>> The New York Times recently published a piece looking into some new details in terms
of the timeline and communications surrounding the hold of military aid to Ukraine.
What's interesting about this new article is that it gets into the involvement of some
figures in the Trump administration who have avoided testifying, avoided talking much about
this.
In some cases have implied that they knew nothing about what was going on, and we're
now finding out that that's not necessarily the case.
So we're gonna talk about a few here.
The first is Mick Mulvaney.
At one point, about a week after Trump had initially decided or communicated that he
wanted the aid to be held, he had sent an email saying, I'm just trying to tie up some
loose ends.
Did we ever find out about the money for Ukraine and whether we can hold it back?
So he has been involved since June in that effort.
Just bear that in mind as the President says that in the house, they never had people first
hand information, but also stopped Mick Mulvaney from testifying.
And Mick Mulvaney, the guy who sort of like publicly outed Trump about this scandal when
he admitted that it was a quid pro quo on National TV, he doesn't want to come and testify
before the Senate either.
And it looks like there's quite a bit that he could probably reveal.
Now the reply to that email from Mick Mulvaney was from an aide Robert Blair, who replied
that it would be possible but not pretty, quote, expect Congress to become unhinged
if the White House tried to countermand spending passed by the House and Senate.
And he wrote it might further fuel the narrative that Mr. Trump was pro-Russia.
So from the very beginning when they were trying set up this scheme, some inside of
the administration were saying, look, I’m with you, but this is going to be really and.
And they did start to develop a legal argument from their point of view that because Trump
is the Commander in Chief, he can effectively override everything that Congress wants to
do, which is a bold position.
Probably they’ll apply to some other stuff eventually.
We have more on other people but this is Mick Mulvaney initially implying before that he
didn't have much involvement in this and apparently he was involved from the first week.
>> Yeah, and then he had a second round of excuses which is what I mean I was involved
in holding up the aid but I didn't know that it was because Trump wanted the investigations.
Later you find out in the details he absolutely knew and he was the one enforcing it.
>> Mm-hm.
>> So but there is the fact that Mulvaney is trying to distance himself away from the
Biden investigations is an interesting escape hatch because then he can go to investigators
and go.
I mean, I didn't know but now I know.
Okay, here's evidence.
Okay?
Mulvaney flipping is everything.
If he flips, but that's a giant, giant if.
He's shown some indication that he does wanna flip, and that he has insurance like Giuliani
talked about as to why Trump should not throw him under the bus.
He has said that publicly.
I am paraphrasing the word insurance, but basically said, I got too much information
for anyone to throw me under a bus.
So he knows, there's no question he, he not only knew what they did, he knew it was wrong.
And he knows that he can turn on Trump with that evidence.
And so there's guilt all over this.
There's 1,000 angles that I wanna discuss here but that just one more on what John already
mentioned.
The law that they're violating in this particular case is the Impoundment Control Act.
So when Congress puts aside money to be spent on a country, as they did with Ukraine, you
cannot stop that money.
And if you do, it violates the Impoundment Control Act.
And so the internal White House lawyers, Justice Department lawyers, Office of Management and
Budget lawyers all got together, and they're like, okay, how do we break this law while
having an excuse that we're not breaking the law?
So the best thing they had was, well, we can say it's in the President's constitutional
powers to break that law.
Yeah, there's no such thing, okay?
That's why they took a long time trying to come up with the thing that doesn't exist.
>> You can understand why they would think Trump would like that, when he's previously
said there's a thing, Article II, that let's me do whatever I want to do.
>> Yeah, that's not remotely true, that is not in our constitutional system.
There is no clause of the constitution that says yes, it's true, Congress writes the laws
but the President can ignore them at his leisure.
That doesn't exist.
>> Yeah.
>> The President must follow the laws, period.
>> Ideally, I guess.
Yes, okay, in terms of there's a lot of guilt to go around, and also like I had mentioned
that, people have been trying to caution Trump away from this path.
He had that aid, but you have some higher ups as well.
In late August, Defense Secretary Mark Esper joined Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and
John Bolton, the national security advisor at that time, for a previously undisclosed
Oval Office meeting with the president, where they tried but failed to convince him that
releasing the aid was in the interests of the United States.
That's a couple of months into this at that point.
And so, again, those are a couple of people that we haven't heard much from.
It would be great to have Pompeo and Bolton testify, but they've either opted not to or
been blocked from doing so, which is totally the mark of an innocent person.
>> And interestingly, too, in terms of what Mick Mulvaney knew and when he knew it and
all this, I thought this is really interesting.
Mr. Mulvaney is said by associates to have stepped out of the room whenever Mr. Trump
would talk with Mr. Giuliani to preserve Mr. Trump's attorney client privilege, leaving
him with limited knowledge about their efforts regarding Ukraine.
Or like the fact that he apparently just leaves the room whenever Rudy comes in might have
a simpler explanation.
>> He's a weirdo [LAUGHS].
But yeah, apparently he was trying to limit his exposure to information that he would
have to later deny having access to.
>> But there's no question as you find out later that he in fact did know was connected
to the Biden's and in fact pushed that along.
But the very fact that he's trying to set up that excuse of hey when Giuliani came into
the room I always left, attorney client privilege means I know I realize I might get caught
and what we did was clearly illegal, okay?
So now to the point that John made about the big meeting, Defense Secretary Esper, Secretary
of State Mike Pompeo, very, very loyal to Donald Trump, and John Bolton, National Security
Advisor, all say to Donald Trump, you cannot hold up this money.
It's a really terrible idea, do not hold up Ukraine's aid is not going to work out well
with Congress and come down on you anyway.
It's against our national security interests, etc. Trump's like, yeah, I know but on the
other hand, you know, it would help the Russians and I would get to investigate my political
opponent.
I don't, man this seems like an easy question.
I don't give a god damn about the law, what are you guys stupid?
Why would I care about the law?
Now, did I make up the part where Donald Trump just spoke?
Yes, okay but after- the parts that the three advisers said is true.
Okay, so putting the kidding aside, those three top loyalists to Donald Trump come and
tell him do not do this.
It's an immensely bad idea.
He goes, I don't care.
That didn't affect him at all.
>> Yeah.
>> And look again, putting the kidding aside, there are two different parts of this.
One is he wants to investigate his political opponent and doesn't care what laws he's breaking.
The other is Russia loves this.
So because it's all military equipment going to Ukraine, they're in the middle of that
fight at that point, in fact, right then is when Ukraine head sees the Russian tanker.
Okay, so then all of a sudden Donald Trump blocks military aid to Ukraine.
Again, Putin celebrating in the streets.
We are told by people who don't believe in overwhelming evidence that continues to be
a coincidence.
So yet another coincidence where Putin is happy about something Trump has done.
>> Yeah.
So, look, I found this article to be interesting.
It puts a little bit more context to what some of these incredibly powerful and not
all but some still well connected members of the Trump administration were thinking
and doing at the time.
I don't expect that it's probably gonna change many people's minds.
>> But, no look, so let's talk about things that could be interesting if a trial ever
occurs in the Senate.
Because it wasn't just his own administration officials, lower-level, mid-level, and higher-level,
it was also Republican senators.
So both Rob Portman and Ron Johnson went and talked to Donald Trump near the end of this
whole process.
And they're like, what are you doing?
No, we appropriated the funds.
You can't do this.
He's like I don't like the corruption in Ukraine.
So Rob Portman says, yeah, but quote, but we should not hold that against Ukraine.
We need to release these funds.
So here are Republicans coming in, that was September 11th when Trump finally concedes
and releases it, two Republican senators saying, President Trump, you must release those funds.
So, of course, the other enormously important data point here is a couple days before that
Donald Trump had found out about the whistleblower complaint.
>> Yeah.
>> So they finally tell him, so he released the funds on September 11, and in the last
two days before that, two things happen, he finds out there's a whistleblower complaint
and he might get caught.
And two Republican senators come in and say you're in a world of trouble man if you don't
release those funds and we're not Democrats.
We're Republicans.
So it is indisputable that are you release the funds because he got caught?
Well, not because he wanted to.
>> One other thing happened too.
I wasn't going to read this initially but yeah, in that timeline the day before he finally
changes after months of holding the aid pushing for it to be held.
He changes his mind and take a look at this.
This is amazing.
Remember, his argument is that yes for a time it was being held but not because of, you
know, White House trip or investigation or anything like that it's just over the corruption.
So on September 10, the day before he changed his mind and finally stopped the hold, a political
appointee at the budget office, Michael Duffy wrote a lengthy email to the Pentagon's top
budget official.
He asserted that the Defense Department had the authority to do more to ensure that the
aid could be released to Ukraine by the congressionally mandated deadline at the end of that month,
suggesting that any responsibility for any failure should not rest with the White House.
43 minutes later, the Pentagon official, Elaine McCusker, hit send on a brief but stinging
reply.
You can't be serious.
I am speechless.
Because think about this, Trump had been holding it for months, they find out about the whistleblower,
the Republicans come.
He says okay, let's do it.
And you, what's been taking you guys so long?
You could be expediting this, get this done get this done.
If it's not done in time.
It's not about us has nothing to the White House.
It's all on you guys.
You guys are responsible.
Now is that consistent with, well, we've been holding it, but it's over corruption concerns?
We're really concerned about the corruption there.
>> Yeah.
>> But they're suddenly trying to dump blame on anyone they can.
>> When the Pentagon originally asked, why are you holding up the funds, the Office of
Management and Budget would not give them a reason.
They're like, we're gonna get back to you on that, because there is no legitimate reason.
And at the end, before they reversed their decision, they say, it's the Pentagon's fault
for holding up the funds.
That's why she writes you can't be serious.
We're the ones who wanted you to release the funds from day one.
Now you're gonna turn around and blame us? Trump 101 and again, if you're a republican
and you think Trump's gonna be on your side, no, he's not.
He's gonna throw you under the bus the minute he can.
Last thing, guys, the other thing that happened in the last two days, was the chairman of
three House Committees announced that they were opening investigations.
So Democrats are opening investigations.
The Pentagon says you have to release the budget anyway, the money anyway.
He finds out there's a whistleblower complaint and he got caught, and two Republican senators
come and yell at him and say, you're gonna have to release the funds anyway, what are
you doing?
You're going to get caught by everyone.
So that's why he releases the funds.
No ands, ifs or buts.
If you're living on a different planet, okay, sure whatever.
In your planet there is no logic, there are no facts.
On this planet, Trump definitely held it illegally and only released it because of this pressure
slip.
Last thing is, hey, I would call Ron Johnson and Rob Portman to the stand in the Senate
trial.
You guys are Republican senators, you talked to Donald Trump right before he released the
aid.
It looks like he released the aid because of you guys, so what did you tell him, and
why did you tell him that?
And were you concerned that he was doing something illegal?
You obviously went to yell at him.
You obviously went to disagree with him.
You obviously went to tell Trump, you are doing something wrong.
So why did you think he was doing something wrong?
I would love to see that.