Some Senate Republicans think releasing material a mistake
WASHINGTON» Several Senate Republicans were privately stunned Wednesday and questioned the White House’s judgment after it released a rough transcript of President Donald Trump’s call with the Ukraine president that showed Trump offering the help of the U.S. attorney general to investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
One Senate Republican, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly, said the transcript’s release was a “huge mistake” that the GOP now has to confront and defend — while the party argues at the same time that House Democrats are overreaching with their impeachment inquiry of Trump.
Three other GOP senators complained privately in discussions with The Washington Post that the White House erred by releasing the transcript, arguing that it sets a precedent for future presidents about disclosure of calls with foreign leaders and could be seen as a concession to Democrats.
Publicly, two senators expressed serious concerns about the revelation, as cracks have begun to emerge with GOP lawmakers privately discussing Trump’s conduct and their party’s political standing.
“Republicans ought not to be rushing to circle the wagons and say there’s no ‘there’ there when there’s obviously a lot that’s very troubling there,” Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., told reporters after reviewing the whistle-blower’s complaint. “. . . Democrats ought not be using words like ‘impeach’ before they knew anything about the actual substance.”
Sasse, who opposed Trump’s 2016 candidacy, recently has spoken more favorably about Trump and earned the president’s endorsement in his re-election bid.
“It remains troubling in the extreme. It’s deeply troubling,” Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, told reporters Wednesday when asked about the transcript.
As Republican senators left a closed-door luncheon Wednesday, they were mostly supportive of the president and dismissive of the transcript, even as some lawmakers and their aides groused behind the scenes about the White House’s response.
There were scattered statements about whether Trump handled the call appropriately, but any sense of alarm was muted.
“As a general rule, transcripts of phone conversations between heads of state should not be released. In this case, an exception had to be made,” said Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., pointing out that some Senate Republicans had asked the president to release the document.
He added that he was not troubled by its content.
“It’s a decision for the White House,” Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., said when asked about the release, quickly calling out Democrats for “hating” Trump.
“It’s unprecedented that he’s released it and there are some ramifications for the office, but people were clamoring for all the information, and he’s giving it,” said Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., who attended a White House meeting Wednesday morning to review the rough transcript.
While many Republicans continue to dismiss Democrats’ impeachment efforts, cracks have begun to emerge privately as GOP lawmakers have discussed Trump’s conduct and their party’s political standing.
Those fault lines could foreshadow how Senate Republicans ultimately handle a trial, should the House impeach the president, according to several lawmakers and aides.
In the rough transcript of the July 25 call, Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to work with U.S. Attorney General William Barr to investigate the conduct of Biden and offered to meet with the foreign leader at the White House after he promised to conduct such an inquiry.
Those statements and others in the phone call between Trump and Zelenskiy were so concerning that the intelligence community inspector general thought them a possible violation of campaign finance law.
In late August, intelligence officials referred the matter to the Justice Department as a possible crime, but prosecutors concluded last week that the conduct was not criminal, according to senior Justice Department officials.
Trump has acknowledged publicly that he asked Zelenskiy to investigate Biden’s son, who served on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company that came under scrutiny by authorities there.
Trump has denied doing anything improper, but lawmakers have raised concerns about his directive to freeze nearly $400 million in military assistance for Ukraine in the days leading up the phone call with Zelenskiy.
Sen. Patrick Toomey, R-Pa., echoed other Republicans in arguing there was “no quid pro quo,” adding, “while the conversation reported in the memorandum relating to alleged Ukrainian corruption and Vice President Biden’s son was inappropriate, it does not rise to the level of an impeachable offense.”
Three Senate GOP aides said Wednesday that their bosses were unhappy with the White House’s decision and the sense that Republican lawmakers were being forced into the difficult position of defending Trump while contending with what many Democrats see as a problematic transcript.
But other Senate Republicans, allied with Trump, were dismissive. “Wow. Impeachment over this?” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., tweeted. “What a nothing (non-quid pro quo) burger.”
One early divide among Senate Republicans is between the “Burr camp” and the “Johnson camp,” according to two senior GOP aides who were not authorized to speak publicly, referring to Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee.
Burr’s faction of the Senate GOP has a darker, frustrated view of Trump’s handling of Ukraine, while Johnson has linked the Ukraine issue to his committee’s work into reviewing the launch of the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails while serving as secretary of state.
During a closed-door Senate Republican lunch Tuesday, both Burr and Johnson underscored their own position in conversation with colleagues, who asked them whether their respective committees would launch investigations of Biden.
Burr said Wednesday said he had no interest in investigating the Biden-Ukraine angle.
“That’s not my lane, but I’m only focused on gathering the facts on this piece,” he said, referencing Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Johnson said his committee has been conducting “information gathering and oversight” related to the 2016 campaign probe, which might now involve Hunter Biden.
“It just kind of morphs into that same cast of characters, what they were doing,” he said.
Others who have expressed concern about the whistle-blower complaint and pushed for more disclosure include Romney, the 2012 GOP presidential nominee who carries stature nationally in the party, even though he is still building relationships within the Senate.
Romney’s willingness to pressure the White House has irritated Trump advisers, who cheered the president’s tweet this week about Romney’s 2012 defeat.