On Twitter, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez asserted the rationale behind the recently announced impeachment proceedings against US President Donald Trump.
Quoting from the transcripts of Trump’s phone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, she tweeted, “Folks, I am surprised the White House even released this transcript. It’s worse than we thought. The President sought to use the powers of the United States government to investigate a political opponent. We have no choice but to impeach.”
She added that the leaked transcript was really a collection of notes that was “way above and beyond what is necessary for impeachment. The President engaged in an outright betray of our country.”
The move to impeach came after the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that the Democratic Party would launch impeachment proceedings against Trump over allegations that he pressured Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden, one of the contenders for the Democratic Presidential nomination.
Pelosi was formerly the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, which gave her years of experience dealing with whistleblower complaints and the American security apparatus. In a Tuesday morning phone call with Trump where he raised the whistleblower’s complaint that first spoke about his conversation with Zelensky, she told the President that he had walked into her wheelhouse.
Pelosi stated that the President "seriously violated the Constitution" and that his actions amounted to "a betrayal of his oath of office, betrayal of our national security and betray of the integrity of our elections."
In a series of tweets on Tuesday, Trump called the inquiry “breaking news Witch Hunt garbage”, adding that it was ‘PRESIDENTIAL HARASSMENT.’ He has since launched a fundraising campaign amongst his supporters to raise money for an 'impeachment defense team.'
The transcripts show that the president asked the Ukrainian president to investigate allegations that Joe Biden’s son used influence to earn work for his private company in Ukraine. At the time, Biden was Vice President under the Obama Administration, and had pressurised the Ukrainian government to fire General Prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who was seen as doing little about the rampant claims of corruption within his office. To add to the pressure, the US withheld around one billion dollars in loan guarantees unless Shokin was removed.
While the Ukrainian parliament later voted to remove Shokin, Trump has alleged that the move benefited Biden’s son, Hunter, who once worked with a company called Burisma Holdings which was under a (then dormant) investigation by Shokin. An investigation by Bloomberg found no evidence that Hunter benefitted from this, however, and quoted Ukraine’s last Prosecutor General saying that he had found no evidence of the same either.
In the phone call with Trump, the president spoke about the aid that the US gives Ukraine. Zelensky responded saying that the next prosecutor general would “100 per cent be my person” and that he would look into the situation and the company mentioned.
Amongst other points of note, Trump asked Zelenski to speak to his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, alongside the US Attorney General William Barr.
The involvement of Barr in the transcripts has prompted the House Judiciary Chief to ask the Attorney General to recuse himself from any Ukraine-related investigation. The mention of US aid has spurred allegations that this was an instance of the Preisident attempting to pressurise the Ukrainian President into action on his behalf.
All in the all, the point of contention is that Trump attempted to push a foreign country to interfere in a US election, much like what happened with the 2016 election. However, unlike the outcome of the Robert S. Mueller probe, which stated that the president did not directly collude with Russian officials to influence the US election, this time the President has personally involved himself in a similar matter and, by releasing the transcripts of his phone call, provided evidence for the same.
Impeachment of a sitting president under the US constitution requires a Congress investigation, the passing of a simple majority of impeachment proceedings by the House of Representatives, followed by a trial of the President by the US Senate (the upper house), presided over by the Chief Justice of the United States.
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