Day 1,102: Bolton book: Trump tied Ukraine aid to faux Biden investigations

More evidence of what’s been largely uncontested during impeachment.

The crux on Donald Trump’s impeachment trial is why he withheld nearly $400 million in aid to Ukraine that Congress had allocated.

It’s obvious he sat on the aid, and the mountain of evidence that he did it pending a manufactured investigation into his political rivals has gone largely unchallenged by Trump’s impeachment defense team. With a long-rigged trial at hand, Republicans have been trying to run the clock out while pointing out the lack of witnesses with first-hand knowledge of Trump’s actions.

That’s entirely due to Trump blocking all of the witnesses who have direct knowledge of his actions in the Ukraine scheme. In theory, these witnesses’ testimony would exonerate Trump, if he is telling the truth. In realty, they’re being blocked because they would implicate him.

Now, a book manuscript from John Bolton, Trump’s former National Security Advisor, and a witness long-sought by Democrats, provides a first-hand account of Trump’s dangerous actions.

President Trump told his national security adviser in August that he wanted to continue freezing $391 million in security assistance to Ukraine until officials there helped with investigations into Democrats including the Bidens, according to an unpublished manuscript by the former adviser, John R. Bolton.

In his August 2019 discussion with Mr. Bolton, the president appeared focused on the theories Mr. Giuliani had shared with him, replying to Mr. Bolton’s question that he preferred sending no assistance to Ukraine until officials had turned over all materials they had about the Russia investigation that related to Mr. Biden and supporters of Mrs. Clinton in Ukraine.

The White House has reacted to Bolton’s information with the obvious nervousness of trying to defend a patently guilty man by trying to silence him at all costs.

Since Mr. Bolton’s statement, White House advisers have floated the possibility that they could go to court to try to obtain a restraining order to stop him from speaking. Such an order would be unprecedented, but any attempt to secure it could succeed in tying up his testimony in legal limbo and scaring off Republican moderates wary of letting the trial drag on when its outcome appears clear.

It certainly doesn’t sound like Trump or the White House believe any of these witness would prove Trump’s claims.

1,102 days in, 360 to go

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