Whistleblower file on Trump made public
WASHINGTON — House Democrats’ fastgrowing impeachment investigation centered on President Donald Trump’s efforts to get Ukraine to help him against a political rival gained strength Thursday as a whistleblower’s extraordinary complaint against the president became public, revealing a claim that White House officials tried to “lock down” records of the president’s actions.
The news drew quick accusations of an attempted White House “coverup” from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, and a furious retort from Trump, who likened the whistleblower to “a spy.”
Musing about “what we used to do in the old days” in cases of “spies and treason,” he said, “we used to handle it a little differently than we do now.”
According to the whistleblower’s complaint, a redacted version of which was released Thursday by the House Intelligence Committee, White House officials took unusual steps in the days after Trump’s July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to secure the transcript of the call.
“White House officials told me that they were ‘directed’ by White House lawyers to remove the electronic transcript from the computer system in which such transcripts are typically stored,” the complaint said. “The transcript was loaded into a separate electronic system that is otherwise used to store and handle classified information of an especially sensitive nature.”
According to the whistleblower, one official described this as “an abuse” because the call “did not contain anything remotely sensitive from a national security perspective.”
In the call, Trump asked Zelenskiy to do him a “favor” and help investigate his political opponents, especially former Vice President Joe Biden.
The whistleblower’s allegation about the effort to secrete the documents was one piece of a wide-ranging complaint that expressed fears Trump was hijacking U.S. foreign policy for personal gain. The whistleblower has not been identified, although The New York Times reported that he is a CIA officer who was detailed to the White House for a time and has since returned to the CIA.
Pelosi said the allegations about Trump’s contacts with Ukraine would now be the central focus of the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry.
“Their actions are a cover-up,” Pelosi said at her weekly press briefing Thursday. “It’s not only happened that one time. My understanding is it may have happened before.”
According to the complaint, White House officials said the effort to keep the Ukraine call under wraps was “not the first time” extra steps had been taken “for the purpose of protecting politically sensitive — rather than national security sensitive — information.”
Pelosi did not give any timeline for the impeachment inquiry, saying “there is no rush to judgment.” But, she added, the allegations about Ukraine go significantly beyond previous accusations against Trump. “We are at a different level of lawlessness that is selfevident to the American people,” she said.
Rep. Adam B. Schiff, DBurbank, who led the first House hearing Thursday into the new allegations, agreed. “What has come to light in the last couple of weeks, for many of us, is just a bridge too far,” he told the Los Angeles Times in an interview.
Trump, repeating that his call to Zelenskiy was “perfect,” denounced the proceedings in the House.
“It shouldn’t be allowed. There should be a way of stopping it. Maybe legally through the courts,” he told reporters as he returned to Washington from New York, where he had been attending the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.
Earlier, during a closeddoor meeting with members of the U.S. mission to the U.N., Trump lashed out at the whistleblower and those who relayed the details of his July conversation with Ukraine’s president.
“I want to know who’s the person, who’s the person who gave the whistleblower the information? Because that’s close to a spy,” he said.
Trump also referred to Biden as “Sleepy Joe” and said he was “dumb as a rock” and denounced “press scum.” He expressed confidence about his chances in 2020 and beyond: “We’re looking good for another four years and then if we want to, another four and another four,” he said, drawing laughter from some of those in the room.