury. President Richard Nixon, who resigned in disgrace before a formal House vote on impeachment, was knee-deep in the Watergate scandal.
What exactly has President Trump done? He acted in a ham-fisted and sloppy manner on a phone call with a foreign leader when it came to the conducting of his foreign policy — an action squarely within his well-established <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-the-new-york-post-trumps-alleged-impoundment-of-ukraine-money-doesnt-make-for-an-impeachable-offense">constitutional bailiwick</a>. True, he should not have mentioned Joe Biden by name. But ultimately, Trump tried to attach <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/the-two-theories-of-trumps-actions-in-the-ukraine-affair/">corruption-related strings</a>, however clumsily, to the doling out of one of the most consistently <a href="https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-reports/2016/03/11/foreign-aid">politically unpopular</a> items in annual federal budgets: Foreign aid.
The conduct upon which Democrats are now attempting to impeach the president is orders of magnitude less destructive than the conduct upon which the Framers would have considered impeachment justified. It reeks of the sort of petty politics and jostling for power that led the Framers to conscientiously reject the far lesser &#8220;maladministration&#8221; as a possible grounds for impeachment. What&#8217;s worse, House Democrats rushed their process due to political timing and, in their rush, have <a href="https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2019-12-09/opinion-trump-impeachment-hearings-democrats">fundamentally failed to make their case</a> to the American people. They have <a href="https://theresurgent.com/2020/01/20/democrats-have-failed-at-impeachment-trump-will-remain-president/">failed at impeachment</a>, and they have no one to blame but themselves. And in their recklessness, Democrats have also set a deeply pernicious precedent for the future of the Constitution&#8217;s carefully calibrated separation of powers framework.
Alas, let the trial commence.

House Speaker Pelosi And Senator Schumer Hold News Conference On DACA Case

HAMMER: What Exactly Are They Impeaching Him For, Again?

2020 Election

Adam Schiff

Charles Schumer

Constitution

Federalist

Jerry Nadler

Joe Biden

Robert Hyde, the former landscaper-turned-congressional candidate at the center of a new Ukraine &#8220;scandal&#8221; about supposed surveillance of former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, posted a video message Friday addressing the bizarre WhatsApp messages that inspired Democrats to demand new investigations and prompted Ukraine to announce it was officially looking into the matter.
On Tuesday evening, House Democrats heading up the impeachment effort released new materials related to Ukraine that they say require &#8220;full investigation&#8221; and additional witnesses to be called for the impeachment trial in the Senate. Among the evidence is a series of typo-riddled, sometimes nonsensical WhatsApp messages sent in March 2019 by Hyde to Lev Parnas. Parnas is an ex-associate of Rudy Giuliani who has been indicted for attempting to funnel foreign money to Republicans and has been cooperating with the Democrat-led impeachment committee.
In the WhatsApp texts sent in March (excerpts below), Hyde claims he has &#8220;contacts&#8221; who are supposedly tracking the movements of Yovanovitch, who was still serving as ambassador in Ukraine at the time. Yovanovitch was eventually dismissed early from her position by Trump, allegedly because she stood in the way of investigations Trump wanted Ukraine to conduct involving Joe and Hunter Biden.
As Democrats called for an investigation into Hyde&#8217;s wild claims, Ukraine’s interior ministry issued a statement Thursday announcing that it has opened “a criminal investigation into the possible illegal surveillance” of Yovanovitch, <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/ukraine-opens-criminal-investigation-surveillance-marie-yovanovitch/story?id=68324113">ABC News</a> reported. &#8220;The ministry in a statement said police had opened the investigation in light of text messages released by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee between two associates of President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani.&#8221;
Hyde has <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ukraine-opens-investigation-into-surveillance-of-u-s-ambassador-after-dems-release-outrageous-whatsapp-texts">laughed off</a> the allegations on Facebook and in multiple interviews, saying he was just &#8220;playing.&#8221; &#8220;We sent some colorful texts,&#8221; Hyde told Eric Bolling on Wednesday. &#8220;It’s kind of unfortunate the left had to get their panties in a bunch.&#8221;
On Friday, Hyde posted a strange video in which he challenged House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) to reveal the texts that Hyde says he was being fed by some guy whose name he can&#8217;t pronounce about the alleged surveillance of Yovanovitch. Hyde also floats the conspiracy theory that the messages were sent to him by Schiff himself just to &#8220;f***&#8221; with him.
&#8220;Look like Adam Schiff liked to put out something between Parnas and I where we were effing around &#8212; and I was down in Ecuador, I believe, climbing volcanoes,&#8221; says Hyde. &#8220;But I would like Adam Schiff to put out the other transcripts from the guy I was talking to, that I think Adam Schiff put there to f*** with me.&#8221; He goes on to underscore that he has &#8220;no ties to Ukraine.&#8221; WATCH:
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<a href="https://t.co/RhidNMrOex">pic.twitter.com/RhidNMrOex</a>
&mdash; HYDE for U.S. Congress (@rfhyde1) <a href="https://twitter.com/rfhyde1/status/1218231487256055808?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 17, 2020</a></blockquote>
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Below are some of the strange texts sent by Hyde to Parnas between March 23 and 29 included among the <a href="https://intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/20200114_-_hpsci_transmittal_letter_to_hjc_-_new_evidence_attachment.pdf">materials</a> released by the Democrats Tuesday:
<blockquote>Wow. Can’t believe Trumo [sic] hasn’t fired this b*tch. I’ll get right in that … She under heavy protection outside Kiev … They are moving her tomorrow … The guys over they [sic] asked me what I would like to do and what is in it for them … Wake up Yankees man … She’s talked to three people. Her phone is off. Computer is off. … She’s next to the embassy. … Not in the embassy … Private security. Been there since Thursday … They know she’s a political puppet …. They will let me know when she is on the move … I mean where if they can find out … That address I sent you checks out … It’s next to the embassy … They are willing to help if we/you would like a price … Guess you can do anything in the Ukraine with money … What I was told …. Update she will not be moved special security unit upgraded force on the compound people are already aware of the situation my contacts are asking what is the next step because they cannot keep going to check people will start to ask questions … If you want her out they need to make contact with security forces … From Ukrainians … Nothing is changed she is still not moving they check today again … It’s confirmed we have a person inside … Hey brother do we stand down?? Or you still need intel be safe … She had visitors … It’s confirmed we have a person inside … Hey broski tell me what we are doing what’s the next step</blockquote>

WATCH: Man At Center Of Latest Ukraine ‘Bombshell’ That Sparked Investigation Has Challenge For Adam Schiff

On Thursday, the Government Accountability Office issued its report on the White House temporarily freezing U.S. security aid allocated for Ukraine, concluding that President Trump violated the Impoundment Control Act by &#8220;substitut[ing] his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law.&#8221; Trump responded Friday morning by tweeting out a quote from Harvard Law&#8217;s Alan Dershowitz, who argues that the GAO has it &#8220;exactly backwards.&#8221;
“The [GAO] got it exactly backwards,&#8221; Trump tweeted, quoting Dershowitz, a self-described liberal who has frequently defended Trump over the course of his presidency. &#8220;Here’s what they said. The law does not permit the President to substitute his own policy priorities to those Congress has enacted into law. It’s exactly the opposite. The Constitution does not allow Congress to substitute its own priorities for the foreign policies of the President.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
&#8230;.for the foreign policies of the President.” <a href="https://twitter.com/AlanDersh?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@AlanDersh</a> Alan Dershowitz <a href="https://twitter.com/seanhannity?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@seanhannity</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/FoxNews?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@FoxNews</a> They do what the House asks. The Swamp!
&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1218164098212474881?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 17, 2020</a></blockquote>
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As The Daily Wire reported Thursday, the GAO issued its conclusions on the legality of the White House withholding the aid to Ukraine in an alleged attempt to &#8220;pressure&#8221; the government to conduct investigations into alleged Ukrainian corruption, particularly involving Joe and Hunter Biden.
“Faithful execution of the law does not permit the President to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law,” the 8-page <a href="https://www.politico.com/f/?id=0000016f-aee6-dda2-af6f-efef31580000">report</a> signed by General Counsel Thomas H. Armstrong, states in its overview. “OMB withheld funds for a policy reason, which is not permitted under the Impoundment Control Act (ICA). The withholding was not a programmatic delay. Therefore, we conclude that OMB violated the ICA.”
“In the summer of 2019, OMB withheld from obligation approximately $214 million appropriated to DOD for security assistance to Ukraine,&#8221; the GAO&#8217;s &#8220;decision&#8221; section outlines. &#8220;OMB withheld amounts by issuing a series of nine apportionment schedules with footnotes that made all unobligated balances for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) unavailable for obligation. … As explained below, we conclude that OMB withheld the funds from obligation for an unauthorized reason in violation of the ICA.1 See 2 U.S.C. § 684. We also question actions regarding funds appropriated to the Department of State (State) for security assistance to Ukraine.”
“At issue in this decision is whether OMB had authority to withhold the USAI funds from obligation,” Armstrong explains in the &#8220;discussion&#8221; section of the report. “The Constitution specifically vests Congress with the power of the purse, providing that ‘No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.’ U.S. Const. art. I, § 9, cl. 7. The Constitution also vests all legislative powers in Congress and sets forth the procedures of bicameralism and presentment, through which the President may accept or veto a bill passed by both Houses of Congress, and Congress may subsequently override a presidential veto. Id., art. I, § 7, cl. 2, 3. The President is not vested with the power to ignore or amend any such duly enacted law.”
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The report concludes by urging the OMB and the State Department to “provide the information we need to fulfill our duties under the ICA regarding potential impoundments of FMF funds.”
“We will continue to pursue this matter and will provide our decision to the Congress after we have received the necessary information,” Armstrong stresses. “We consider a reluctance to provide a fulsome response to have constitutional significance.”
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/read-it-gaos-report-on-white-house-withholding-ukraine-aid-violated-law">Read the GAO&#8217;s full report here</a>.
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</div>
</div>

Trump Responds To GAO Report Saying He Violated Law In Withholding Ukraine Aid

Alan Dershowitz

Since House Democrats released new evidence Tuesday evening from their investigation into the Trump administration&#8217;s Ukraine &#8220;pressure&#8221; campaign. Evidence Democrats say requires further investigation. The primary source of those materials, Lev Parnas — a former Rudy Giuliani associate who has been indicted on charges of funneling foreign money to Republicans — has been making the media rounds and leveling new accusations, including that U.S. Attorney General William Barr was &#8220;absolutely&#8221; in on the Ukraine scheme. The State Department has responded unequivocally to Parnas&#8217;s claim.
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Parnas appeared on MSNBC&#8217;s &#8220;Maddow&#8221; Wednesday, where host Rachel Maddow asked him to discuss the various <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/democrats-dump-new-impeachment-evidence-on-eve-of-vote-say-it-proves-senate-trial-cant-be-full-and-fair">allegations</a> included in the Democrats&#8217; eleventh-hour document dump. &#8220;It’s been reported as far as we understand from public reporting that you conveyed to [senior Zelensky aide Sergey] Schafer the exact quid pro quo that you wanted Zelensky to announce investigations into Joe Biden or military aid would not be released to Ukraine. Is that accurate?” asked Maddow, as reported by <a href="https://www.mediaite.com/news/giuliani-pal-lev-parnas-accuses-trump-of-clear-quid-pro-quo-all-aid-was-predicated-on-biden-investigation-announcement/">Mediaite</a>.
&#8220;Basically, the message that I was supposed to, that I gave Sergei Shaffer was a very harsh message that was told to me to give it to him in a very harsh way, not a pleasant way,&#8221; he said.
Asked who gave him the order, Parnas said, &#8220;Mayor Giuliani. Rudy told me after, you know, meeting the president at the White House. The message was it wasn’t just military aid, it was all aid. Basically their relationships would be sour, that we would stop giving them any kind of aid. &#8230; Unless — there were several demands at that point. A, the most important was the announcement of the Biden investigation.&#8221;
Parnas went on to claim that President Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, national security adviser John Bolton, and Attorney General Barr were all &#8220;in the loop&#8221; on the Ukraine &#8220;shakedown&#8221; scheme.
Asked for comment by Maddow&#8217;s show on Parnas&#8217;s claim about Barr being &#8220;absolutely&#8221; in on &#8220;the effort to get the Ukrainians to announce an investigation of Vice President Joe Biden,&#8221; Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec responded, flatly, &#8220;100% false.&#8221;
In a follow-up discussion with the <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/100-false-doj-rejects-lev-parnas-claim-that-barr-was-part-of-ukraine-scheme">Washington Examiner</a>, Kupec reiterated the adamant response. &#8220;Kupec told the Washington Examiner that there was no truth to Parnas&#8217;s claims,&#8221; the outlet reports. &#8220;She added that the Justice Department&#8217;s position &#8216;has not changed&#8217; since September, when the Ukraine controversy first broke through a whistleblower complaint and when the agency emphatically distanced itself from Giuliani&#8217;s foray into Ukraine in a lengthy statement.&#8221;
After Trump released the transcript of his July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in which he said Barr would follow up about the investigations he mentioned, the Justice Department fired off a statement making clear Trump had never spoken with the attorney general about the matter.
&#8220;The President has not spoken with the Attorney General about having Ukraine investigate anything relating to former Vice President Biden or his son, and the President has not asked the Attorney General to contact Ukraine — on this or any other matter,&#8221; the statement read. &#8220;The Attorney General has not communicated with Ukraine — on this or any other subject. Nor has the Attorney General discussed this matter, or anything relating to Ukraine, with Rudy Giuliani.&#8221;
During his interview with Maddow Wednesday, Parnas also accused the president of knowing &#8220;exactly&#8221; what was going on with the Giuliani-led effort in Ukraine.
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&#8220;President Trump knew exactly what was going on,&#8221; Parnas <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/giuliani-associate-parnas-says-trump-knew-exactly-what-was-going-n1116731">told</a> Maddow. &#8220;He was aware of all my movements. I wouldn&#8217;t do anything without the consent of Rudy Giuliani or the president. I have no intent, I have no reason to speak to any of these officials. I mean, they have no reason to speak to me. Why would President Zelenskiy&#8217;s inner circle or Minister Avakov or all these people or President Poroshenko meet with me? Who am I? They were told to meet with me. And that&#8217;s the secret that they&#8217;re trying to keep. I was on the ground doing their work.&#8221;
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ukraine-opens-investigation-into-surveillance-of-u-s-ambassador-after-dems-release-outrageous-whatsapp-texts">Ukraine Opens Investigation Into ‘Surveillance’ Of U.S. Ambassador After Dems Release ‘Outrageous’ WhatsApp Texts</a>

William Barr

New Ukraine Allegation Leveled Against Attorney General Barr; State Department Slaps It Down

Rachel Maddow

President Trump

READ IT: GAO&#8217;s Report On White House Withholding Ukraine Aid: Violated Law

WhatsApp messages sent by a landscaper-turned-Republican congressional candidate Robert Hyde to Lev Parnas, an indicted ex-associate of Rudy Giuliani, have prompted an official investigation by Ukraine into the potential surveillance of former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. The messages, says Hyde, were <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/man-at-center-of-new-ukraine-allegations-democrats-have-their-panties-in-a-bunch-over-drunken-jokes-on-whatsapp">just jokes</a> sent &#8220;to some dweeb we were playing with that we met a few times while we had a few drinks.&#8221;
Amid Democrats&#8217; calls for an investigation into Hyde&#8217;s comments about his supposed &#8220;contacts&#8221; tracking Yovanovitch in Ukraine, Ukriaine&#8217;s interior ministry issued a statement Thursday announcing that it has opened &#8220;a criminal investigation into the possible illegal surveillance&#8221; of Yovanovitch, <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/ukraine-opens-criminal-investigation-surveillance-marie-yovanovitch/story?id=68324113">ABC News</a> reports.
&#8220;The ministry in a statement said police had opened the investigation in light of text messages released by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee between two associates of President Donald Trump&#8217;s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani,&#8221; ABC reports.
As reported by <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/15/democrats-demand-state-release-info-surveillance-yovanovitch-099321">Politico</a>, after releasing new Ukraine investigation materials Tuesday, Democrats are now &#8220;vowing to investigate&#8221; the allegations.
“This unprecedented threat to our diplomats must be thoroughly investigated and, if warranted, prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” said Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who sent a <a href="https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/_cache/files/c/a/ca166ac6-08ec-43ce-976c-1a54bb55d236/2435CEEA38184D26095119FB565DF2DB.ele-to-brian-bulatao-letter-amb-yovanovich-1-15-20.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">letter</a> to the State Department on Wednesday demanding records on Hyde, Parnas and Yovanovitch, Politico notes.
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders also weighed in on the WhatsApp messages, tweeting out a statement Wednesday decrying the &#8220;outrageous&#8221; messages and calling for a full investigation.
&#8220;It is outrageous that the President’s personal lawyers appear to have directed the surveillance of a U.S. ambassador,&#8221; Sanders wrote. &#8220;This must be fully investigated as the Senate conducts the impeachment trial. We have a responsibility to hold this lawless administration to account.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
It is outrageous that the President’s personal lawyers appear to have directed the surveillance of a U.S. ambassador.
This must be fully investigated as the Senate conducts the impeachment trial. We have a responsibility to hold this lawless administration to account. <a href="https://t.co/nY3ykuKdiZ">https://t.co/nY3ykuKdiZ</a>
&mdash; Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) <a href="https://twitter.com/SenSanders/status/1217508141530861571?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 15, 2020</a></blockquote>
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But Hyde says this latest Ukraine &#8220;scandal&#8221; is based on a trolling joke on &#8220;dweeb&#8221; Parnas, who he says he was warned about early on.
&#8220;I was never in Kiev,&#8221; Hyde wrote in a Facebook post Tuesday, as reported by <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/15/democrats-demand-state-release-info-surveillance-yovanovitch-099321">Politico</a>. &#8220;For them to take some texts my buddy’s and I wrote back to some dweeb we were playing with that we met a few times while we had a few drinks is definitely laughable.&#8221;
In an interview with NBC News Tuesday, Hyde added that he’d been drinking when he sent some of the messages, then addressed the issue again in a phone interview with “America This Week with Eric Bolling” on Wednesday.
“We were playing,” Hyde told Bolling. “I thought we were playing. I didn’t know he was so serious.”
“We sent some colorful texts,” Hyde added. “It’s kind of unfortunate the left had to get their panties in a bunch.”
Asked if he was actually tracking Yovanovitch, Hyde told Bolling, “Absolutely not. Are you kidding me? I’m a little nasty [expletive], excuse my language. Come on, you know me, Eric.”
Hyde also told Bolling that he&#8217;d been warned &#8220;a long time ago&#8221; about Parnas. “Listen, I was told a long time ago who Lev was by a lot of people down in communities throughout this country who would pull me aside, have meetings with me, and tell me to stay away from the guy,” he said.
Below are some of the key texts sent by Hyde to Parnas between March 23 and 29 included among the <a href="https://intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/20200114_-_hpsci_transmittal_letter_to_hjc_-_new_evidence_attachment.pdf">materials</a> released by the Democrats Tuesday:
<blockquote>Wow. Can’t believe Trumo [sic] hasn’t fired this b*tch. I’ll get right in that … She under heavy protection outside Kiev … They are moving her tomorrow … The guys over they [sic] asked me what I would like to do and what is in it for them … Wake up Yankees man … She’s talked to three people. Her phone is off. Computer is off. … She’s next to the embassy. … Not in the embassy … Private security. Been there since Thursday … They know she’s a political puppet …. They will let me know when she is on the move … I mean where if they can find out … That address I sent you checks out … It’s next to the embassy … They are willing to help if we/you would like a price … Guess you can do anything in the Ukraine with money … What I was told …. Update she will not be moved special security unit upgraded force on the compound people are already aware of the situation my contacts are asking what is the next step because they cannot keep going to check people will start to ask questions … If you want her out they need to make contact with security forces … From Ukrainians … Nothing is changed she is still not moving they check today again … It’s confirmed we have a person inside … Hey brother do we stand down?? Or you still need intel be safe … She had visitors … It’s confirmed we have a person inside … Hey broski tell me what we are doing what’s the next step</blockquote>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/democrats-dump-new-impeachment-evidence-on-eve-of-vote-say-it-proves-senate-trial-cant-be-full-and-fair">Democrats Dump New Impeachment Evidence On Eve Of Vote, Say It Proves Senate Trial Can’t Be ‘Full And Fair’</a>
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<div id="bling-4" data-google-query-id="CPS37tq_iOcCFQE-fwodsOoHEQ">This article has been revised for clarity.</div>
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Marie Yovanovitch

Ukraine Opens Investigation Into ‘Surveillance’ Of U.S. Ambassador After Dems Release ‘Outrageous’ WhatsApp Texts

On the eve of the House Democrats&#8217; vote to transfer their articles of impeachment against President Trump, Democrats heading up the impeachment effort released new documents of evidence they say requires further investigations. Among the materials are a series of WhatsApp messages between Rudy Giuliani associate Lev Parnas and Republican congressional candidate Robert Hyde — whose name has not previously come up in the impeachment inquiry — in which he discusses supposedly surveilling U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch.
Amid Democrats&#8217; <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/15/democrats-demand-state-release-info-surveillance-yovanovitch-099321">demands</a> for an investigation into Hyde&#8217;s &#8220;disturbing&#8221; and &#8220;outrageous&#8221; messages to Parnas, the landscaper-turned-congressional candidate has responded to the &#8220;definitely laughable&#8221; allegations that he was &#8220;surveilling&#8221; a U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.
The messages between Hyde and Parnas among the <a href="https://intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/20200114_-_hpsci_transmittal_letter_to_hjc_-_new_evidence_attachment.pdf">materials</a> released by the Democrats Tuesday evening include the following messages from Hyde — all sent between March 23 and 29 — and interspersed with links to various articles, some related to Yovanovitch:
<blockquote>Wow. Can&#8217;t believe Trumo [sic] hasn&#8217;t fired this b*tch. I&#8217;ll get right in that &#8230; She under heavy protection outside Kiev &#8230; They are moving her tomorrow &#8230; The guys over they [sic] asked me what I would like to do and what is in it for them &#8230; Wake up Yankees man &#8230; She&#8217;s talked to three people. Her phone is off. Computer is off. &#8230; She&#8217;s next to the embassy. &#8230; Not in the embassy &#8230; Private security. Been there since Thursday &#8230; They know she&#8217;s a political puppet &#8230;. They will let me know when she is on the move &#8230; I mean where if they can find out &#8230; That address I sent you checks out &#8230; It&#8217;s next to the embassy &#8230; They are willing to help if we/you would like a price &#8230; Guess you can do anything in the Ukraine with money &#8230; What I was told &#8230;. Update she will not be moved special security unit upgraded force on the compound people are already aware of the situation my contacts are asking what is the next step because they cannot keep going to check people will start to ask questions &#8230; If you want her out they need to make contact with security forces &#8230; From Ukrainians &#8230; Nothing is changed she is still not moving they check today again &#8230; It&#8217;s confirmed we have a person inside &#8230; Hey brother do we stand down?? Or you still need intel be safe &#8230; She had visitors &#8230; It&#8217;s confirmed we have a person inside &#8230; Hey broski tell me what we are doing what&#8217;s the next step</blockquote>
To the message about paying Ukrainians, Parnas responded &#8220;LOL.&#8221; To some of the other posts, Parnas simply replied &#8220;interesting&#8221; and &#8220;perfect.&#8221;
With Democrats calling for an investigation into his alleged &#8220;surveillance&#8221; of Yovanovitch — who Giuliani reportedly wanted removed from her post because she would hamper his call for investigations into Burisma and the Bidens — Hyde posted a message on Facebook Tuesday, mocking the Democrats&#8217; allegations.
&#8220;I was never in Kiev,&#8221; Hyde wrote, as reported by <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/15/democrats-demand-state-release-info-surveillance-yovanovitch-099321">Politico</a>. &#8220;For them to take some texts my buddy’s and I wrote back to some dweeb we were playing with that we met a few times while we had a few drinks is definitely laughable.&#8221;
Speaking with NBC News Tuesday, Hyde said that he&#8217;d been drinking when he sent some of the messages. In a phone interview with &#8220;America This Week with Eric Bolling&#8221; on Wednesday, Hyde laughed off the latest Ukraine scandal in which he was the unlikely star.
&#8220;We were playing,&#8221; Hyde said. &#8220;I thought we were playing. I didn&#8217;t know he was so serious.&#8221;
&#8220;We sent some colorful texts,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It&#8217;s kind of unfortunate the left had to get their panties in a bunch.&#8221;
Asked if he was really surveilling Yovanovitch, Hyde said, &#8220;Absolutely not. Are you kidding me? I’m a little nasty [expletive], excuse my language. Come on, you know me, Eric.&#8221;
As pointed out by <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/robert-hyde-talks-to-eric-bolling-ahead-of-lev-parnas-interview-with-rachel-maddow?source=articles&amp;via=rss">The Daily Beast</a>, Hyde also made some comments about being warned in advance about Parnas. &#8220;Listen, I was told a long time ago who Lev was by a lot of people down in communities throughout this country who would pull me aside, have meetings with me, and tell me to stay away from the guy,” he said. &#8220;Honestly, I was never a close associate with Lev Parnas. Did I like his character and did we have laughs and joke a bit? Of course. But to try to throw me under a bus somehow for joking around on WhatsApp? I’d love to see Adam Schiff’s texts on WhatsApp.”
In its report on Hyde&#8217;s &#8220;<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-impeachment-inquiry/who-robert-hyde-latest-character-trump-impeachment-scandal-has-wild-n1116656">wild backstory</a>,&#8221; NBC notes that after getting himself into &#8220;Trump&#8217;s world&#8221; in 2016 via various big donations, Hyde &#8220;ditched his landscaping company to open a &#8216;government and public relations&#8217; consulting company called Finley Hyde &amp; Associates in December 2018.&#8221; In August, he announced that he was <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/roberthyde">running</a> for Congress in Connecticut&#8217;s 5th District.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/democrats-dump-new-impeachment-evidence-on-eve-of-vote-say-it-proves-senate-trial-cant-be-full-and-fair">Democrats Dump New Impeachment Evidence On Eve Of Vote, Say It Proves Senate Trial Can’t Be ‘Full And Fair’</a>

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Holds News Conference Announcing Impeachment Managers

Man At Center Of New Ukraine Allegations: Democrats Have ‘Their Panties In A Bunch’ Over ‘Colorful’ Jokes On WhatsApp

Hours after finally announcing their decision to hold the vote on sending their delayed articles of impeachment to the Senate, the Democrat-led House impeachment investigation committee released new materials to the press that Democrats say prove a trial in the Senate cannot be &#8220;full and fair&#8221; without documents they&#8217;ve demanded from Trump.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delayed the transfer of the impeachment articles against President Trump for nearly a month in an attempt to pressure Senate Republicans to hold an impeachment trial that effectively retries the case the House Democrats were supposed to have already proven convincingly. Amid mounting pressure, including from key Democrats in the Senate, Pelosi finally caved Tuesday, the Democrats holding a press conference to announce that they would vote on sending the articles on Wednesday.
Tuesday night, on the eve of the big vote, House investigators released new documents that have &#8220;spurred Democrats to renew calls for the White House to turn over documents related to the Ukraine pressure campaign that it has refused to share with Congress,&#8221; reports <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/ukraine-prosecutor-offered-information-related-to-biden-in-exchange-for-ambassadors-ouster-newly-released-materials-show/2020/01/14/cc45d19e-371e-11ea-9541-9107303481a4_story.html">The Washington Post</a>, which promptly reported on the conveniently timed document dump.
Along with the new materials, the chairs of the Democrat-led House Intelligence, Oversight, Judiciary and Foreign Affairs Committees issued a joint statement Tuesday night saying the &#8220;new evidence&#8221; means &#8220;there cannot be a full and fair trial in the Senate&#8221; until Trump hands over the demanded information he has thus far withheld.
&#8220;All of this new evidence confirms what we already know: the President and his associates pressured Ukrainian officials to announce investigations that would benefit the President politically,” reads the statement, as reported by the Post. “There cannot be a full and fair trial in the Senate without the documents that President Trump is refusing to provide to Congress.”
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&#8220;New materials released by House Democrats appear to show Ukraine’s top prosecutor offering an associate of President Trump’s personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, damaging information related to former vice president Joe Biden if the Trump administration recalled the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine,&#8221; the Post explains.
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&#8220;The text messages and documents provided to Congress by former Giuliani associate Lev Parnas also show that before the ambassador, Marie Yovanovitch, was removed from her post, a Parnas associate now running for Congress sent menacing text messages suggesting that he had Yovanovitch under surveillance in Ukraine,&#8221; the Post continues.
&#8220;A lawyer for Yovanovitch said Tuesday that the episode should be investigated,&#8221; the outlet notes.
The Post goes on to emphasize the Democrats&#8217; argument that the new materials merit further investigation as they include &#8220;a number of previously unknown details about efforts by Giuliani and his associates to obtain material in Ukraine that would undermine Trump’s Democratic opponents.&#8221;
Among the materials is a document that includes a message from Giuliani to Parnas saying he has gotten a person he simply refers to as &#8220;no 1&#8221; involved in his attempt to lift a U.S. visa ban on the former Ukrainian prosecutor &#8220;who was planning to come to the United States to make claims about Biden.&#8221; (<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/ukraine-prosecutor-offered-information-related-to-biden-in-exchange-for-ambassadors-ouster-newly-released-materials-show/2020/01/14/cc45d19e-371e-11ea-9541-9107303481a4_story.html">Read the Post&#8217;s full report here</a>.)
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/nancy-pelosi-appoints-adam-schiff-jerry-nadler-and-five-others-as-impeachment-managers">Nancy Pelosi Appoints Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, And Five Others As Impeachment Managers</a>
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</section>
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Speaker Pelosi Announces Impeachment Managers, Signs And Transmits Articles To Senate For Trial

Democrats Dump New Impeachment Evidence On Eve Of Vote, Say It Proves Senate Trial Can&#8217;t Be ‘Full And Fair’

Washington Post

Democrat presidential candidate Joe Biden is not referring to his son, Hunter Biden, by his name anymore as public pressure mounts for Biden&#8217;s son to testify in President Donald Trump&#8217;s Senate trial over his alleged corrupt business dealings with Ukrainian gas company Burisma.
The former vice president on Tuesday referred to his son as &#8220;my only surviving son,&#8221; in an apparent attempt to cast sympathy for him, during CNN&#8217;s Democrat presidential debate and on Twitter.
&#8220;Republicans have savaged my only surviving son,&#8221; Biden tweeted. &#8220;They’ve spread lies about me that networks won’t even carry. It doesn’t matter if they go after me. As President of the United States, I have to be able to not only fight — I have to heal. And that’s what I’ll do if I’m elected.&#8221;
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Republicans have savaged my only surviving son. They’ve spread lies about me that networks won’t even carry. It doesn’t matter if they go after me.
As President of the United States, I have to be able to not only fight — I have to heal. And that’s what I’ll do if I’m elected.
&mdash; Joe Biden (Text Join to 30330) (@JoeBiden) <a href="https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1217289913969840130?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 15, 2020</a></blockquote>
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During the presidential debate, Biden had the following exchange with CNN&#8217;s Wolf Blitzer [emphasis added]:
<blockquote>BLITZER: Tomorrow, the speaker, Nancy Pelosi, will send articles of impeachment against President Trump to the United States Senate, launching the third trial of a U.S. president. The Republican-led Senate has signaled that it is likely to acquit him.
Vice President Biden, if you&#8217;re the nominee, is it going to be harder to run against President Trump if he&#8217;s been acquitted and able to claim vindication, especially after what he&#8217;s said about your family?
BIDEN: It&#8217;s irrelevant. There&#8217;s no — there&#8217;s no choice but to — for Nancy Pelosi and the House to move. He has, in fact, committed impeachable offenses. Whether the Senate makes that judgment or not, it&#8217;s for them to decide.
But — and, by the way, I&#8217;m told that, you know, we — that I don&#8217;t — I say we have to unite the country and it&#8217;s going to be harder after this trial. It may be. But, look, you know, I understand how these guys are, this Republican Party. They&#8217;ve got gone after — savaged my surviving son, gone after me, told lies that your networks and others won&#8217;t even carry on television because they&#8217;re flat-out lies.</blockquote>
Biden&#8217;s new way of referring to his son comes after The New York Times <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-russians-hack-ukrainian-gas-company-tied-to-bidens-attacks-were-successful">reported</a> this week that the Russian military successfully hacked Burisma in an effort to dig up dirt on the Bidens ahead of the 2020 election.
&#8220;The controversy surrounding Biden stems from the fact that his son was hired by Burisma to be on the company’s board of directors — despite not having any experience in natural gas or in Ukraine — at a time when the Obama administration tapped Biden to handle U.S. interests in Ukraine,&#8221; The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-russians-hack-ukrainian-gas-company-tied-to-bidens-attacks-were-successful">reported</a>. &#8220;In 2016, Biden sought to remove a Ukrainian prosecutor who was investigating the company that his son was working for over allegations of corruption.&#8221;
Biden has repeatedly blown up on the campaign trail when people have asked him about his son, who was previously <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2014/10/16/politics/hunter-biden-discharged-from-navy/index.html">kicked out</a> of the U.S. Navy for using cocaine.
“Mr. Vice President, how many times have you ever spoken to your son about his overseas business dealings?” Fox News&#8217; Peter Doocy asked.
“I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings,” Biden <a href="https://twitter.com/dmartosko/status/1175480222164160512">falsely claimed</a>. “And here’s what I know, I know Trump deserves to be investigated. He is violating every basic norm of a president. You should be asking him the question, why is he on the phone with a foreign leader trying to intimidate a foreign leader, if that’s what happened, that appears to be what happened, you should be looking at Trump.”
“Everybody looked at this, and everybody’s looked at it and said there’s nothing there,” Biden claimed. “Ask the right questions!”
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Joe Biden on his Ukraine scandal: “Why&#39;s [Trump] on the phone with a foreign leader trying to intimidate [them]?”
Biden in 2016 on what he told Ukraine: “I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money’” <a href="https://t.co/IjNgweVH67">pic.twitter.com/IjNgweVH67</a>
&mdash; Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) <a href="https://twitter.com/RealSaavedra/status/1175471237138485249?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 21, 2019</a></blockquote>
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In November, Doocy asked Biden about his son fathering a child with a woman in Arkansas while he was <a href="https://www.syracuse.com/us-news/2019/11/hunter-biden-fathered-child-with-woman-while-dating-brothers-widow-dna-test-reveals.html">dating</a> his brother’s widow.
Doocy asked Biden, “Do you have a comment on this report and court filing out of Arkansas that your son Hunter just made you a grandfather?”
“No, that’s a private matter, I have no comment,” Biden responded.
“But only you would ask that,&#8221; Biden said in an agitated state. &#8220;You’re a good man. You’re a good man. Classy.”
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Biden gets angry at a reporter for doing his job:
Reporter: &quot;Do you have a comment on this report and court filing out of Arkansas that your son Hunter just made you a grandfather?&quot;
Biden: &quot;No, that&#39;s a private matter, I have no comment. But only you would ask that. &#8230; Classy&quot; <a href="https://t.co/vxPzE8St8Q">pic.twitter.com/vxPzE8St8Q</a>
&mdash; Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) <a href="https://twitter.com/RealSaavedra/status/1197618070123995136?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 21, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Joe Hunter Biden

Joe Biden Isn’t Using Hunter’s Name Anymore, Has New Way Of Referring To Him

Hunter Biden

The New York Times reports that Iran has admitted to shooting down a Ukrainian 737 this week that killed 176 people, and claimed that the plane was accidentally shot down when it turned toward an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) military base.
The plane was shot down on Tuesday after Iran fired numerous missiles targeting U.S. forces in Iraq in retaliation for the U.S. military killing IRGC-Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, who was responsible for murdering hundreds of U.S. soldiers.
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BREAKING: <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IRAN?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#IRAN</a> admits shooting down the Ukrainian Airplane says human error, accidental, the plane turned toward an IRGC military base.<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IranPlaneCrash?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#IranPlaneCrash</a>
&mdash; Farnaz Fassihi (@farnazfassihi) <a href="https://twitter.com/farnazfassihi/status/1215841813644431361?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 11, 2020</a></blockquote>
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Iran&#8217;s admission that it shot down the passenger plane comes after it lied for several days when it falsely claimed that it did not shoot the plane down and accused the United States of engaging in a &#8220;psychological operation&#8221; against Iran by &#8220;propagating such fallacies&#8221; that it falsely claimed was &#8220;a big lie.&#8221;
&#8220;It is unfortunate that the psychological operation of the US government and those supporting it are adding insult to the injury of the bereaved families and victimising them for certain goals by propagating such fallacies,&#8221; Iranian Government spokesman Ali Rabiei <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7872337/Iran-accuses-big-lie-missile-claims.html">said</a>. &#8220;No one will assume responsibility for such a big lie once it is known that the claim had been fraudulent.&#8221;
Video from inside Iran surfaced on Tuesday night that showed the plane going down in flames shortly after taking off from Imam Khomeini International Airport.
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<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Breaking?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Breaking</a> First footage of the Ukrainian airplane while on fire falling near <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Tehran?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Tehran</a> <a href="https://t.co/kGxnBb7f1q">pic.twitter.com/kGxnBb7f1q</a>
&mdash; Ali Hashem علي هاشم (@alihashem_tv) <a href="https://twitter.com/alihashem_tv/status/1214756252749877250?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 8, 2020</a></blockquote>
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On Thursday, The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/09/video/iran-plane-missile.html">reported</a> new video that showed the moment that the plane was clearly struck by a surface to air missile, writing, &#8220;Visual and sonic clues in the footage also matched flight path information and satellite imagery of the area near where the plane crashed.&#8221;
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BREAKING: New video appears to show missile hitting Flight 752 before it crashed near Tehran, killing 176 people <a href="https://t.co/Jb3Cy3OgUT">pic.twitter.com/Jb3Cy3OgUT</a>
&mdash; BNO News (@BNONews) <a href="https://twitter.com/BNONews/status/1215354885924847616?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 9, 2020</a></blockquote>
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After the plane was shot down, Iran <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/passenger-plane-crashes-in-iran-now-iran-wont-turn-over-black-box-to-boeing">said</a> that it would not turn over the black box from the wreckage to Boeing, but would turn it over to one of their allies for examination.
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, a notorious propagandist, wrote on Twitter: &#8220;A sad day. Preliminary conclusions of internal investigation by Armed Forces: Human error at time of crisis caused by US adventurism led to disaster. Our profound regrets, apologies and condolences to our people, to the families of all victims, and to other affected nations.&#8221;
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A sad day. Preliminary conclusions of internal investigation by Armed Forces: 
Human error at time of crisis caused by US adventurism led to disaster
Our profound regrets, apologies and condolences to our people, to the families of all victims, and to other affected nations. 💔
&mdash; Javad Zarif (@JZarif) <a href="https://twitter.com/JZarif/status/1215847283381755914?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 11, 2020</a></blockquote>
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Zarif&#8217;s remarks closely align with talking points from the Democrat Party, which has sought to blame the Trump administration for the plane being shot down.
Democrat presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/just-despicable-democrat-pete-buttigieg-blasted-for-blaming-u-s-for-iran-shooting-passenger-plane">responded</a> to the incident by tweeting, “Innocent civilians are now dead because they were caught in the middle of an unnecessary and unwanted military tit for tat. My thoughts are with the families and loved ones of all 176 souls lost aboard this flight.”
Democrat Rep. Jackie Speier (CA) also tried to pin the plane being shot down on the Trump administration, telling CNN, &#8220;This is yet another example of collateral damage from the actions that have been taken in a provocative way by the president of the United States.&#8221;
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.<a href="https://twitter.com/RepSpeier?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@RepSpeier</a> blames Trump for Iran shooting down a passenger jet: “This is yet another example of collateral damage from the actions that have been taken in a provocative way by the president of the United States.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/DBeGdIozxW">pic.twitter.com/DBeGdIozxW</a>
&mdash; Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) <a href="https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1215397037509959680?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 9, 2020</a></blockquote>
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Failed Democrat congressional candidate Saira Rao falsely claimed: &#8220;Every single one of the 176 passengers on the Ukrainian plane that went down was murdered by Donald Trump. We have to start calling a thing a thing and stop pretending that this man and America are not the biggest terrorists in the world.&#8221;
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Every single one of the 176 passengers on the Ukrainian plane that went down was murdered by Donald Trump. 
We have to start calling a thing a thing and stop pretending that this man and America are not the biggest terrorists in the world.
&mdash; saira rao (@sairasameerarao) <a href="https://twitter.com/sairasameerarao/status/1215368240215379969?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 9, 2020</a></blockquote>
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This report has been updated to include additional information.

Crash site of a Ukrainian airliner that burst into flames

Iran Admits It Shot Down Passenger Plane Killing 176 People

Iran

According to a breaking report from <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/iranians-shot-down-ukraine-flight-mistake-sources-1481313">Newsweek</a>, the recent Ukrainian Boeing 737 that <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/passenger-plane-crashes-in-iran-now-iran-wont-turn-over-black-box-to-boeing">fell to its death</a>, killing all aboard, was likely the result of mistakenly fired Iranian anti-aircraft missiles.
&#8220;The Ukrainian flight that crashed just outside the Iranian capital of Tehran was struck by an anti-aircraft missile system, a Pentagon official, a senior U.S. intelligence official and an Iraqi intelligence official told Newsweek,&#8221; the outlet began.
&#8220;Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752, a Boeing 737–800 en route from Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airpot to Kyiv&#8217;s Boryspil International Airport, stopped transmitting data Tuesday just minutes after takeoff and not long after Iran launched missiles at military bases housing U.S. and allied forces in neighboring Iraq,&#8221; Newsweek continued. &#8220;The aircraft is believed to have been struck by a Russia-built Tor-M1 surface-to-air missile system, known to NATO as Gauntlet, the three officials told Newsweek.&#8221;
The weekly news magazine then reached its main point: &#8220;One Pentagon and one U.S senior intelligence official told Newsweek that the Pentagon&#8217;s assessment is that the incident was accidental. Iran&#8217;s anti-aircraft were likely active following the country&#8217;s missile attack, which came in response to the U.S. killing last week of Revolutionary Guard Quds Force commander Major General Qassem Soleimani, sources said.&#8221;
In total, 176 perished on the ill-fated flight. Sixty-three were Canadian nationals.
The Daily Wire recently <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/passenger-plane-crashes-in-iran-now-iran-wont-turn-over-black-box-to-boeing">reported</a> on the flight and the fact that the Iranian government was initially reluctant to cooperate in the ensuing investigation. “Iran will not give the black box of the crashed Ukrainian airliner to plane maker Boeing, the head of Tehran’s civil aviation organization was quoted as saying on Wednesday,” Reuters <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-crash-black-box/iran-will-not-give-black-box-from-crashed-ukrainian-airliner-to-boeing-mehr-idUSKBN1Z71C7">reported</a> at the time. “[An Iranian government spokesperson] also said it was not clear which country Iran would send the box to so that its data could be analyzed, semi-official Mehr news agency reported.”
The timing of the downed flight was naturally suspicious, considering that it transpired around the same time that Iran was launching missiles into Iraq to target military bases in Iraq hosting American troops.
Some anti-Iran hawks on Twitter reacted furiously to the news.
&#8220;Wow &#8230; Iran also refusing to hand over the black box from the flight,&#8221; said prominent conservative Twitter user &#8220;AG.&#8221; &#8220;Really looks like they shot down a civilian airliner leaving Tehran.&#8221;
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Wow&#8230; 
Iran also refusing to hand over the black box from the flight. Really looks like they shot down a civilian airliner leaving Tehran. <a href="https://t.co/pB1ndgY7Wz">https://t.co/pB1ndgY7Wz</a>
&mdash; (((AG))) (@AGHamilton29) <a href="https://twitter.com/AGHamilton29/status/1215307585454256129?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 9, 2020</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;Reason unclear,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;It was either an accident as they were preparing for possible retaliation from the US or intentional action meant to be blamed on the US pending retaliation which never came. In either case, 176 innocent people are now dead and Iran is likely responsible.&#8221;
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Reason unclear. It was either an accident as they were preparing for possible retaliation from the US or intentional action meant to be blamed on the US pending retaliation which never came. In either case, 176 innocent people are now dead and Iran is likely responsible.
&mdash; (((AG))) (@AGHamilton29) <a href="https://twitter.com/AGHamilton29/status/1215308918479605761?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 9, 2020</a></blockquote>
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The unfolding situation with respect to the downed Ukrainian airline is concurrent with the broader geopolitical ratcheting up of tensions between the U.S. and Iran. Yesterday, Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/shapiro-iran-loses-its-showdown-with-trump">opined</a> on the broader state of hostilities between the two nations:
<blockquote>The truth is that Iran came off poorly in this exchange. That’s not just because a ballistic missile attack that fails to damage American assets looks pitiful. It’s because Iran just undercut its entire case in Iraq. In the aftermath of Soleimani’s killing, the left-wing press, Democrats, and isolationist right in the United States were blaming Trump for escalating the Iranian situation; that take will not hold water after this latest response.</blockquote>

Iran plane crash

BREAKING: Iranian Missile Likely Shot Down Ukrainian Plane By Mistake, Report Says

In an interview with <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/buttigieg-not-wanted-son-ukraine-220724456.html">The Associated Press</a> released Monday, South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg echoed a criticism of the Democratic presidential frontrunner frequently leveled by the man the Democrats want so badly to dethrone — the very criticism that sparked the Democrats&#8217; impeachment effort.
Without a single Republican vote, the House Democrats impeached President Trump for allegedly attempting to pressure the Ukrainian government into investigating his political opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, specifically in connection to his son&#8217;s lucrative position on the board of a Ukrainian energy company while Biden was heading up U.S.-Ukraine relations.
&#8220;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,&#8221; Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during their much-scrutinized July 25 call. &#8220;So whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it … It sounds horrible to me.&#8221;
Trump was referencing Biden threatening in March 2016 to withhold $1 billion in U.S. aid to pressure Ukraine into firing its top prosecutor, Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin, who was conducting a corruption investigation into the energy company, Burisma Holdings, which was employing Biden&#8217;s son, Hunter Biden.
Biden later publicly boasted about his successful pressure campaign, but has since defended his actions, insisting that he wanted Shokin removed because he was failing to weed out corruption, not because of his investigation into his son&#8217;s company.
In his new interview with AP, Buttigieg took a shot at Biden over the issue, saying that he would not have allowed his son to take the position in the first place. AP reports:
<blockquote>Pete Buttigieg says he &#8220;would not have wanted to see&#8221; his son serving on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company while he was leading anti-corruption efforts in the country, an implicit criticism of the controversy that has ensnared his 2020 Democratic presidential rival Joe Biden.</blockquote>
His administration, Buttigieg told AP, will &#8220;do everything we can to prevent even the appearance of a conflict.&#8221;
&#8220;That&#8217;s very important because as we see it can create a lot of complications even when there is no wrongdoing,&#8221; he explained.
&#8220;So, I would not have wanted to see that happen,&#8221; the Democratic candidate said when asked how he would have handled the Burisma situation if he were in Biden&#8217;s position.
After echoing Trump&#8217;s criticism against Biden, Buttigieg attempted to distance himself from Republicans, saying: &#8220;And at the same time, again, I think this is being used to divert attention from what&#8217;s really at stake in the impeachment process. There&#8217;s been no allegation, let alone finding of any kind of wrongdoing.&#8221;
&#8220;I just think it&#8217;s the wrong conversation to be having right now, though, given the spectacular misconduct that we have already seen in facts that are not in dispute, where the only argument to be had is over whether it rises to the level of removal,&#8221; the mayor added.
AP reached out to Biden&#8217;s campaign but they declined to comment.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/buttigieg-channels-trump-hits-biden-on-ukraine">Report: New Evidence Shows Hunter Biden-Ukraine Payments Flagged As ‘Suspicious’ In Early 2016</a>

Biden Buttigieg

Buttigieg Channels Trump: Hits Biden On Ukraine

Pete Buttigieg

Over the weekend, former Vice President and leading Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden told a crowd of supporters in Peterborough, New Hampshire, that fossil fuel executives should be thrown in jail.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hunter-biden-served-as-ceremonial-figure-on-board-for-more-than-80000-per-month-report">Hunter Biden</a>, the son of the former VP, previously served as a fossil fuel executive, sitting on the board of Burisma Holdings, one of Ukraine’s largest natural gas companies. Biden&#8217;s son reportedly made $80,000 a month as a board member.
&#8220;In order to curb the rate of pollution, Biden explained, we need to hold fossil fuel executives &#8216;liable for what they have done, particularly in those cases where there are underserved neighborhoods,'&#8221; <a href="https://townhall.com/tipsheet/cortneyobrien/2019/12/30/biden-obliviously-tells-press-that-fossil-fuel-execs-should-be-jailed-n2558679">Townhall</a> reported. &#8220;When they don&#8217;t deliver, Biden offered, &#8216;put them in jail.'&#8221;
In other words, Mr. Biden accidentally argued that Hunter, his son, should potentially serve jail time.
Hunter&#8217;s position on the board of Burisma while his father served as VP has sparked obvious ethical questions. Aside from the unqualified Biden son&#8217;s big paycheck with the company, Burisma paid $3.4 million to Rosemont Seneca Bohai LLC, a company headed by Hunter&#8217;s business partner Devon Archer, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-hunter-biden-ukraine-idUSKBN1WX1P7">Reuters</a> reported in October.
WATCH:
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.<a href="https://twitter.com/JoeBiden?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JoeBiden</a> on fossil fuel execs: “We should put them in jail” for pollution <a href="https://t.co/OLqZMwi4E5">pic.twitter.com/OLqZMwi4E5</a>
&mdash; Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) <a href="https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1211413338053365761?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 29, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Biden has offered extreme positions with regard to Climate Change, even if that means cutting hundreds of thousands of blue collar jobs.
“The answer is yes,” the candidate said of potentially cutting &#8220;hundreds of thousands of blue collar workers in the interest transitioning to [a] greener economy&#8221; during a Democratic presidential debate in December.
“The answer is yes because the opportunity for those workers is to switch to high paying jobs,” Biden continued, as noted by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/biden-eliminate-hundreds-of-thousands-of-blue-collar-jobs-for-greener-economy">The Daily Wire</a>. “We should, in fact, be making sure right now that every new building built is energy contained, that it doesn’t leak energy, that in fact we should be providing tax credits for people to be able to make their homes turn to solar power. There are all kinds of folks — right here in California, we’re now on the verge of having batteries that are about the size of the top of this podium that you can store energy when in fact the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining. We have enormous opportunities.”
According to a report from <a href="https://theintercept.com/2019/09/04/after-climate-forum-biden-heads-to-a-fundraiser-co-hosted-by-a-fossil-fuel-executive/">The Intercept</a> in September, Mr. Biden attended a fundraising event co-hosted by fossil fuel executive Andrew Goldman, who co-founded Western LNG, a natural gas production company based in Houston, Texas.
The New Hampshire rally for the Democratic candidate was filled with bad news for Biden. Aside from making the case against his own son, the frontrunner was heckled for allegedly &#8220;touching kids.&#8221;
&#8220;A protester at a rally for Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden yelled at the former vice president on Sunday, telling him not to touch kids and calling him a &#8216;pervert,'&#8221; <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/protester-yells-at-biden-during-campaign-event-dont-touch-kids-you-pervert?itm_source=parsely-api">The Daily Wire</a> reported. &#8220;Biden and the protester, who is out of view in the video, go back and forth for several moments, with Biden saying, &#8216;Alright, I agree with you man, I agree, nice talking to you.'&#8221;
“Don’t touch kids, you pervert!” the protester yelled back at Biden.
WATCH:
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“Don’t touch kids, you pervert!” shouted a heckler to Joe Biden at his NH campaign event. <a href="https://t.co/9VW10JcO2v">pic.twitter.com/9VW10JcO2v</a>
&mdash; Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) <a href="https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1211447906328178690?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 30, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Joe and Hunter Biden

WATCH: Joe Biden Accidentally Makes Argument To Potentially Jail Own Son

Joe Biden got heckled — again.
This time the former vice president was in New Hampshire, campaigning in Milford on Sunday. Several hecklers interrupted him, calling him &#8220;creepy&#8221; and a &#8220;pervert.&#8221;
Just after Biden started speaking, a man in the back of the room shouted &#8220;don’t touch kids, you pervert.&#8221; Then a woman said &#8220;the truth is going to come out, buddy,&#8221; and started chanting &#8220;quid pro Joe.&#8221; Then another man asked Biden where the money is that he and his son Hunter “earned from Ukraine.&#8221;
Biden looked taken aback, and then laughed.
As the first man shouted, Biden said, &#8220;This is not a Trump rally.&#8221; After the hecklers finished, a flustered Biden said, &#8220;This, this, this is a democracy.&#8221;
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WATCH: Three consecutive interruptions at Biden’s Milford, NH event—shortly after taking the mic, a man in the back of the room calls the former VP “creepy” and a “pervert”. Then a woman in the crowd shouts &quot;quid pro Joe” at Biden. 1/2 <a href="https://t.co/XcWAiUsILN">pic.twitter.com/XcWAiUsILN</a>
&mdash; Allie Raffa (@AllieRaffa) <a href="https://twitter.com/AllieRaffa/status/1211434927910215680?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 29, 2019</a></blockquote>
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“Don’t touch kids, you pervert!” shouted a heckler to Joe Biden at his NH campaign event. <a href="https://t.co/9VW10JcO2v">pic.twitter.com/9VW10JcO2v</a>
&mdash; Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) <a href="https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1211447906328178690?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 30, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Before Biden even got into the race, a slew of women came out and said that he had touched them inappropriately. Lucy Flores, a former Nevada assemblywoman who was running for lieutenant governor in 2014, accused Biden of inappropriately touching her during a campaign rally, saying she felt uncomfortable and demeaned by his touching.
Then Amy Lappos told The Hartford Courant that “Biden touched her inappropriately and rubbed noses with her during a 2009 political fundraiser in Greenwich when he was vice president.”
“It wasn’t sexual, but he did grab me by the head,” she told The Courant. “He put his hand around my neck and pulled me in to rub noses with me. When he was pulling me in, I thought he was going to kiss me on the mouth.”
Then two more women came forward. “Caitlyn Caruso, a former college student and sexual assault survivor, said Mr. Biden rested his hand on her thigh — even as she squirmed in her seat to show her discomfort — and hugged her ‘just a little bit too long’ at an event on sexual assault at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She was 19,” The New York Times reported.
Biden issued a statement as the total number of women who came forward grew to nine.
“In my many years on the campaign trail and in public life, I have offered countless handshakes, hugs, expressions of affection, support and comfort. And not once — never — did I believe I acted inappropriately. If it is suggested I did so, I will listen respectfully,” he said in a statement.
The man who heckled Biden about his son was referring to the Bidens&#8217; links to Ukraine. President Trump was impeached by the House because Democrats said his July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was inappropriate because he asked Zelensky to probe a corrupt company that once employed Hunter Biden, who reportedly made more than $80,000 a month from Burisma Holdings.
To that heckler, Biden said, &#8220;I&#8217;ve released 21 years of my tax returns, how many has yours? What&#8217;s he hiding?&#8221; referring to Trump, who has not released his tax returns.
Earlier this month on a campaign swing through Iowa, Biden blasted a man as a &#8220;liar&#8221; after the man cited Hunter Biden&#8217;s role at Burisma.
&#8220;You sent your son over there to get a job and work for a gas company where he had no experience. &#8230; In order to get access for the president &#8230; you&#8217;re selling access to the president just like he was,” the man said.
&#8220;You’re a damn liar, man. That&#8217;s not true and no one has ever said that.&#8221;
Then Biden challenged the 83-year-old man to a push-up contest.

Democratic Presidential Candidate Joe Biden Campaigns In Iowa

Hecklers Hammer Biden In NH: Ask Him About Ukraine, Call Him ‘Creepy’

On Saturday, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden tried to walk back comments that he made this week when he declared that he would not comply with a Senate subpoena in President Donald Trump&#8217;s impeachment trial, which involves alleged Biden corruption in Ukraine.
Biden made the remarks during an interview with The Des Moines Register on Friday when he was asked, &#8220;Do you stand by your earlier statements that you wouldn&#8217;t comply if you were subpoenaed to testify in an impeachment trial before the Senate?&#8221;
&#8220;Correct, and the reason I wouldn&#8217;t is because it&#8217;s all designed to deal with Trump doing what he&#8217;s done his whole life: trying to take the focus off him,&#8221; Biden responded. &#8220;The issue is not what I did, not a single person, not one single person, even that thug Giuliani and his compatriots, have said I did anything other than my job.&#8221;
&#8220;Every one of the people whose sworn testimony [unintelligible] for him said Biden did his job and he did it well,&#8221; Biden continued. &#8220;This is all about a diversion, and we play his game all the time; he&#8217;s done it his whole career; he&#8217;s done it his whole career, and I&#8217;m very proud of the job I did. I never, never, never moved off of dealing with corruption there.&#8221;
Moments later, The Des Moines Register asked Biden, &#8220;Doesn&#8217;t that position you as if you&#8217;re defying a subpoena – putting yourself above the law?&#8221;
Biden responded, &#8220;Well look, the grounds for them to call me would be overwhelmingly specious but, so, I don&#8217;t anticipate that happening anyway.&#8221;
Biden then revealed that the reason he does not want to comply with the subpoena is that he is worried about how the media would cover what he said in his testimony.
&#8220;But what it would do if I went – let&#8217;s say I voluntarily just said, let me go make my case, what are you gonna cover?&#8221; Biden continued. &#8220;You guys, instead of [focusing], you&#8217;re gonna cover for three weeks anything I said, and he&#8217;s going to get away. You guys buy into it all the time. Not a joke. Think about it. As we say in my church – examine your conscience. Doesn&#8217;t mean I shouldn&#8217;t testify if you thought I should, but think what it&#8217;s about. It&#8217;s all about what he does all the time, his entire career, take the focus off. This guy violated the Constitution.&#8221;
WATCH:
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Watch: <a href="https://twitter.com/JoeBiden?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JoeBiden</a> says he wouldn&#39;t comply with a Senate subpoena in <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@realDonaldTrump</a>&#39;s impeachment trial because it would create a narrative that would let the president &quot;off the hook.&quot;
Read more from our interview earlier today: <a href="https://t.co/xgpO6OOPw2">https://t.co/xgpO6OOPw2</a> <a href="https://t.co/bqrapiVhVO">pic.twitter.com/bqrapiVhVO</a>
&mdash; Des Moines Register (@DMRegister) <a href="https://twitter.com/DMRegister/status/1210731617276182528?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Biden seemingly tried to walk back his comments on Saturday in a series of tweets, which added confusion to his stance on the matter, as he did not definitively say whether or not he would comply with a subpoena.
&#8220;I want to clarify something I said yesterday,&#8221; Biden wrote on Twitter. &#8220;In my 40 years in public life, I have always complied with a lawful order and in my eight years as VP, my office – unlike Donald Trump and Mike Pence – cooperated with legitimate congressional oversight requests.&#8221;
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I want to clarify something I said yesterday. In my 40 years in public life, I have always complied with a lawful order and in my eight years as VP, my office — unlike Donald Trump and Mike Pence — cooperated with legitimate congressional oversight requests.
&mdash; Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) <a href="https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1210946785847468033?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;But I am just not going to pretend that there is any legal basis for Republican subpoenas for my testimony in the impeachment trial,&#8221; Biden continued. “That is the point I was making yesterday and I reiterate: this impeachment is about Trump’s conduct, not mine. The subpoenas should go to witnesses with testimony to offer to Trump’s shaking down the Ukraine government – they should go to the White House.&#8221;
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The subpoenas should go to witnesses with testimony to offer to Trump’s shaking down the Ukraine government — they should go to the White House.
&mdash; Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) <a href="https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1210946792369610752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Biden Declares He Won’t Comply With Subpoena, Fears Media Reaction To His Testimony. Now He’s Trying To Walk It Back.

President Donald Trump promoted a video clip on Friday night that implied House Speaker Rep. Nancy Pelosi&#8217;s (D-CA) son, Paul Pelosi, might have been involved in a Ukrainian corruption scandal similar to the allegations facing former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.
The video was featured in a tweet from a random Twitter account that stated: &#8220;@oann exposes those DemocRATS &amp; their Ukraine ties Joe &amp; Hunter &amp; Nancy &amp; Paul; seems like it’s a Family Affair What’s going on here ? Pay attention to 1:13 in this video as it has been removed from social media&#8221;
Trump retweeted the video, <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1210750161174941696">writing</a>, &#8220;Wow Crazy Nancy, what’s going on? This is big stuff!&#8221;
The insinuation that Paul Pelosi may have been involved in corruption in Ukraine has not been verified.
WATCH:
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.<a href="https://twitter.com/OANN?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@oann</a> exposes those DemocRATS &amp; their Ukraine ties Joe &amp; Hunter &amp; Nancy &amp; Paul; seems like it’s a Family Affair 
What’s going on here ? Pay attention to 1:13 in this video as it has been removed from social media <a href="https://t.co/EFivBxANF1">pic.twitter.com/EFivBxANF1</a>
&mdash; Constitutional Republic TEXT TRUMP 88022 (@Text88022) <a href="https://twitter.com/Text88022/status/1210570523970850816?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 27, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Transcript of the video:
<blockquote>As the Ukraine scandal backfires on the Biden family, the Pelosis maybe the next to come under scrutiny. An old promotional video resurfaced on Thursday, more than six years after it was uploaded by an energy company that does business in Ukraine. The video starts out with Nancy Pelosi speaking about her efforts [in office] to push for clean energy. Her message is followed by a promotional statement from her son Paul, who is a board member of Viscoil and an executive at its related company, NRGLab.
Just two years after this video was uploaded, Pelosi led a congressional delegation to Ukraine to discuss issues like energy security, and her son traveled as recently as 2017 on behalf of the Corporate Governance Initiative where he now serves as executive director. While the official reason given for his visit was to discuss a youth soccer partnership program with the Ukrainian government, clips of that trip are now reportedly being removed from online. One of those clips was saved by The American Mirror on Twitter, with the caption: “What’s really going on here?”
This comes as Hunter Biden faces similar allegations that he used his father’s position to make lucrative business deals in Ukraine and China.</blockquote>
Numerous fact check organizations, including <a href="https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/pelosi-jr-ukraine/">Snopes</a>, <a href="https://www.politifact.com/facebook-fact-checks/statements/2019/oct/10/facebook-posts/pelosi-romney-and-kerry-dont-have-sons-working-com/">Politifact</a>, and <a href="https://www.factcheck.org/2019/10/dubious-posts-tie-political-families-to-ukraine-work/">FactCheck.org</a> have all cast doubts on the allegations, which has been floating around on the internet for a while.
Here&#8217;s Trump&#8217;s tweet promoting the video:
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Wow Crazy Nancy, what’s going on? This is big stuff! <a href="https://t.co/hoHSERKgh9">https://t.co/hoHSERKgh9</a>
&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1210750161174941696?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Trump&#8217;s promotion of the video, which appears to be sketchy at best, comes after he has taunted Pelosi numerous times in recent days as she continues to withhold articles of impeachment from the Senate.
On Thursday, Trump tweeted: &#8220;Nancy Pelosi’s District in California has rapidly become one of the worst anywhere in the U.S. when it come to the homeless &amp; crime. It has gotten so bad, so fast &#8211; she has lost total control and, along with her equally incompetent governor, Gavin Newsom, it is a very sad sight!&#8221;
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Nancy Pelosi’s District in California has rapidly become one of the worst anywhere in the U.S. when it come to the homeless &amp; crime. It has gotten so bad, so fast &#8211; she has lost total control and, along with her equally incompetent governor, Gavin Newsom, it is a very sad sight!
&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1210183406904074240?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 26, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Trump added, &#8220;California leads the nation, by far, in both the number of homeless people, and the percentage increase in the homeless population &#8211; two terrible stats. Crazy Nancy should focus on that in her very down district, and helping her incompetent governor with the big homeless problem!&#8221;
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California leads the nation, by far, in both the number of homeless people, and the percentage increase in the homeless population &#8211; two terrible stats. Crazy Nancy should focus on that in her very down district, and helping her incompetent governor with the big homeless problem!
&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1210347885386178560?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 26, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Trump continued, &#8220;Why should Crazy Nancy Pelosi, just because she has a slight majority in the House, be allowed to Impeach the President of the United States? Got ZERO Republican votes, there was no crime, the call with Ukraine was perfect, with &#8216;no pressure.&#8217; She said it must be &#8216;bipartisan &amp; overwhelming,&#8217; but this Scam Impeachment was neither. Also, very unfair with no Due Process, proper representation, or witnesses. Now Pelosi is demanding everything the Republicans weren’t allowed to have in the House. Dems want to run majority Republican Senate. Hypocrites!&#8221;
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&#8230;&amp; overwhelming,” but this Scam Impeachment was neither. Also, very unfair with no Due Process, proper representation, or witnesses. Now Pelosi is demanding everything the Republicans weren’t allowed to have in the House. Dems want to run majority Republican Senate. Hypocrites!
&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1210035580140175361?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 26, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Pelosi family

Trump Promotes Video That Implies Pelosi’s Son Involved In Ukrainian Corruption

Nancy Pelosi

Despite Mark Galli’s recent claims in <a href="https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2019/december-web-only/trump-should-be-removed-from-office.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2019/december-web-only/trump-should-be-removed-from-office.html&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1577118452556000&amp;usg=AFQjCNEhuGnDa89zSOJWekCYIVaIqckiQA">Christianity Today</a>, the overwhelming majority of both evangelical Christians and Orthodox Jews reject the notion of impeaching the president and plan to vote for him in 2020. It is not hard to understand why.
Regarding impeachment, we begin with the same presumption of innocence given to every defendant. That is not merely a quirk of American jurisprudence, but a biblical principle summarized in the Sayings of the Fathers (1:6): “Judge every person favorably.” We are obligated to see the behavior of others, including the president, in a favorable light until we know otherwise.
Could the president’s call with his Ukrainian counterpart be seen as improper? Yes. But it could <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/the-two-theories-of-trumps-actions-in-the-ukraine-affair/">also have been a reasonable request</a> for an investigation of criminal activity. At this rate, we will never know.
One cannot assert the president was wrong to want an investigation of Joe Biden’s involvement in Ukraine’s judiciary until we know both that Biden’s behavior was unquestionably above-board, and that the president knew or should have known that this was the case. Otherwise, we must presume (there’s that word again) that President Trump was genuinely concerned about the involvement of the previous vice president in Ukraine’s well-documented corruption. That does not become less appropriate merely because Biden is running for office again — if anything, just the opposite.
Then we must consider that President Volodymyr Zelensky, along with several other officials in both administrations, has insisted all along that there was no coercion, no bribery, and no “quid pro quo.” Galli’s assertion that President Trump “attempted to use his political power to coerce a foreign leader to harass and discredit one of the president’s political opponents” remains dubious, at best — not “unambiguous,” as he claims. We are therefore morally obligated to presume it is false.
The way to have defeated that presumption was through impartial examination of conduct on both sides. Democrats instead rushed to their partisan debacle, strongly suggesting that the truth did not lie with them from the outset.
President Andrew Johnson’s impeachment did not involve a special counsel — probably because they didn’t exist yet. This is the first time the House of Representatives deliberately bypassed an independent investigation prior to impeachment.
Archibald Cox, the special prosecutor looking into the Watergate scandal, served for over six months until Richard Nixon had him fired — which triggered the House of Representatives to begin impeachment three months later. Six months after that, Nixon’s resignation brought it all to an end. Do the math: 15 months after the prosecutor was appointed, the House had yet to hold a single vote.
Ken Starr was already serving as special prosecutor long before Linda Tripp contacted him with tapes of her conversations with Monica Lewinsky. Yet it took Starr nearly eight months to produce the report that cost Clinton his law license. The House launched formal impeachment proceedings a month later, and then took two months to adopt articles of impeachment. The process took ten months overall, shortened both because the special prosecutor was already hard at work and because of the obvious evidence of illegal activity.
Last week’s impeachment, by comparison, took less than two months from beginning to end. Mueller taught Democrats that a special counsel concerned for law and justice could not be relied upon to reach their predetermined and preferred conclusion. Instead, the House bypassed its own rules for involvement of the minority party and inclusion of exculpatory evidence, bandied about charges of bribery and “quid pro quos” and then, in apparent desperation, called it unlawful for a president to assert executive privilege. While Democrats wore dark clothing and were told to restrain themselves in the chamber, their actual mood was best exemplified by Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MN)’s video, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-democrat-rep-tlaib-posts-video-celebrating-impeachment-vote-trump-responds">chortling</a> as she went to “i<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-fresh-face-dem-congresswoman-were-gonna-hank-berrien">mpeach the motherf*****</a>.” And no wonder: Impeachment was Democrats&#8217; only notable accomplishment for the year.
As Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC) so aptly put it, the standards used were so inadequate that they couldn’t secure a conviction for a parking ticket. Most Democratic senators will similarly express contempt for the presidency, the presumption of innocence, the democratic process, and the rule of law all with one shameful vote, but it is inappropriate in the extreme for Galli to advocate for such a travesty — and in the name of biblical values, no less.
What, then, of the next election? It is a sad fact that in a democracy, a presidential election is in some ways a glorified popularity contest. The president proved himself an expert at securing free coverage, which helped him win the nomination over more mainstream politicians. But a president’s personal failings, until they rise to the level of an impeachable offense, cannot override our primary concern when selecting a candidate for that office: The policies he or she will promote, and the impact those policies will have upon all Americans.
I recently commented that the Coalition for Jewish Values would like to demonstrate lack of partisanship by castigating the president for an objectionable policy decision, but he has stymied our efforts by not making one. On life, family, marriage, conscience — and, yes, Anti-Semitism and Israel — he has not merely satisfied, but has exceeded, any reasonable expectations. Just as relevant is that the Democrats who would replace him opposed each and every one of those policy choices. That is why the pro-values community remains likely to vote to re-elect the president in 2020, and why it should do so.
&nbsp;
Rabbi Yaakov Menken is the managing director of the <a href="https://coalitionforjewishvalues.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://coalitionforjewishvalues.org/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1577118452556000&amp;usg=AFQjCNEu2s6hwO2BttmAJk9V5rKcz_yh6w">Coalition for Jewish Values</a>, and co-editor of the Orthodox Jewish journal <a href="https://cross-currents.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://cross-currents.com/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1577118452556000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHLGJT10b-69pv-fjRcdthOir71xA">Cross-Currents.com</a>. Opinions are his own.

President Trump Delvers Remarks At White House Mental Health Summit

MENKEN: Supporting The President Is The Moral Choice

Christianity

Judaism

Religion

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) revealed on Wednesday during Democrats&#8217; partisan impeachment hearing that it was her son that convinced her to impeach President Donald Trump and, furthermore, that he convinced her to do so back in June — a month before Trump&#8217;s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
&#8220;It is my adult son Ian Schakowsky, whom I will always credit for my decision last June to support an impeachment inquiry,&#8221; Schakowsky said. &#8220;It had never been my goal to impeach a president, but Ian made such a compelling case.&#8221;
&#8220;He reminded me of the oath that I have taken 11 times now to support and defend the Constitution of the United States,&#8221; Schakowsky continued. &#8220;He said, &#8216;Mom, this is not about politics, this is not about party,&#8217; and pushing back against my arguments, he said, &#8216;This has nothing to do with the final outcome, it&#8217;s about doing the right thing, even if others don&#8217;t.'&#8221;
&#8220;He made me see that it was about my legacy, my modest place in history,&#8221; Schakowsky concluded. &#8220;I want to thank you, my son, for helping me do the right thing today, to vote to impeach the President of the United States, Donald Trump, because no American is above the law.&#8221;
WATCH:
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Democrat Rep. Schakowsky says her son convinced her to impeach in June, which was before the Ukraine phone call<a href="https://t.co/woBRHeZSeT">https://t.co/woBRHeZSeT</a> <a href="https://t.co/eWlrJLuYIg">pic.twitter.com/eWlrJLuYIg</a>
&mdash; RNC Research (@RNCResearch) <a href="https://twitter.com/RNCResearch/status/1207429447089086465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 18, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Democrats went on to vote for impeaching Trump in what became the first time in U.S. history that a president was impeached on a purely partisan basis as only Democrats voted for impeaching the president while all Republicans and multiple Democrats voted against impeachment.
Democrat presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard did not vote for either articles of impeachment &#8212; abuse of power and obstruction of Congress &#8212; and instead voted &#8220;present.&#8221;
Gabbard said, “I could not in good conscience vote for impeachment because removal of a sitting President must not be the culmination of a partisan process, fueled by tribal animosities that have so gravely divided our country.”
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Dem HI Rep Gabbard on her “present” vote on impeachment: I could not in good conscience vote for impeachment because removal of a sitting President must not be the culmination of a partisan process, fueled by tribal animosities that have so gravely divided our country.
&mdash; Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChadPergram/status/1207477655643271169?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 19, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Trump was at a campaign rally when the impeachment vote occurred and said in response to learning about the results of the vote,  “With today’s illegal, unconstitutional and partisan impeachment, House Democrats are declaring their deep hatred and disdain for American Voters. This lawless and partisan impeachment is a political suicide march for the Democrat Party!”
“I don’t know about you, but I’m having a great time,” Trump added.
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🚨MOMENTS AGO🚨 “With today’s illegal, unconstitutional and partisan impeachment, House Democrats are declaring their deep hatred and disdain for American Voters. This lawless and partisan impeachment is a political suicide march for the Democrat Party!” President Donald J. Trump <a href="https://t.co/Z78vcBEQ7n">pic.twitter.com/Z78vcBEQ7n</a>
&mdash; Dan Scavino (@DanScavino) <a href="https://twitter.com/DanScavino/status/1207491373965959168?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 19, 2019</a></blockquote>
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George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley, a harsh critic of Trump who votes for Democrats, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-critic-witness-tells-democrats-you-just-dont-have-the-evidence-to-impeach">warned</a> Democrats during their impeachment hearings that they did not have the evidence needed to impeach Trump.
During his opening statement, Turley said, &#8220;I would like to start, perhaps incongruously, with a statement of three irrelevant facts. First, I am not a supporter of President Trump. I voted against him in 2016 and I have previously voted for Presidents Clinton and Obama. Second, I have been highly critical of President Trump, his policies, and his rhetoric, in dozens of columns. Third, I have repeatedly criticized his raising of the investigation of the Hunter Biden matter with the Ukrainian president. These points are not meant to curry favor or approval. Rather they are meant to drive home a simple point: one can oppose President Trump’s policies or actions but still conclude that the current legal case for impeachment is not just woefully inadequate, but in some respects, dangerous, as the basis for the impeachment of an American president.&#8221;
Turley added, To put it simply, I hold no brief for President Trump. My personal and political views of President Trump, however, are irrelevant to my impeachment testimony, as they should be to your impeachment vote. Today, my only concern is the integrity and coherence of the constitutional standard and process of impeachment. President Trump will not be our last president and what we leave in the wake of this scandal will shape our democracy for generations to come. I am concerned about lowering impeachment standards to fit a paucity of evidence and an abundance of anger. If the House proceeds solely on the Ukrainian allegations, this impeachment would stand out among modern impeachments as the shortest proceeding, with the thinnest evidentiary record, and the narrowest grounds ever used to impeach a president. That does not bode well for future presidents who are working in a country often sharply and, at times, bitterly divided.&#8221;
&nbsp;

Jan Schakowsky

Democrat Jan Schakowsky: My Kid Convinced Me To Impeach Trump Before Ukraine Call Happened

U.S. House of Representatives

On Tuesday’s episode of “The Andrew Klavan Show,” Klavan talks about how Adam Schiff has played into the hands of Putin by falling for the Russian collusion conspiracy theory. Video and partial transcript below: 
The Republicans are basically threatening to turn the tables on this entire investigation. Bill McGurn has a terrific column in [The Wall Street] <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-job-for-adam-schiff-11576540574">Journal</a> [Tuesday,] saying:
<blockquote>Now that his impeachment work is over, here&#8217;s a new assignment for Adam Schiff: to investigate whether the bad intel in the Christopher Steele dossier was there because the former British spy was a sloppy partisan — or because he was the patsy in a Russian disinformation campaign.
As chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Mr. Schiff is plainly the man for the job. Such an investigation fits comfortably with his oft-stated complaint that Vladimir Putin interfered in the 2016 presidential election and will do so again in 2020 if we don&#8217;t stop it. Meanwhile, the allegation that the Steele “dossier” was a product of Russian disinformation comes from one of Mr. Schiff&#8217;s own star witnesses, Fiona Hill.</blockquote>
&#8230; The myth that the Democrats spread around and that [former Special Counsel Robert] Mueller helped spread was that Vladimir Putin was trying to get Trump to win and Hillary to lose — I said from the very beginning, that is absolutely absurd. Everyone knew, including me, everyone knew Hillary Clinton was going to win. There was no way Vladimir Putin had any idea that Donald Trump could win because nobody had any idea Donald Trump could win. So I speculated, “Well, what was he doing?” He&#8217;s obviously just screwing around with our election and their own witness, Fiona Hill, said the same thing. Here she is:
<blockquote>HILL: The Russians interests, frankly, to delegitimize our entire presidency. So one issue that I do want to raise and I think that this would resonate with our colleagues, some on the committee from the Republican Party, is that the goal of the Russians was really to put whoever became the president by trying to tip their hands on one side of the scale under a cloud. 
So if secretary, former first lady, former Senator Clinton had been elected as president, as indeed many expected in the run up to the election in 2016, she too would have had major questions about her legitimacy. And I think that, you know, what we&#8217;re seeing here as a result of all of these narratives, is this is exactly what the Russian government was hoping for. If they seed misinformation, they seed doubt, they have everybody questioning the legitimacy of a presidential candidate being President Trump or potentially President Clinton, that they would pit one side of our electorate against the other, that they would pit one party against the other. </blockquote>
See, this is the thing, and I said this from the very beginning, because it has to be true as the only way the story makes sense. Vladimir Putin has been messing with our elections forever. They do all this kind of — they take out ads and they do whatever they can to disrupt things. He doesn&#8217;t care whether Donald Trump is president. This whole mythology that Donald Trump was a Russian asset, [which] Brennan and Clapper were selling on TV to cover up their own bad behavior in the Obama administration, it just doesn&#8217;t make sense. 
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There was simply no way for Vladimir Putin to know there was any chance of Donald Trump winning. He went after Clinton because it was obvious she was going to win — that&#8217;s why he&#8217;s mostly targeting Clinton, not Trump. But if it had been clear that Trump was going to win, he would have targeted Trump. It&#8217;s America that he&#8217;s after — it&#8217;s us — he wants us at each other&#8217;s throats. 
So who are the Russians&#8217; assets? Because this is Putin&#8217;s success that he couldn&#8217;t even have dreamed of, Adam Schiff going on TV and convicting Trump for two years of Russian collusion, falsely, of lying about it. Adam Schiff lying about his relationship with the whistleblower in the Ukraine affair, Adam Schiff lying now about whether he could have known that the FBI FISA warrant process was out of control when Devin Nunes knew two years ago. Why didn&#8217;t he know? Because he was lying. 
Adam Schiff is a Russian asset. I don&#8217;t think on purpose, I just think he&#8217;s a patsy who [has] played into the Russian plan to make us to turn us against each other. James Comey, another guy who went after Trump with a vengeance, who made it sound as if it were possible that Donald Trump was some kind of colluding with the Russians — I think it was Lindsey Graham [who] recently said Donald Trump doesn&#8217;t collude with anybody. He doesn’t collude with his own government, why would he collude with the Russians? It&#8217;s nonsense. 
Of course, Jerry Nadler, who just does whatever that [he’s] told, I&#8217;m sure, who&#8217;s bumbling around trying to make this impeachment thing sound like it&#8217;s a constitutional emergency. These are the three Russian stooges, these are the guys who either the Moe, Larry, and Curly of Russia&#8217;s attempt to fiddle with our country, and they have just been patsies for this guy, who is very good at this information and who sent that disinformation through Christopher Steele and through this — now we know, bogus, dossier. Who fell for it? I didn&#8217;t, they did. 
<a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-andrew-klavan-show/id1045171376?mt=2">Listen to full episodes of “The Andrew Klavan Show” on iTunes. </a> 
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/the-andrew-klavan-show">Watch “The Andrew Klavan Show” on-demand!</a>

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