Crow: Withholding of Ukraine aid jeopardized lives
U.S. Rep. Jason Crow argued Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s withholding of military aid to Ukraine last year harmed America’s national security and jeopardized the lives of Ukrainian soldiers engaged in a fight for liberty in eastern Europe.
The Aurora Democrat, a combat veteran and prosecutor in the impeachment case against Trump, stood on the Senate floor for 45 minutes and told of his time at war.
He also told the story of Oleksandr Markiv, a Ukrainian soldier who died fighting Russianbacked militias in September, after U.S. military aid to Ukraine was withheld.
“Tens of thousands of Ukrainians like Markiv volunteered to fight the Russian-backed separatists in the east,” Crow said, reading from a Los Angeles Times article about Markiv. “Many of them were sent to the front lines wearing sneakers and without flak jackets and helmets, let alone rifles and ammunition.”
“And while our friends were at war with Russia, wearing sneakers — some without helmets — something else was happening,” Crow said. “On July 25, President Trump made a phone call. He spoke to Ukrainian President (Volodymyr) Zelensky and asked for a favor. And on that same day, just hours after his call, his administration was quietly placing an illegal hold on critical military aid to support our friends.”
The Trump administration withheld military aid to Ukraine for months last summer as the president sought an investigation into the family of Joe Biden, a top Democratic rival to Trump.
The aid was later released in September. The withholding of aid to Ukraine led directly to the impeachment of Trump last month.
On Wednesday, Crow spoke about the importance of counter-battery radar, which was included in the delayed aid to Ukraine. As an Army ranger fighting insurgents along Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan, Crow and the soldiers serving alongside him relied on counter-battery radar to detect incoming mortar and rocket attacks, he said.
“So, 20, 30, 40 seconds before those rockets and mortars rained down on us, an alarm would sound,” Crow recalled. “We would run out from our tents and jump into our concrete bunkers and wait for the attack to end. This is not a theoretical exercise, and the Ukrainians know it.”
Crow has carved out a niche among the House Democrats prosecuting Trump this week. His combat service has afforded him a role as national security expert among the impeachment managers, and he has been called upon twice already to describe, first hand, the importance of military assistance to soldiers.
“We help our partner fight Russia over there so we don’t have to fight Russia here,” he said of Ukraine on Wednesday. “Our friends, on the front lines and in trenches, with sneakers.”
After a lengthy rules debate Tuesday, Trump’s trial in the Senate began in earnest Wednesday, the first of three days that Democratic prosecutors have to make the case Trump should be removed from office for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress related to the Ukraine aid scandal.
The president was in Switzerland
this week for an economic forum, where he told reporters he has watched some of his trial. At a news conference in the city of Davos, Trump maintained he is innocent.
“I did nothing wrong. It was a perfect conversation. It was totally appropriate,” Trump said of the July 25 phone call with Zelensky in which he requested an investigation into the Bidens.
“If that were impeachable, Lyndon Johnson would have had to leave office in his first day,” Trump added later. “Kennedy would have had to leave office his first day. It’s a hoax.”
The president said current and former members of his administration — including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former national security adviser John Bolton — should not testify in the Senate trial because of national security concerns. Senate Republicans voted down an effort to subpoena Bolton late Tuesday night.
“He knows what I think about leaders,” Trump said of Bolton, according to a White House transcript. “What happens if he reveals what I think about a certain leader, and it’s not very positive, and then I have to deal on behalf of the country? It’s going to be very hard. It’s going to make the job very hard.”
Rep. Doug Lamborn, a Colorado Springs Republican and ardent Trump supporter, publicly thanked the president on Twitter for his work at the World Economic Forum.
“While (Trump) was in Davos fighting to maintain and showcase American economic dominance, Democrats in the Senate are working on a baseless impeachment,” Lamborn said.