Fact-checking the trial
We separate the accurate from the not-so-accurate.
Wednesday, the House Democrats began formal arguments in the Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.
A number of people involved made not-quite-accurate claims over everything from Trump’s phone call July 25 with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to the Obama administration’s aid to Ukraine.
Trump switches dates of Schiff’s version of Zelensky phone call
President Donald Trump repeated one of his frequent factual errors Wednesday about Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff ’s exaggerated version of the phone call between Trump and Zelensky.
The president said the White House released its partial transcript of the call in response to Schiff ’s rendition, but it was released the day before, on Sept. 25. Speaking during an Intelligence Committee hearing on Sept. 26, Schiff did a “parody” of Trump’s words on the call, and the president reacted by accusing him of treason.
“I’d watch his lies,” Trump said in a Fox Business interview Wednesday. “I watch where they’ve actually played a rerun, which they shouldn’t even do, it was so bad, where he goes before Congress, and he makes a statement that I made, and it was a total fraud. I never made it.
“That’s why I released the conversation, because if I didn’t release it, people would have said that I made the statement that he made. This guy is a fraud,” Trump said.
The president made a similar claim during a news conference in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday. “When we released that conversation, all hell broke out with the Democrats, because they say, ‘Wait a minute. This is much different than Shifty Schiff told us.’ “
Trump is correct that Schiff ’s version was not totally accurate, relative to the summary of the call released by the White House, but the administration could not have released the call summary in response to Schiff. Rather, Schiff ’s version was based on the summary.
Schiff gave “an embellished rendition of the White House memo of the July phone call,” FactCheck.org said. “As we’ve explained before, Schiff said he was recounting ‘the essence of what the president communicates’ and ‘in not so many words.’ “ – Jeanine Santucci
Schiff: In 2016, Russia hacked Democrats after Trump’s ‘Russia, if you’re listening …’
Schiff, the lead House impeachment manager, said Wednesday, “In 2016, candidate Trump implored Russians to hack his opponent’s email account, something the Russian military agency did hours later. Only hours later, they hacked his opponent’s campaign.”
Schiff referred to a remark Trump made July 27, 2016, during a news conference in Florida where he said he hoped Moscow could locate emails associated with his rival Hillary Clinton: “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” he said. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
The report on Russian interference in the 2016 election issued by special counsel Robert Mueller noted that “within approximately five hours of Trump’s statement, [Russian military intelligence] officers targeted for the first time Clinton’s personal office,” including 15 email accounts at a specific domain, one of which belonged to a
Clinton aide.
As noted by The New York Times, the events of that day in the summer of 2016 were part of an indictment against a dozen Russians charged with hacking by the Justice Department.
In written responses provided by Trump during the Mueller investigation, the president said he made the “Russia, if you’re listening …” remark “in jest and sarcastically, as was apparent to any objective observer.” – Martina Stewart
Cruz: Obama administration sent ‘blankets and MREs’ to Ukraine
During a break in the trial Wednesday night, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said the Obama administration “sent blankets and MRE’s” to Ukraine, “but they wouldn’t give lethal aid.”
“I traveled to Ukraine in 2014, came back and urged Barack Obama to give lethal military aid to Ukraine. The Obama administration refused to do so,” Cruz said. “Instead, they sent blankets and MRE’s.”
Cruz’s remarks echo others by fellow Republicans. Trump said Obama provided Ukraine with “pillows and sheets.” In 2015, Sen. John McCain, RAriz., said, “The Ukrainians are being slaughtered, and we’re sending them blankets and meals. Blankets don’t do well against Russian tanks.”
The Obama administration provided hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to Ukraine, according to CNN and PolitiFact.com.
Cruz is correct that lethal military aid began to be provided to Ukraine only during Trump’s tenure. “The first lethal deliveries came from Trump,” Jim Townsend, deputy assistant secretary of defense for European and NATO Policy during the Obama administration, told PolitiFact. – Martina Stewart and Savannah Behrmann
Were Republicans, Trump allowed to participate in the House inquiry?
In a wide-ranging pair of speeches on the Senate floor Tuesday, Jay Sekulow, a private lawyer for Trump, and White House counsel Pat Cipollone accused Democrats of seeking to remove Trump since he was elected.
Sekulow said Schiff committed a “trifecta” of improprieties by denying Trump access to evidence, counsel at hearings and the right to cross-examine witnesses during the House inquiry.
“That’s a trifecta, a trifecta that violates the Constitution of the United States,” Sekulow said.
House Democrats on three committees held closed-door depositions, but Republicans were allowed to attend and ask questions. The Judiciary Committee invited Trump’s lawyers to participate in hearings by questioning witnesses, but the White House declined to participate in what Cipollone called a “baseless and highly partisan” inquiry. – Bart Jansen
What the Mueller report found on obstruction of justice
Sekulow said Tuesday that “there was no obstruction,” referring to the special counsel’s report on Russian interference. The report detailed 11 episodes of conduct by Trump that might have constituted obstruction, but Mueller refused to make a firm conclusion on the issue. – Martina Stewart