The Commentariat -- November 8, 2019

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Brett Samuels of the Hill: "President Trump on Friday said there should be no public hearings in the impeachment inquiry as he railed against the process unfolding in the House. 'They shouldn't be having public hearings. This is a hoax,' Trump said as he left the White House for events in Georgia. The comments mark a sharp break from Trump's allies, who have spent recent weeks complaining about the lack of transparency in the ongoing impeachment inquiry. The first public hearings in the process are set to take place next week.... Trump on Friday downplayed the potentially damaging effects of [witness] transcripts [which the House has released], claiming he was unfamiliar with many of the witnesses and that none of them had first-hand information. 'I'm not concerned about anything,' Trump said. 'The testimony has all been fine. I mean for the most part, I've never even heard of these people. There are some very fine people. You have some Never Trumpers. It seems that nobody has any first-hand knowledge.' The president asserted that all that counts are the call notes from his July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky." ~~~

I hardly knew the gentleman. -- Donald Trump, this morning, on Gordon Sondland ~~~

~~~ Quint Forgey of Politico: "... Donald Trump on Friday said he would turn over the transcript of a call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky which preceded the July conversation between the two leaders that ignited House Democrats' impeachment inquiry. 'I had a second call with the president which actually, I believe, came before this one, and now they all want that one. And if they want it, I'll give it to them,' Trump told reporters outside the White House, presumably referring to congressional impeachment investigators. 'I haven't seen it recently, but I'll give it to them.'... [Trump phoned] Zelensky in the hours after his election on April 21, and although various reporting has stated that Trump raised the issue of Ukrainian corruption, little is publicly known about the details of the discussion." ~~~

~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: I heard Trump's chopper talk this morning. It was pathetic. He repeated himself; then he repeated himself; then he said the same thing again. Frightening. He also said he barely knew Gordon Sondland -- the million-dollar-donor Trump charged with carrying out the rogue Ukraine policy -- so I guess Gordy is pretty close to officially under the bus.

Not the Best-laid Plan. Jonathan Chait: House Republicans "plan to make the case that [Trump's] deputies 'could have acted on their own to influence Ukraine policy.' So the whole scheme was going on right under Trump's nose, without his knowledge or participation?... The president has developed a lifelong aversion, honed through years of directing shady and outright criminal schemes, to any of his advisers taking notes in a meeting with him.... And so, while European Union envoy Gordon Sondland has testified that Trump directed him to withhold diplomatic favors from Ukraine to compel investigations of Trump's domestic enemies, he has no physical evidence.... Yet the emerging plan to present Sondland as the true mastermind of the Trump administration's Ukraine scheme, and Trump as an ignorant bystander, is going to run into several massive problems.... It relies on the assumption not only that Sondland was acting alone, but so too were several other Trump officials, all in pursuit of the same extortion plot[:] Mick Mulvaney, who has publicly admitted a quid pro quo..., Mike Pence ... when he publicly affirmed that the aid was tied to Ukraine investigating the Bidens.... [Rudy] Giuliani has stated repeatedly that his work was undertaken at Trump's direction ('I don’t do anything that involves my client without speaking with my client.')... Then there is the wee fact that Trump actually has revealed his own involvement."

Mrs. McCrabbie: In his nutso Chopper Talk "press conference" this morning, Donald Trump responded to a question about Jeff Sessions' run for Senate by remarking that Sessions "has said nice things about me." Yes, yes, he has. Sessions is kicking off his Senate campaign with an appeal, not to Alabamians, but to a Florida man:

Olivia Gazis, et al., of CBS News: "House Republicans plan to announce Congressman Jim Jordan as an addition to the House Intelligence Committee, replacing Congressman Rick Crawford. The pugilistic Jordan, a former wrestling coach known for his avoidance of suit jackets, has been a strong defender of President Trump as the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee and a prominent member of the House Judiciary Committee. Republican leaders in the House are hoping that Jordan can bring his combative questioning style to the first open hearings in the impeachment inquiry held by the Intelligence Committee next week. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has sole discretion over Intelligence Committee assignments. A spokesman for Crawford did not return a request for comment." ~~~

~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Jordan may be muscling his way into a more prominent role in the impeachment doings, but he has other problems:

~~~ Corky Siemaszko of NBC News: "A professional referee says in a lawsuit filed Thursday that disgraced doctor Richard Strauss masturbated in front of him in a shower after a wrestling match at Ohio State University, and that he reported the encounter directly to Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, who was then the assistant coach. 'Yeah, that's Strauss,' Jordan and then-head coach Russ Hellickson replied, according to the lawsuit, when the referee, identified in court papers as John Doe 42, told them about the incident. The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Ohio, implies that Jordan's response to the incident, which the referee said happened in 1994, was essentially a shrug. John Doe 42 is the second person to say he told Jordan directly about either being approached or molested by Strauss, who was found by independent investigators to have sexually abused 177 male students over two decades."

Normon Solomon in TruthDig: "The donations from billionaires to the current Democratic [presidential] candidates could be viewed as a kind of Oligarchy Confidence Index, based on data from the Federal Election Commission. As reported by Forbes, Pete Buttigieg leads all the candidates with 23 billionaire donors, followed by 18 for Cory Booker, and 17 for Kamala Harris. Among the other candidates who have qualified for the debate coming up later this month, Biden has 13 billionaire donors and Amy Klobuchar has 8, followed by 3 for Elizabeth Warren, 1 for Tulsi Gabbard, and 1 for Andrew Yang. Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders has zero billionaire donors. (The tenth person who has qualified for the next debate, self-funding billionaire candidate Tom Steyer, is in a class by himself.) Meanwhile, relying on contributions from small donors, Sanders and Warren 'eagerly bait, troll and bash billionaires at every opportunity,' in the words of a recent Los Angeles Times news story." Thanks to P.D. Pepe for the lead & Forrest M. for the link.

~~~~~~~~~~

A Subpoena at Midnight. Alayna Treene of Axios: "The House committees investigating President Trump and Ukraine issued a subpoena Thursday night for acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney to testify on Friday morning as part of their impeachment inquiry, two sources familiar tell Axios.... Mulvaney is the highest-ranking White House official to be subpoenaed yet, and the midnight-hour move suggests the committees are reaching into the final phase of their private investigation as they prepare to take their inquiry public next week. The committees first subpoenaed Mulvaney to turn over documents in October, but subpoenaing him to appear for a hearing is a further escalation...." ~~~

     ~~~ Update. Katie Flaherty of NBC News: "Acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney will skip a scheduled deposition Friday before the House committees leading the impeachment inquiry into ... Donald Trump, despite receiving subpoena for his attendance, a senior administration official told NBC News. 'He won't be showing up,' the official said."

NPR: "House investigators have [just] released the deposition by Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent, who talked behind closed doors about the Ukraine affair." A pdf of the transcript, via the House, is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

Mr. Giuliani, at that point, had been carrying on a campaign for several months full of lies and incorrect information about Ambassador Yovanovitch.... His assertions and allegations against former Ambassador Yovanovitch were without basis, untrue, period.... Potus wanted nothing less than President Zelenskiy to go to the microphone and say investigations, Biden and Clinton. Basically there needed to be three words in the message, and that was the shorthand. -- Deputy Secretary of State George Kent, in a House deposition, October 15 ~~~

~~~ Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post: "... senior State Department official [George Kent] described President Trump's shadow efforts to force Ukraine's leadership to open investigations that would benefit him politically in perhaps the starkest terms to date, according to a transcript of his impeachment testimony released Thursday. Deputy Assistant Secretary ... Kent, who oversaw Ukraine policy, told lawmakers that to get an Oval Office meeting, Trump was demanding that the country's new president, Volodymyr Zelensky, promise to open investigations into the 2016 U.S. election, Trump's former rival Hillary Clinton and former vice president Joe Biden.... Trump 'wanted nothing less than President Zelensky to go to a microphone and say investigations, Biden and Clinton,' Kent told House impeachment investigators. Kent's assessment came from a summary of a conversation that Trump had with Gordon Sondland, a Trump megadonor turned diplomat, who from his perch in Brussels had seized control of Ukraine policy." ~~~

~~~ Nahal Toosi, et al., of Politico: George "Kent testified in a closed session on Oct. 15, telling lawmakers that, like other career diplomats, he was essentially cut out of decisions about Ukraine due to maneuvering by other administration officials and outsiders, including Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani. Kent accused Giuliani of conducting a 'campaign of lies' about the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, that led to her early recall from Kyiv.... At one point, after Giuliani slammed Yovanovitch, Kent and others in a May 2019 interview, Kent was told by his superiors to 'keep my head down and lower my profile in Ukraine,' he said. The instruction came via an intermediary from David Hale, the undersecretary of State for political affairs, according to Kent's understanding. It wasn't clear if Hale had talked to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo about it." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ An Easy Mark. Josh Lederman of NBC News: "A senior U.S. diplomat told Congress that he was briefed on conversations ... Donald Trump had with Russia's President Vladimir Putin and Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban in which the two foreign leaders talked Trump into a negative view about Ukraine and its new leader. George Kent ... told House investigators that Putin and Orban, along with Trump personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, had 'shaped the president's view of Ukraine and (President Volodymyr) Zelenskiy.' He said Trump's conversations with the two leaders accounted for the change in Trump's view of Zelenskiy from 'very positive' after their first call on April 21 to 'negative' just one month later when he met with advisers on Ukraine in the Oval Office. In the interim, Trump spoke by phone with Putin on May 3, and hosted Orban at the White House on May 13. Kent's description of those conversations, included in the transcript of his deposition by the House released Thursday, feeds into longstanding concerns from national security experts that the president's views on key foreign issues are being influenced by Putin and other autocratic leaders such as Orban."

Franco Ordoñez & Mara Liasson of NPR: "A top aide to Vice President Pence arrived Thursday to testify in the ongoing House impeachment inquiry into President Trump. Jennifer Williams is a longtime foreign service officer who was assigned to be the vice president's special adviser for Europe and Russia in the spring. She would be the first person from the vice president's office to testify in the probe of whether the president withheld military aid from Ukraine while seeking a political favor. She will be the third person who was listening in on the July 25 call between Trump and Urainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to testify, a White House aide confirmed to NPR's Mara Liasson." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Rene Marsh, et al., of CNN: "An aide to Vice President Mike Pence who listened to the call between ... Donald Trump and the Ukrainian President told impeachment inquiry investigators on Thursday that she found the conversation to be unusual because it was political in nature, according to two sources familiar with the testimony. Jennifer Williams, an aide in the vice president's office and a long time State Department staffer, said the phone call did not have the normal tone of a diplomatic call. Williams did not raise concerns about the call with her superiors.... She did not know of any request from Trump to Pence to bring up investigations during a meeting the vice president had in Warsaw with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on September 1.... [She] ... testified she did not know if the vice president read the transcript [of the Trump/Zelensky call]. Pence himself has repeatedly insisted that Trump did nothing wrong but has not clarified how much he knew about efforts to pressure Ukraine and the parallel Ukraine policy that Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani and others were leading.... Williams testified that she had limited information about why military aid was being withheld from Ukraine. She was puzzled about it, but was kept in the dark about the decision-making process. She described herself as someone who stayed in her lane and wasn't pushing to understand why the aide was withheld."

Carol Leonnig & Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "Former national security adviser John Bolton is willing to defy the White House and testify in the House impeachment inquiry about his alarm at the Ukraine pressure campaign if a federal court clears the way, according to people familiar with his views. Bolton could be a powerful witness for Democrats: Top State Department and national security officials have already testified that he was deeply concerned about efforts by Trump and his allies to push Ukraine to open investigations into the president's political rivals while the Trump administration held up military aid to that country. The former national security adviser, who abruptly left his post in September, is expected to confirm their statements and describe his conversations with Trump, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing inquiry.... It remains unclear how quickly that could happen -- and whether it would be in time for Bolton to be called as a witness in the public House impeachment hearings, which are scheduled to begin next week. On Wednesday, House Democrats said they are awaiting a key test case involving former White House counsel Donald McGahn, in which a district-court decision could come by the end of this month." Mediaite has the story here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Andrew Desiderio of Politico: "House impeachment investigators are moving on from John Bolton. The former national security adviser refused to appear for his scheduled deposition Thursday morning, a House Intelligence Committee official said, and his lawyer informed the panel that Bolton would take the House to court if he is subpoenaed. So instead of fighting a court battle that could take months, the official added, Bolton's refusal to testify will be used as evidence of obstruction of Congress against ... Donald Trump.... Bolton's defiance of Congress comes a day after the House withdrew its subpoena for Charles Kupperman, Bolton's former deputy who had asked a federal court to decide whether he had to comply with the subpoena.... In withdrawing the subpoena for Kupperman, lawyers for the House told a federal court that the former aide should abide by an impending decision in the House's bid to secure testimony from former White House counsel Don McGahn." Bolton & Kupperman had the same attorney. (Also linked yesterday.)

Meredith McGraw of Politico: "Earl Matthews, a senior National Security Council official who attended several of the meetings now at the center of the congressional impeachment inquiry, will depart from his job on Friday.... Matthews ... was part of a small group that sat in on meetings with Ukrainian officials that House Democrats are now scrutinizing as they investigate whether ... Donald Trump pressured Ukraine to investigate a political rival.... Still, Matthews has not been pulled into the Democrats' impeachment probe, according to an administration official.... An administration official only confirmed that the U.S. Army did not extend Matthews' rotation with the White House." (Also linked yesterday.)

The Corrupt Buffoon & His Band of Zany Blockheads. Episode 397: "The Great Greenland Purchase"

~~~ The Check Is in the Mail. Sorry, Trying to Buy Greenland. Yuliya Talmazan of NBC News: "In his testimony [before the House Intel Committee, [Bill] Taylor was asked about his remark that secretaries of defense and state, the CIA director and the national security advisor sought a joint meeting with President Trump to change his mind on withholding military aid from Ukraine, but such a meeting was 'hard to schedule.' He pointed out that it was due to a scheduling issue, but also the president's keen interest in buying Greenland from Denmark. 'I think this was also about the time of the Greenland question, about purchasing Greenland, which took up a lot of energy in the [National Security Council],' Taylor told the lawmakers. 'That's disturbing for a whole different reason,' House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., responded to Taylor, according to the transcript." Mrs. McC: Ah, yeah. If this were a comedy short, you'd be laughing your head off. It's like Ralph Kramer is running the country. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: "Congress' nonpartisan watchdog said Thursday it is reviewing the Trump administration's decision this summer to hold up hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid for Ukraine to determine whether officials violated appropriations law by not notifying Congress of the hold.... A spokesman for the Government Accountability Office confirmed that the agency is reviewing whether the administration violated appropriations law by failing to notify Congress of the development after Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) requested the review during a Senate Budget Committee hearing last week.... The review is a request for a legal opinion rather than an investigation, because the agency does not have subpoena or enforcement power.... Politico first reported in August about the freeze placed on $250 million in funds meant to help Ukraine deter Russian aggression, despite the money already having been appropriated by Congress.... The White House then acquiesced to bipartisan pressure and removed the hold weeks later, after it came to light."

Andrew Kramer of the New York Times: "Aides to Ukraine's leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, decided that military aid and support for peace talks outweighed the risks of appearing to take sides in American politics.... Government officials, lawmakers and others close to the Zelensky government have revealed new details of how high-level Ukrainian officials ultimately decided to acquiesce to President Trump's request -- and, by a stroke of luck, never had to follow through.... Even as [senior Zelensky aide Andriy] Yermak negotiated the wording [in a tug-of-war with U.S. envoy Kurt Volker] in August, the stakes were clear. While rumors had been swirling for months about a possible hold on military aid, by early August high-level Ukrainian officials had confirmed the freeze.... In September..., [Ambassador Gordon Sondland] explained in blunt terms to Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Yermak, there was little chance the aid would be forthcoming until they made the public statement on the investigations.... Mr. Trump wanted the Ukrainian president to speak on CNN, William B. Taylor Jr., the top American diplomat in Ukraine, testified.... Finally bending to the White House request, Mr. Zelensky's staff planned for him to make an announcement in an interview on Sept. 13 with Fareed Zakaria, the host of a weekly news show on CNN. Though plans were in motion to give the White House the public statement it had sought, events in Washington saved the Ukrainian government from any final decision and eliminated the need to make the statement.... Word of the freeze in military aid had leaked out, and Congress was in an uproar. Two days before the scheduled interview, the Trump administration released the assistance and Mr. Zelensky's office quickly canceled the interview." (Also linked yesterday.)

MEANWHILE, Freedom Caucus to the Rescue! Karoun Demirjian & Rachel Bade of the Washington Post: “House Republicans’ latest plan to shield President Trump from impeachment is to focus on at least three deputies — U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, Trump’s lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani, and possibly acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney — who they say could have acted on their own to influence Ukraine policy.... As Republicans argue that most of the testimony against Trump is based on faulty secondhand information, they are sowing doubts about whether Sondland, Giuliani and Mulvaney were actually representing the president or freelancing to pursue their own agendas. The GOP is effectively offering up the three to be fall guys.... By raising questions about the motivation of Trump’s top lieutenants on Ukraine policy, the GOP hopes to undermine the reliability of otherwise incriminating testimony from several current Trump administration officials.... Sondland 'made a presumption,' House Oversight Committee member Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) told reporters, stressing that 'what Sondland was told by the president ... [is] there was no quid pro quo.'... 'There is no direct linkage to the president of the United States,” Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) told reporters this week, contending that while lawyers normally coordinate with their clients, Giuliani is a special case. 'There are a whole lot of things that he does that he doesn’t apprise anybody of.'... Some congressional Republicans have suggested that Mulvaney was simply exercising his own well-documented penchant for cutting foreign aid....” ~~~

     ~~~ Greg Sargent of the Washington Post: “Here are four facts revealing this new line to be epic nonsense.... [1] Trump personally ordered acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to inform budget officials that the aid that had already been appropriated by Congress was being frozen, officials told The Post.... [2] Giuliani publicly confirmed the whole plot, and that he was acting at Trump’s direction.... [4] Texts between Sondland and other ambassadors and Ukrainian officials show him negotiating, at the direction of Giuliani and [Trump], for Ukraine’s 'anti-corruption statement' to mention both the 2016 Ukraine-hack conspiracy theory and Burisma.... [4]  On Sept. 1, the same day Sondland informed a top Zelensky aide that the military aid was conditional, Vice President Pence ... informed Zelensky that the administration was 'still looking at' the aid, i.e., it was on hold. Pence also told Zelensky he needed to do more to fight 'corruption.'”

** Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: "Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sidestepped questions about his lack of support for Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to Ukraine who was abruptly recalled from her post earlier this year amid a smear campaign seeking her removal." Oh, read on. What an arrogant, lying ass. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ “A Tortured Response.” John Hudson of the Washington Post: “Secretary of State Mike Pompeo offered a tortured response Thursday to questions about the sworn impeachment testimony of his former senior adviser Michael McKinley, who told investigators last month that he approached Pompeo three times with concerns about a campaign to undermine the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. At a news conference in Germany, Pompeo denied discussing the issue with McKinley in May, after Marie Yovanovitch had been recalled from her posting in Kyiv, but appeared to evade the fact that McKinley’s testimony referenced conversations between he [him!] and Pompeo in September. Pompeo has faced criticism about his decision not to defend Yovanovitch ever since details of her removal became public.... 'When Ambassador Yovanovitch returned to the U.S., he didn’t raise that issue with me,' Pompeo said Thursday. He added that because McKinley’s focus wasn’t Ukraine 'it shouldn’t surprise anyone that in May when that took place, he didn’t say a thing to me.'... Last month, Pompeo told ABC News that McKinley never said a 'single thing' about Yovanovitch to him.” ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Tortured? No, Mike, you're an arrogant, lying ass. And the people you stuck it to -- the people you were supposed to defend against the Great Orange Menace & Rabid Rudy -- they're paying you back for those lies & your swaggering arrogance, and they're paying you back under oath, and ultimately on the front pages of the nation's newspapers. ~~~

I keep a Bible open on my desk to remind me of God and his word, and the truth. -- Mike Pompeo, April 2019

Reading ... about Pompeo's habit of keeping a bible at his desk, I thought of trying out the old 'see what the bible says' game. Open at random and check the verses where your unplanned eye falls. Here's what I got, thinking of 'Pompeo':

" ' As for the virtuous man who is poor. let us oppress him;
let us not spare the widow,
nor respect old age, white-haired with many years.
Let our strength be the yardstick of virtue,
since weakness argues its own futility.
Let us lie in wait for the virtuous man, since he annoys us ... "

-- Wisdom 2:10 (The Jerusalem Bible)

The chapter heading is 'Life as the godless see it', so the voices of the above verses are the godless speaking. Very republican. Pompeo-esque. -- Patrick, in yesterday's Comments

Pompeo is a Protestant Christian, so most likely the Bible on his desk does not include the Book of Wisdom, which is too bad. P.S. Wisdom is a girl. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie

Marcy Wheeler, who apologizes for being long-winded, is not all that impressed with the WashPo's report (linked here yesterday) that Bill Barr took the bold step of refusing to hold a made-for-teevee presser completely exonerating Trump of any and all crimes related to the Ukraine extortion conspiracy on accounta all that other stuff Barr did to cover for the Corrupt Buffoon & His Band of Zany Blockheads: "So, at a time after someone had already shared Ukrainian information with the Barr-micromanaged [John] Durham investigation, after Barr had met with lawyers who were trading that access for propaganda to feed Durham, after Barr’s DOJ had scoped the whistleblower complaint to ensure it would not tie the complaint to the fully predicated criminal investigation in SDNY, after DOJ failed to turn over the complaint to FEC as required by a memorandum of understanding, after DOJ created an excuse to delay sharing the whistleblower complaint with Congress as mandated by law, after DOJ tried to hide Barr’s own involvement from Congress by overclassifying that fact … after all those overt acts that, depending on Barr’s understanding of what he got briefed way back in February and learned in multiple different ways since then, might amount to overt acts in the conspiracy SDNY has already charged [Lev] Parnas and [Igor] Fruman in, Barr declined to go out before cameras and comment on an ongoing investigation (which is, remember, what Jim Comey was ostensibly fired for) by publicly exonerating the President." ~~~

~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Chris Hayes suggested a plausible reason Barr might have opted out of giving a press conference about the Ukraine scheme: see, reporters show up for press conferences, and those reporters just might ask Barr about his own part in the whole Ukraine scheme. Any honest answers he gave (as if!) might tend to incriminate Bill as a co-conspirator. Can the U.S. attorney general plead the Fifth during a press conference?

Paul LeBlanc of CNN: "A lawyer for the Ukraine whistleblower, whose complaint document triggered the House impeachment inquiry of ... Donald Trump, has sent a letter to the White House warning the President to 'cease and desist' attacking his client. 'I am writing out of deep concern that your client, the President of the United States, is engaging in rhetoric and activity that places my client, the Intelligence Community Whistleblower, and their family in physical danger,' Andrew Bakaj wrote to White House counsel Pat Cipollone in a Thursday letter obtained by CNN's Anderson Cooper.... Trump has repeatedly attacked the whistleblower and tried to discredit the individual, saying he, Trump, deserves to 'meet his accuser' and has demanded the whistleblower's identity be revealed."

 
Erica Orden of CNN: "A New York state judge ordered ... Donald Trump to pay $2 million to a collection of nonprofit organizations in connection with a settlement with the New York state attorney general's office to resolve a civil lawsuit alleging the foundation unlawfully coordinated with the 2016 Trump presidential campaign. In her decision filed Thursday, Justice Saliann Scarpulla found that 'Mr. Trump breached his fiduciary duty to the Foundation,' including by 'allowing his campaign to orchestrate' a televised fundraiser ostensibly for the foundation in Des Moines, Iowa, in January 2016, and allowing the campaign to direct the distribution of the money raised from that event 'to further Mr. Trump's political campaign.' In her decision, however, the judge didn't impose one of the outcomes the attorney general's office sought: a ban on Trump and his children serving on the board of any other New York nonprofit. She also declined to order Trump to pay punitive damages.... Trump ... had vowed to fight the lawsuit, tweeting last year, 'I won't settle this case!' But the lawyers on both sides ... came to a 'consensual resolution of the bulk of this proceeding' in October, the judge said in her decision, and agreed that the judge would determine the amount of damages Trump would be required to pay. The settlement comes in the wake of an agreement by the foundation in December to dissolve under judicial supervision." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "The settlement, which was finalized last month and announced on Thursday in the judge’s order, included a detailed admission of misconduct that is rare for the president, who has long employed a scorched-earth approach toward fighting lawsuits. Among Mr. Trump’s admissions in court papers: The charity gave his campaign complete control over disbursing the $2.8 million that the foundation had raised at a fund-raiser for veterans in Iowa in January 2016, only days before the state’s presidential nominating caucuses. The fund-raiser, he acknowledged, was in fact a campaign event." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: So now I think we know why the New York Don suddenly decided last week to become "a Florida man." If you're an old con man to set in your ways to take up residence on an exotic island ostensibly under foreign control, Florida is the place for you. It's full of old con men.

Ana Swanson, et al., of the New York Times: "The United States and China have agreed that an initial trade deal between the two countries would roll back a portion of the tariffs they are placing on each other’s products, officials from both countries said, a significant step toward defusing tensions between the world’s largest economies. The agreement has not yet been completed, and a deal could fail to materialize as it has in previous rounds of negotiations. But if a pact is reached, the Trump administration has committed to cutting some tariffs, American officials and other people with knowledge of the negotiations said."

Steven Erlanger of the New York Times: “French President Emmanuel Macron shocked allies in an interview published on Thursday, saying that he did not know whether NATO’s commitment to collective defense was still valid and that the alliance was experiencing 'brain death' because of a lack of strategic coordination and leadership from the United States. 'What we are currently experiencing is the brain death of NATO,' Mr. Macron told The Economist magazine. He said the United States under President Trump appeared to be 'turning its back on us,' notably by pulling troops out of northeastern Syria without notice, and he called on Europeans, as he has often done, to do more in their own defense with the aim of 'strategic autonomy.'’’ CNN's story is here. The Economist's interview (translated into English) is here; you have to "register" to read the interview. Mrs. McC: I didn't.

Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: “The top American diplomat on the ground in northern Syria has criticized the Trump administration for not trying harder to prevent Turkey’s military offensive there last month — and said Turkish-backed militia fighters committed 'war crimes and ethnic cleansing.' In a searing internal memo, the diplomat, William V. Roebuck, raised the question of whether tougher American diplomacy, blunter threats of economic sanctions and increased military patrols could have deterred Turkey from attacking. Similar measures had dissuaded Turkish military action before.” (Also linked yesterday.) Here's the memo, via the NYT. A related Guardian story, by Julian Borger, is here.

Book Report: "A Warning"

Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: “Senior Trump administration officials considered resigning en masse last year in a 'midnight self-massacre' to sound a public alarm about President Trump’s conduct, but rejected the idea because they believed it would further destabilize an already teetering government, according to a new book by an unnamed author. In 'A Warning' by Anonymous, obtained by The Washington Post ahead of its release, a writer described only as 'a senior official in the Trump administration' paints a chilling portrait of the president as cruel, inept and a danger to the nation he was elected to lead. The author — who first captured attention in 2018 as the unidentified author of a New York Times opinion column — describes Trump careening from one self-inflicted crisis to the next.... The book depicts Trump as making misogynistic and racist comments behind the scenes.... One theme laced throughout the book is Trump’s indifference to the boundaries of the law.... The author portrays Trump as fearful of coups against him and suspicious of note-takers on his staff.... 'He stumbles, slurs, gets confused, is easily irritated, and has trouble synthesizing information, not occasionally but with regularity.'...” The Guardian has a story based on Rucker's report.

Alex Johnson of NBC News: "... Donald Trump's behavior can be so erratic that most top administration officials have pre-written resignation letters ready to submit, an anonymous author claiming to be a senior official in the Trump administration says in a book scheduled to be published this month. To complicate matters, the president's decision-making abilities are getting worse with time, according to excerpts of 'A Warning' that were obtained and read Thursday night on MSNBC's 'The Rachel Maddow Show.'" The Maddow segment is embedded at the top of Johnson's story.

Jennifer Szalai of the New York Times: “'A Warning,' Anonymous says, is intended for a 'broad audience,' though to judge by the parade of bland, methodical arguments (Anonymous loves to qualify criticisms with a lawyerly 'in fairness'), the ideal reader would seem to be an undecided voter who has lived in a cave for the past three years, and is irresistibly moved by quotations from Teddy Roosevelt and solemn invocations of Cicero.... Everything in the text of 'A Warning' suggests a dyed-in-the-wool establishment Republican.... Yes, Anonymous is happy about the conservative judicial appointments, the deregulation, the tax cuts; what rankles is the 'unbecoming' behavior, the 'unseemly antics.'... Toward the end of the book, an earlier quote from Mr. Trump kept coming back to me, unbidden: 'These are just words. A bunch of words. It doesn’t mean anything.'”

Darren Samuelsohn & Josh Gerstein of Politico report on Thursday's testimony in Roger Stone's trial: "Federal prosecutors unveiled a barrage of evidence against ... Stone as they tried to show that Stone bullied an associate to stay silent when a House committee investigating Russia’s 2016 election interference came calling. It all made for riveting courtroom drama at Stone’s trial on charges of obstruction of Congress, lying and witness tampering as jurors heard all the juicy details from a variety of crude communications between Stone and the liberal talk show host Randy Credico — the witness Stone is charged with threatening and trying to silence.... Credico..., a comic and impressionist..., took the stand for the prosecution and had many in the jury box chortling with his wisecracks and a slew of vintage TV and film references. His testimony also triggered repeated interventions by the prosecution and the federal judge to stop with the digressions and keep his responses from devolving into a stand-up act.... Credico’s rollicking testimony followed a much more buttoned-down presentation from a former FBI agent who adopted a clinical tone as she read into the record a series of vulgar threats and insults Stone unleashed at his acquaintance as the federal investigations heated up." ~~~

     ~~~ Charlie Gile & Dareh Gregorian of NBC News report on the Stone trial here. "The Godfather" and a Bernie Sanders impression are featured. Dan Friedman has the story for Mother Jones. The three stories have different emphases.

Presidential Race 2020, Billionaires Edition

Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Michael R. Bloomberg is actively preparing to enter the Democratic presidential primary and is expected to file paperwork this week designating himself as a candidate in at least one state with an early filing deadline, people briefed on Mr. Bloomberg’s plans said. Mr. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor and billionaire businessman, has been privately weighing a bid for the White House for weeks and has not yet made a final decision on whether to run, an adviser said. But in the first sign that he is seriously moving toward a campaign, Mr. Bloomberg has dispatched staffers to Alabama to gather signatures to qualify for the primary there. Though Alabama does not hold an early primary, it has a Friday deadline for candidates to formally enter the race." CNN's story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Steve M. "This is one time when I think people in the media should get out of their bubble. Bloomberg is not famous nationwide. When he's polled, more people don't know who he is than like him or dislike him. He's basically Tom Steyer, except Eastern, so he gets more media coverage. He's also sour-tempered and uncharismatic -- you know, a perfect candidate for the party of Barack Obama and JFK.... He'll be out by Super Tuesday -- and we just have to hope that he doesn't get it into his head to run third party. If he does, he could muster just enough support in a few Northeast states to make, say, New Jersey or New Hampshire easier for Trump to win. It's a ridiculous distraction." Read on. Steve takes apart Alex Burns' nutso speculation. ~~~

     ~~~ Erik Loomis of LG&$: Bloomberg "stands for nothing but capital and this is not what even Biden voters want. He certainly stands for the Wall Street establishment that is scared by Elizabeth Warren. And hey, since I’ve been told repeatedly on Left Twitter and Jacobin that Warren is a NEOLIBERAL CAPITALIST LOVER OF CAPITALISM, maybe we can all unite around yet another old white man!" ~~~

     ~~~ Elizabeth Warren & Bernie Sanders welcome Mike Bloomberg to the race. Sort of.

~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Yeah But. Will Bloomberg buy endorsements from Alabama state legislators & small-town mayors? ~~~

Alexandra Jaffe of the AP: “A top aide to Democratic presidential candidate Tom Steyer in Iowa privately offered campaign contributions to local politicians in exchange for endorsing his White House bid, according to multiple people with direct knowledge of the conversations. The overtures from Pat Murphy, a former state House speaker who is serving as a top adviser on Steyer’s Iowa campaign, aren’t illegal — though payments for endorsements would violate campaign finance laws if not disclosed. There’s no evidence that any Iowans accepted the offer or received contributions from Steyer’s campaign as compensation for their backing.... Tom Courtney, a former Democratic state senator from southeastern Iowa who’s running for reelection to his old seat, told The Associated Press that the financial offer 'left a bad taste in my mouth.' Murphy said concerns about his outreach were the result of a 'miscommunication.' As Steyer met with voters in Bluffton, South Carolina, on Thursday, the first question posed to him was about the AP report. He said that he learned about the allegations while driving to the event and that no payments had gone to officials in Iowa.” (Also linked yesterday.)

Elections 2019. Richard Hasen in Slate: "Will the Kentucky Legislature assist Matt Bevin in stealing the governor’s race from Democrat Andy Beshear, who appeared to have won Tuesday’s election by about 5,000 votes?... On Wednesday Kentucky Senate President Robert Stivers raised the prospect that his institution, not the voters, could determine the outcome of the race. If Stivers [tries that stunt], the election would likely end up in federal court.... Either way, that we’re even discussing this potentiality one year before Donald Trump — who has repeatedly challenged the vote totals in his 2016 election victory — is set to face reelection is a wrenching sign for our already-damaged democracy.... We have already seen Republican state legislatures in places like Wisconsin and North Carolina go so far as to strip powers from incoming Democratic governors.... Bevin ... so far he has suspiciously refused to provide details of his claims [of voting irregularies]." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Daniel Desrochers of the Lexington Herald-Leader: “A growing number of Republican lawmakers are urging Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin, a fellow Republican, to either provide evidence of the voting 'irregularities' he has alleged or concede Tuesday’s election to Gov.-elect Andy Beshear, who defeated him by 5,189 votes.... Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, first raised the possibility of the tight election being decided by the Republican-led legislature Tuesday night when he explained the process that would occur if Bevin decided to challenge the results of the race. Bevin bolstered that speculation Wednesday by claiming that thousands of absentee ballots were counted illegally without presenting any proof to back up his claim.'” See also Charles Pierce's post, linked next.

Read more here: https://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article237113614.html#storylink=cpy

Beyond the Beltway

Charles Pierce: "... the authoritarian rot that produced the current president* is present in the Republican Party at all levels. Democratic success in elections, unless it is achieved by overwhelming margins, is in the eyes of Republicans prima facie illegitimate. It started with Bill Clinton and it’s gotten worse ever since." Pierce cites examples; the history behind the first one is a killer. Really.

Way Beyond

Two Jerks Walked into a Brazilian Radio Studio.... Tasneem Nashrulla & Maura Albano of BuzzFeed News: "Glenn Greenwald got into a fistfight with Augusto Nunes, a far-right Brazilian journalist, during the live taping of a radio show in Brazil. The two journalists had a heated exchange over Nunes' previous comments about Greenwald's children with his husband, Brazilian politician David Miranda.... Greenwald then repeatedly call Nunes a coward, prompting Nunes to strike him. The two men then exchanged slaps and shoves as others on the show intervened and pried them apart. But not before Greenwald made one last attempt to strike Nunes in the face." Includes video (I couldn't get the audio, but that doesn't mean you can't). (Also linked yesterday.) 

The Commentariat -- November 7, 2019

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Erica Orden of CNN: "A New York state judge ordered ... Donald Trump to pay $2 million to a collection of nonprofit organizations in connection with a settlement with the New York state attorney general's office to resolve a civil lawsuit alleging the foundation unlawfully coordinated with the 2016 Trump presidential campaign. In her decision filed Thursday, Justice Saliann Scarpulla found that 'Mr. Trump breached his fiduciary duty to the Foundation,' including by 'allowing his campaign to orchestrate' a televised fundraiser ostensibly for the foundation in Des Moines, Iowa, in January 2016, and allowing the campaign to direct the distribution of the money raised from that event 'to further Mr. Trump's political campaign.' In her decision, however, the judge didn't impose one of the outcomes the attorney general's office sought: a ban on Trump and his children serving on the board of any other New York nonprofit. She also declined to order Trump to pay punitive damages.... Trump ... had vowed to fight the lawsuit, tweeting last year, 'I won't settle this case!' But the lawyers on both sides ... came to a 'consensual resolution of the bulk of this proceeding' in October, the judge said in her decision, and agreed that the judge would determine the amount of damages Trump would be required to pay. The settlement comes in the wake of an agreement by the foundation in December to dissolve under judicial supervision."

Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: "The top American diplomat on the ground in northern Syria has criticized the Trump administration for not trying harder to prevent Turkey's military offensive there last month -- and said Turkish-backed militia fighters committed 'war crimes and ethnic cleansing.' In a searing internal memo, the diplomat, William V. Roebuck, raised the question of whether tougher American diplomacy, blunter threats of economic sanctions and increased military patrols could have deterred Turkey from attacking. Similar measures had dissuaded Turkish military action before."

Richard Hasen in Slate: "Will the Kentucky Legislature assist Matt Bevin in stealing the governor's race from Democrat Andy Beshear, who appeared to have won Tuesday's election by about 5,000 votes?... On Wednesday Kentucky Senate President Robert Stivers raised the prospect that his institution, not the voters, could determine the outcome of the race. If Stivers [tries that stunt], the election would likely end up in federal court.... Either way, that we're even discussing this potentiality one year before Donald Trump -- who has repeatedly challenged the vote totals in his 2016 election victory -- is set to face reelection is a wrenching sign for our already-damaged democracy.... We have already seen Republican state legislatures in places like Wisconsin and North Carolina go so far as to strip powers from incoming Democratic governors.... Bevin ... so far he has suspiciously refused to provide details of his claims [of voting irregularies]."

Alexandra Jaffe of the AP: "A top aide to Democratic presidential candidate Tom Steyer in Iowa privately offered campaign contributions to local politicians in exchange for endorsing his White House bid, according to multiple people with direct knowledge of the conversations. The overtures from Pat Murphy, a former state House speaker who is serving as a top adviser on Steyer's Iowa campaign, aren't illegal -- though payments for endorsements would violate campaign finance laws if not disclosed. There's no evidence that any Iowans accepted the offer or received contributions from Steyer's campaign as compensation for their backing.... Tom Courtney, a former Democratic state senator from southeastern Iowa who's running for reelection to his old seat, told The Associated Press that the financial offer 'left a bad taste in my mouth.' Murphy said concerns about his outreach were the result of a 'miscommunication.' As Steyer met with voters in Bluffton, South Carolina, on Thursday, the first question posed to him was about the AP report. He said that he learned about the allegations while driving to the event and that no payments had gone to officials in Iowa."

Two Jerks Walked into a Brazilian Radio Studio.... Tasneem Nashrulla & Maura Albano of BuzzFeed News: "Glenn Greenwald got into a fistfight with Augusto Nunes, a far-right Brazilian journalist, during the live taping of a radio show in Brazil. The two journalists had a heated exchange over Nunes' previous comments about Greenwald's children with his husband, Brazilian politician David Miranda.... Greenwald then repeatedly call Nunes a coward, prompting Nunes to strike him. The two men then exchanged slaps and shoves as others on the show intervened and pried them apart. But not before Greenwald made one last attempt to strike Nunes in the face." Includes video (I couldn't get the audio, but that doesn't mean you can't).

NPR: "House investigators have [just] released the deposition by Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent, who talked behind closed doors about the Ukraine affair." A pdf of the transcript, via the House, is here. ~~~

~~~ Nahal Toosi, et al., of Politico: "Kent testified in a closed session on Oct. 15, telling lawmakers that, like other career diplomats, he was essentially cut out of decisions about Ukraine due to maneuvering by other administration officials and outsiders, including Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani. Kent accused Giuliani of conducting a 'campaign of lies' about the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, that led to her early recall from Kyiv.... At one point, after Giuliani slammed Yovanovitch, Kent and others in a May 2019 interview, Kent was told by his superiors to 'keep my head down and lower my profile in Ukraine,' he said. The instruction came via an intermediary from David Hale, the undersecretary of State for political affairs, according to Kent's understanding. It wasn't clear if Hale had talked to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo about it."

** Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: "Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sidestepped questions about his lack of support for Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to Ukraine who was abruptly recalled from her post earlier this year amid a smear campaign seeking her removal." Oh, read on. What an arrogant, lying ass.

Carol Leonnig & Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "Former national security adviser John Bolton is willing to defy the White House and testify in the House impeachment inquiry about his alarm at the Ukraine pressure campaign if a federal court clears the way, according to people familiar with his views. Bolton could be a powerful witness for Democrats: Top State Department and national security officials have already testified that he was deeply concerned about efforts by Trump and his allies to push Ukraine to open investigations into the president's political rivals while the Trump administration held up military aid to that country. The former national security adviser, who abruptly left his post in September, is expected to confirm their statements and describe his conversations with Trump, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.... It remains unclear how quickly that could happen -- and whether it would be in time for Bolton to be called as a witness in the public House impeachment hearings, which are scheduled to begin next week. On Wednesday, House Democrats said they are awaiting a key test case involving former White House counsel Donald McGahn, in which a district-court decision could come by the end of this month." Mediaite has the story here. ~~~

~~~ Andrew Desiderio of Politico: "House impeachment investigators are moving on from John Bolton. The former national security adviser refused to appear for his scheduled deposition Thursday morning, a House Intelligence Committee official said, and his lawyer informed the panel that Bolton would take the House to court if he is subpoenaed. So instead of fighting a court battle that could take months, the official added, Bolton's refusal to testify will be used as evidence of obstruction of Congress against ... Donald Trump.... Bolton's defiance of Congress comes a day after the House withdrew its subpoena for Charles Kupperman, Bolton's former deputy who had asked a federal court to decide whether he had to comply with the subpoena.... In withdrawing the subpoena for Kupperman, lawyers for the House told a federal court that the former aide should abide by an impending decision in the House's bid to secure testimony from former White House counsel Don McGahn." Bolton & Kupperman had the same attorney.

Andrew Kramer of the New York Times: "Aides to Ukraine's leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, decided that military aid and support for peace talks outweighed the risks of appearing to take sides in American politics.... Government officials, lawmakers and others close to the Zelensky government have revealed new details of how high-level Ukrainian officials ultimately decided to acquiesce to President Trump's request -- and, by a stroke of luck, never had to follow through.... Even as [senior Zelensky aide Andriy] Yermak negotiated the wording [in a tug-of-war with U.S. envoy Kurt Volker] in August, the stakes were clear. While rumors had been swirling for months about a possible hold on military aid, by early August high-level Ukrainian officials had confirmed the freeze.... In September..., [Ambassador Gordon Sondland] explained in blunt terms to Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Yermak, there was little chance the aid would be forthcoming until they made the public statement on the investigations.... Mr. Trump wanted the Ukrainian president to speak on CNN, William B. Taylor Jr., the top American diplomat in Ukraine, testified.... Finally bending to the White House request, Mr. Zelensky's staff planned for him to make an announcement in an interview on Sept. 13 with Fareed Zakaria, the host of a weekly news show on CNN. Though plans were in motion to give the White House the public statement it had sought, events in Washington saved the Ukrainian government from any final decision and eliminated the need to make the statement.... Word of the freeze in military aid had leaked out, and Congress was in an uproar. Two days before the scheduled interview, the Trump administration released the assistance and Mr. Zelensky's office quickly canceled the interview."

The Corrupt Buffoon & His Band of Zany Blockheads. Episode 397: "The Great Greenland Purchase"

~~~ The Check Is in the Mail. Sorry, Trying to Buy Greenland. Yuliya Talmazan of NBC News: "In his testimony [before the House Intel Committee, [Bill] Taylor was asked about his remark that secretaries of defense and state, the CIA director and the national security advisor sought a joint meeting with President Trump to change his mind on withholding military aid from Ukraine, but such a meeting was 'hard to schedule.' He pointed out that it was due to a scheduling issue, but also the president's keen interest in buying Greenland from Denmark. 'I think this was also about the time of the Greenland question, about purchasing Greenland, which took up a lot of energy in the [National Security Council],' Taylor told the lawmakers. 'That's disturbing for a whole different reason,' House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., responded to Taylor, according to the transcript." Mrs. McC: Ah, yeah. If this were a comedy short, you'd be laughing your head off. It's like Ralph Kramer is running the country.

Franco Ordoñez & Mara Liasson of NPR: "A top aide to Vice President Pence arrived Thursday to testify in the ongoing House impeachment inquiry into President Trump. Jennifer Williams is a longtime foreign service officer who was assigned to be the vice president's special adviser for Europe and Russia in the spring. She would be the first person from the vice president's office to testify in the probe of whether the president withheld military aid from Ukraine while seeking a political favor. She will be the third person who was listening in on the July 25 call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to testify, a White House aide confirmed to NPR's Mara Liasson.

Meredith McGraw of Politico: "Earl Matthews, a senior National Security Council official who attended several of the meetings now at the center of the congressional impeachment inquiry, will depart from his job on Friday.... Matthews ... was part of a small group that sat in on meetings with Ukrainian officials that House Democrats are now scrutinizing as they investigate whether ... Donald Trump pressured Ukraine to investigate a political rival.... Still, Matthews has not been pulled into the Democrats' impeachment probe, according to an administration official.... An administration official only confirmed that the U.S. Army did not extend Matthews' rotation with the White House."

~~~~~~~~~~

Dartunorro Clark of NBC News: "Public hearings in Congress will begin next Wednesday in the impeachment inquiry of ... Donald Trump, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said Wednesday. The open hearing on Nov. 13 will hear testimony from career diplomat William Taylor and State Department official George Kent and another on Friday will hear testimony from ousted Ukraine Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. Schiff said there will be additional announcements of witnesses[.]" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Stefan Becket & Grace Segers of CBS News: "The House committees leading the impeachment inquiry released the transcript of testimony by the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, William Taylor, who raised questions about whether the U.S. was withholding military aid to Ukraine to pressure the country to open investigations into President Trump's political rivals.... In his testimony, Taylor described a concerted effort to use U.S. leverage to get Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to commit to opening investigations into debunked allegations of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election, as well as the gas company Burisma, which had hired former Vice President Joe Biden's son in 2014. Taylor said these efforts came via an 'irregular, informal channel of U.S. policy-making' consisting of Rudy Giuliani, then-special envoy Kurt Volker, Energy Secretary Rick Perry and U.S. Ambassador to the E.U. Gordon Sondland. He said he became aware of the parallel policy-making paths when working to schedule a phone call with Zelensky in late June. Taylor said Sondland 'cut out' other officials who would normally participate in the call and 'requested that the call not be transcribed.'" The page includes a ScribD reproduction of the text of Taylor's testimony. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Adam Edelman of NBC News: "The top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, Bill Taylor, told House impeachment investigators last month that ... Donald Trump directed officials to tie military aid to Ukraine to demands that the country open political advantageous probes, according to a transcript of his testimony made public Wednesday.... Taylor said he and others 'sat in astonishment' as a White House Office of Management and Budget official said during a July 18 inter-agency call that Trump had ordered a hold on military assistance to Ukraine, according to the transcript.... Taylor laid out in painstaking detail how U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland had told him that Trump was 'adamant' that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy himself publicly announce the Biden and 2016 investigations -- but that Trump nonetheless felt such an arrangement would not constitute a quid pro quo." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

New York Times: The witness testimony, from William B. Taylor Jr., the top American diplomat in Ukraine, provided one of the most vivid accounts about the actions at the heart of the [impeachment] inquiry.... New York Times reporters read through his deposition, highlighting key parts and offering context and analysis." (This is an update of a report linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Aaron Blake of the Washington Post outlines takeaways from the transcript: 1. Taylor identified two "quos" Trump would deliver, both conditioned on Ukraine's announcing "certain investigations, including one involving the company that employed former vice president Joe Biden's son Hunter": one was a White House meeting with Trump, & the the other was release of the appropriated military aid. 2. "Taylor's testimony ... stops short of directly implicating Trump. Taylor indicates that the quid pro quo was coming from [Rudy] Giuliani and says he didn't know whether Trump was behind it."* 3. "Taylor says that [John] Bolton had 'indicated that he was very sympathetic' to Taylor's concerns and that Bolton "was also trying, with the two secretaries and the director of the CIA [Gina Haspel], to get this decision reversed." (At another point, Taylor indicates that the 'two secretaries' were [Mike] Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper.) Taylor also says Bolton warned against holding the July 25 call between Trump and ... Zelensky, because he 'thought it was going to be a disaster.' 'He [Bolton] thought that there could be some talk of investigations or worse on the call,' Taylor said. 'Turned out he was right.'" ~~~

     ~~~ * Mrs. McCrabbie: Taylor's knowledge of Trump's involvement notwithstanding, obviously Trump was in on the plot, because it was he who had put a hold on the military aid and he who was refusing to really invite Zelensky to the White House. (See the Daily Beast story linked in yesterday's Commentariat, plus Patrick's comment in yesterday's thread, about the fake invitation to Zelensky which Trump signed.) ~~~

~~~ Andrew Desiderio of Politico: "Rudy Giuliani was ... Donald Trump's enforcer, circumventing official channels and bewildering professional diplomats as he pressured Ukraine to target Trump's political opponents. Along the way, career foreign service officers became collateral damage -- and questions of a Trump-authorized quid pro quo emerged, blowing up into a scandal that now imperils the Trump presidency. Those are the unchallenged details revealed so far in five transcripts of depositions released this week as part of the House impeachment inquiry. And as Democrats prepare for public hearings next week, they are underscoring the common thread running through the witnesses' accounts. 'I think you will see throughout the course of the testimony -- not only their testimony but many others -- the most important facts are largely not contested,' House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff said Wednesday." ~~~

The investigation I conducted concerning 2016 Ukrainian collusion and corruption, was done solely as a defense attorney to defend my client against false charges, that kept changing as one after another were disproven. -- Rudy Giuliani, in a tweet, Wednesday, apparently in response to the release of witness testimony in the House impeachment inquiry

This tweet by itself establishes that @realDonaldTrump committed an impeachable offense. To say that Giuliani's and Trump's pursuit of 'Ukrainian ... corruption' was 'done solely' to protect Trump's interests establishes that Trump was not acting for the country. -- George Conway, in a follow-up tweet, Wednesday ~~~

~~~ Rudy Lawyers Up. Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: "Rudy Giuliani ... announced Wednesday he'd obtained new legal representation as part of the House impeachment inquiry and amid federal scrutiny of his business dealings in Ukraine.... [In one of a series of tweets, Giuliani wrote yesterday,] 'I am represented and assisted by Robert Costello and the Pierce Bainbridge firm in particular, Eric Creizman and Melissa Madrigal.'... As Giuliani alluded to in his tweets, he has set out to prove that the Justice Department and the entirety of the U.S. intelligence community were wrong in their conclusion that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to boost Trump, making the unfounded assertion that Ukrainians were behind the meddling instead.... Costello ... cropped up during the legal proceedings of Michael Cohen, Trump's onetime personal attorney and fixer, in what appeared to be conversations about a potential pardon. Costello had reportedly told Cohen via email that he was in contact with the White House by way of a 'back channel,' which was Giuliani. 'I spoke with Rudy,' Costello wrote Cohen in April 2018. 'Very Very Positive. You are "loved."' According to emails Cohen shared with the House Intelligence Committee, Costello told Cohen to 'sleep well tonight, you have friends in high places.' Cohen told lawmakers he believed Costello was referring to Trump." Mrs. McC: Is this the way mob lawyers speak or is it the way lawyers think mob lawyers speak? ~~~

     ~~~ It Wasn't Easy. Maggie Haberman, et al., of the New York Times: "The hires came after a weekslong search to find a lawyer who would represent Mr. Giuliani.... At least four prominent attorneys declined for various reasons, according to people familiar with the matter.... Law firms are, for the most part, conservative institutions that often represent a wide range of clients with varying business interests, many of whom tend to shy away from controversy, regardless of their politics. Mr. Giuliani's connection to Mr. Trump, his unpredictability and his recent history of outbursts in his frequent television appearances could make him a challenging client. Lawyers who are solo practitioners were concerned that Mr. Giuliani, who is known to have difficulty delegating, would try to manage his own case, according to a person close to Mr. Giuliani." ~~~

~~~ Ken Vogel, et al., of the New York Times: "Where did a cash-strapped Ukrainian-born American businessman get $500,000 to pay ... Rudolph W. Giuliani? It turns out that the money came from a Long Island lawyer named Charles Gucciardo, a Republican donor and supporter of Mr. Trump. The payment was part of a deal in which Mr. Gucciardo would become an investor in a company started by the businessman, Lev Parnas, according to Mr. Giuliani, Mr. Gucciardo's lawyer and other people familiar with the arrangement.... But it is not clear the stake would have any value, since Fraud Guarantee does not appear to have any customers.... In 2018, [Mr. Gucciardo] made his biggest donation on record to date -- $50,000 to the pro-Trump super PAC America First Action -- and attended an event for major donors at the Trump hotel featuring appearances by the president and Donald Trump Jr. It was there that he met Mr. Parnas and [Igor] Fruman, who had recently co-founded a company called Global Energy Producers that donated $325,000 to the PAC."

Bill Barr Wishes to Retain His Self-Respect. (Too Late, Bill.) Matt Zapotosky, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump wanted Attorney General William P. Barr to hold a news conference declaring that the commander in chief had broken no laws during a phone call in which he pressed his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate a political rival, though Barr ultimately declined to do so, people familiar with the matter said. The request from Trump traveled from the president to other White House officials and eventually to the Justice Department. The president has mentioned Barr's declination to associates in recent weeks, saying he wished Barr would have held the news conference, Trump advisers say. In recent weeks, the Justice Department has sought some distance from the White House, particularly on matters relating to the burgeoning controversy over Trump's dealings on Ukraine and the impeachment inquiry they sparked.... The request for the news conference came sometime around Sept. 25, when the administration released a rough transcript of the president's July phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.... As the rough transcript was released, a Justice Department spokeswoman said officials had evaluated it and the whistleblower complaint to see whether campaign finance laws had been broken, determined that none had been and decided 'no further action was warranted.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Kyle Balluck of the Hill: "President Trump early Thursday pushed back on a report that he asked Attorney General William Barr to hold a news conference clearing him of wrongdoing in the Ukraine controversy that sparked an impeachment inquiry.... 'The story in the Amazon Washington Post, of course picked up by Fake News CNN, saying "President Trump asked for AG Barr to host a news conference clearing him on Ukraine," is totally untrue and just another FAKE NEWS story with anonymous sources that don't exist,' he tweeted." Mrs. McC: So I guess that's a confirmation. ~~~

~~~ MEANWHILE. Devlin Barrett, et al., of the Washington Post: "Justice Department officials are trying to release in the coming weeks a potentially explosive inspector general report about the FBI's investigation into President Trump's 2016 campaign, according to multiple people familiar with the effort.... The report's findings will mark a major public test of Attorney General William P. Barr's credibility, given his past suggestions of significant problems with the investigative decisions made by former FBI leaders involved in the case. The findings by Inspector General Michael Horowitz also will set the stage for the separate but related investigation led by U.S. Attorney John Durham, who is investigating how U.S. intelligence agencies pursued allegations that Russian agents might have conspired with Trump associates during the 2016 campaign. Officials have recently said that investigation is pursuing potential crimes. Barr has spent weeks working on the declassification decisions, as Horowitz scrutinized large volumes of classified information to assess how the FBI launched and pursued the investigation and related cases, people familiar with the matter said."

In Defense of Trump: Lies, False Rumors, Distractions & Threats

Trump's "Impeachment War Room" Is Right-Wing Twitter World. Mike McIntire & Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times: "Days after a decorated Army lieutenant colonel offered damaging testimony about President Trump's conduct on a July phone call with Ukraine's leader, Mr. Trump stood on the South Lawn and issued a vague but ominous warning. 'You'll be seeing very soon what comes out,' Mr. Trump said on Saturday, referring to the officer, Lt. Col. Alexander S. Vindman>.... An attack on Colonel Vindman's character and motives was already making its way from the dark corners of Mr. Trump's social media following to the front lines of the impeachment battle. One day earlier, the right-wing commentator Jack Posobiec had retweeted a lengthy thread by a Florida man -- a fan of QAnon, a fringe conspiracy about the 'deep state' -- claiming to have witnessed Colonel Vindman 'bash America' in conversation with Russian officers during a joint military exercise in Germany in 2013.... Mr. Posobiec's [unsubstantiated] post was retweeted by Mr. Trump's son and chief defender, Donald Trump Jr.... While the White House has scrambled to mount an organized response to the House impeachment inquiry ... Twitter has become the Trump war room." Never mind that Vindman would have spoken in Russian to the Russian officers, & the guy who started the rumor apparently doesn't understand Russian.

Trump's Impeachment Defense: Lie, Lie & Lie Again. Toluse Olorunnipa & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "Standing before a crowd of supporters this week in Lexington, Ky., President Trump repeated a false claim he has made more than 100 times in the past six weeks: that a whistleblower from the intelligence community misrepresented a presidential phone call at the center of the impeachment inquiry that threatens his presidency.... It's a form of gaslighting that has become the central defense strategy for the president as he faces his greatest political threat yet. But th approach is coming under increasing strain as congressional Democrats release transcripts and prepare to hold public hearings presenting evidence that directly undercuts Trump's claims.... He has also pushed other specious arguments in his harried attempt to counter the growing evidence from witnesses implicating his administration in a quid pro quo scheme linking military aid to Ukrainian investigations targeting Democrats." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Yes, But Lindsey Has a More Plausible Defense: Incoherence. Tim O'Donnell of the Week: "Graham seems fed up with the whole thing, saying on Wednesday that he won't read any of the newly released transcripts because the whole thing is 'a bunch of B.S.' Graham said one of the reasons he doesn't think President Trump deserves to be impeached is because there's little chance the Trump administration was savvy enough ... to come up with the idea of withholding military aid from Ukraine in exchange for Kyiv publicly announcing anti-corruption investigations.... '"It was incoherent," [Graham said of Trump's Ukraine policy]. "They seem to be *incapable* of forming a quid pro quo."'" ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: In a way, Lindsey is inadvertently admitting the truth of the basis of the impeachment inquiry. The reason for the "incoherence," after all, is that there were two sets of policies: one executed by the U.S. State Department, and the other by Trump & the Three Stooges Rudy, Lev & Igor. Meanwhile, Gordon Sondland & other buttinskies were trying to "coordinate" the two, to "incohent" effect. ~~~

~~~ Lauren Fox, et al., of CNN: "Republicans are struggling to find a unified defense as they shift their ever-changing arguments about why ... Donald Trump's actions are not impeachable, amid damaging testimony from senior diplomats that Trump sought to condition US military aid to Ukraine on opening investigations into his political rivals. What once was a frequently repeated mantra -- there was no quid pro quo -- has now morphed into a multi-pronged and sometimes disjointed defense, with Republicans each taking the job into their own hands, hoping to fight back against the allegations raised daily with the release of new transcripts. Republicans across the Capitol have resorted to attacking the firsthand knowledge of witnesses, muddying the waters with calls to name the whistleblower and even seeking to discredit the Trump administration's ability to be organized enough to execute a scheme to use military aid in order to advance its own political agenda." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Wait, I thought these guys were supposed to be providing checks on the presidency and/or serving as the president*'s jurors. They aren't supposed to be his defense team. ~~~

~~~ Two great actors read Trump's line. Thanks to P.D. Pepe for the lead:

Betsy Swan & Erin Banco of the Daily Beast: "... Donald Trump promised 'unwavering' support to Ukraine in a May 29 letter congratulating its new president on his election victory. He also invited President Volodymyr Zelensky to the White House, saying the invitation was a sign of the United States' 'commitment' to the young democracy. Trump's letter, which a senior congressional aide shared with The Daily Beast, points to a sharp contrast between Trump's official, warm communications with Zelensky and the moves he actually wanted from Kyiv. The letter, dated May 29, is published here for the first time.... Over the course of the next two months, it became clear to State Department and White House officials that something was preventing a meeting between Trump and Zelensky.... In his infamous press conference last month, acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said the letter to Zelensky was merely a 'courtesy.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

David Ignatius of the Washington Post: "Since the investigation began into President Trump's machinations in Ukraine, one of the most disturbing questions has been: Where is Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, who's supposed to shield his diplomats from political interference? And now we have the answer: Pompeo, in recent months, has essentially been in hiding, protecting himself while his subordinates took the hit -- evidently hoping to preserve his influence with Trump. Sometimes his deflections and denials have been outright misleading. Pompeo has badly tarnished his reputation in accommodating Trump. He joins the long list of those damaged by their service to this president.... [After Pompeo failed to prevent Trump from firing her,] Trump's groundless attacks against [Marie] Yovanovitch continued, as did Pompeo's silence.... When a transcript of the menacing July [25] call [between Trump & Zelensky] was released Sept. 25, Yovanovitch felt personally threatened, and she again asked for help. Pompeo said nothing publicly in her defense [and claimed on TV that his top aide Michael McKinley had not asked him to support Yovanovitch, even tho McKinley testified he had done so three times]. It's deeply troubling to see a powerful person such as Pompeo who is silent in the face of lies and who takes no action to protect his subordinates from wrongdoing." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Pompeo reportedly keeps a Bible open on his desk, which he claims to consult daily. I guess he missed all those instructive passages about helping others. Looks as if Mike is a "prosperity gospel"-type of "Christian."

Yesterday, We Learned This. Julia Davis of the Daily Beast: "Standing beside an approving Donald Trump at a rally in Kentucky on Monday night, Republican Sen. Rand Paul demanded the media unmask the whistleblower whose report about the president's alleged abuse of power dealing with Ukraine sparked impeachment proceedings. American news organizations resisted the pressure, but -- in a 2019 re-play of 'Russia, if you're listening' -- Kremlin-controlled state media promptly jumped on it. Shortly after Sen. Paul tweeted out an article that speculated in considerable detail about the identity of the whistleblower -- with a photograph, a name, and details about the purported political history of a CIA professional -- Russian state media followed suit. As if on cue, the Kremlin-controlled heavy hitters -- TASS, RT, Rossiya-1 -- disseminated the same information. But unlike Rand Paul, one of the Russian state media outlets didn't seem to find the source -- Real Clear Investigations -- to be particularly impressive, and claimed falsely that the material was published originally by The Washington Post. This was the most egregious, but certainly not the only example of Kremlin-funded media cheerleading for Trump's fight against impeachment as proceedings against him unfold with growing speed." ~~~

~~~ So Now This. Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) blocked a resolution Wednesday reaffirming the Senate's support for whistleblower protections and accused Democrats of 'fake outrage.' Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) had asked for unanimous consent to pass the resolution, which 'acknowledges the contributions of whistleblowers' and throws the chamber's support behind protecting whistleblowers from retaliation.... Asked on Tuesday why he hasn't disclosed the name of the individual, Paul told reporters that he 'probably will.' 'I'm more than willing to, and I probably will at some point,' he said. 'There is no law preventing anybody from saying the name.'"

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Yesterday, I wrote, "If we had a real Justice Department -- and apparently we don't -- said DOJ would open a criminal case against Li'l Randy for outting the whistleblower, if indeed he has done so. Whistleblowers are protected under law, & Randy is not a journalist; he ... is a Senator who swore to uphold the Constitution & the laws." It looks as if Li'l Randy is right, and I'm wrong. The Whistleblowers Protection Act (and related laws & a 2012 presidential directive) only protect whistleblowers from retaliation for disclosure of information. It does not protect them from exposure, as far as I can tell based on my extensive study of the Wikipedia entry on the subject. ~~~

~~~ Oliver Darcy & Brian Stelter of CNN: "Fox News hosts and personalities have been instructed over the last several days not to identify the whistleblower whose complaint sparked an impeachment probe against President Trump, people familiar with the matter told CNN Business. Several hosts and commentators on the network who have been supportive of President Trump seem to want to name the person they believe to be the whistleblower, but Fox's guidelines have said not to do so.... Fox is perhaps the only major component of the right-wing media machine that has, thus far, refrained from naming the person identified by that story. No mainstream news organization has identified the whistleblower. CNN has sent guidance to staff about not repeating any reporting that alleges the name and identity of the whistleblower."

** Sharon LaFraniere of the New York Times: "President Trump was more personally involved in his campaign's effort to obtain Democratic emails stolen by Russian operatives in 2016 than was previously known, phone records introduced in federal court on Wednesday suggested. Federal prosecutors disclosed the calls at the start of the criminal trial of Roger J. Stone Jr., Mr. Trump's longtime friend, who faces charges of lying to federal investigators about his efforts to contact WikiLeaks during the 2016 campaign. Russian intelligence officers had funneled tens of thousands of emails they stole from Democratic computers to WikiLeaks, which released them at critical points during the presidential race. The records suggest that Mr. Trump spoke to Mr. Stone repeatedly during the summer of 2016, at a time when Mr. Stone was aggressively seeking to obtain the stolen emails from Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks. The prosecutors noted that they did not know what Mr. Stone and Mr. Trump had discussed. But they stressed that the timing of their calls dovetailed with other key developments related to the theft and release of the Democratic emails. The phone records are the first concrete suggestion that Mr. Trump may have had a direct role in his campaign's effort to benefit from Russia's hidden hand in the election." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: So we are supposed to believe here that Trump thought Assange obtained these hacked e-mails from some Ukrainian guy. And if that were the case (it isn't), why did Trump cry out, "Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing"? Why not, "Ukraine, if you're listening...." The plea to Russia, as well as the phone calls with Stone, are solid evidence that Trump was not asking Zelensky to investigate "the server" in their phone call. He was asking Zelensky to fabricate Ukraine's --or some Ukrainians' -- involvement in the hack. ~~~

~~~ Dan Friedman & David Corn of Mother Jones: "Prosecutors ... are producing material undercutting Trump's claim to Mueller that he has no recollection of talking to Stone during the campaign about WikiLeaks. This information also presents a new wrinkle in the Trump-Russia scandal: Trump might have thought in 2016 that his campaign, in effect, was colluding with WikiLeaks.... 'The evidence in this case will show that Roger Stone lied to the House Intelligence Committee because the truth looked bad,' lead prosecutor Aaron Zelinsky said in his opening statement on Wednesday. 'The truth looked bad for the Trump campaign and the truth looked bad for Donald Trump.'" The reporters cite three answers to interrogatories in which Trump claimed not to recall any discussions with Stone re: WikiLeaks. "Mueller's report characterized Trump's responses as 'inadequate.' Zelinsky's opening statement suggests Stone's trial could show Trump's statements were false.... The story that Zelinsky began telling at the start of the trial raised the possibility (or probability) that Trump and his campaign did interact with Stone regarding the WikiLeaks releases of stolen Democratic documents -- and that they considered Stone a backchannel to Assange and his organization." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: It's rather delicious that Trump is caught up in one election-tampering crime (2016) with a president named Zelensky and in another election-tampering crime (2020) with a prosecutor named Zelinsky. I assume they're different spellings of the same surname. ~~~

~~~ Clare Hymes, et al., of CBS News: "Federal prosecutors in Roger Stone's trial told jurors they plan to call several high-profile witnesses to the stand, including Steve Bannon ..., Rick Gates and radio personality Randy Credico. and revealed new details about Stone's contacts with Trump campaign officials before and after the release of stolen Democratic National Committee emails in 2016, including several phone calls Stone had with then-candidate Trump.... According to [prosecutor Aaron] Zelinsky, Stone emailed Bannon that he knew how to win the 2016 election, but it 'ain't pretty.'... The first witness called to testify was Michelle Taylor, an FBI agent who worked on the case and outlined Stone's communication in the days after the DNC hack. Prosecutors presented evidence that Stone tried to get information to and from [Julian] Assange, and use the hacked emails and information from Assange to influence the 2016 election.... The jury includes 11 women and three men, with the trial expected to last about three weeks under the direction of Judge Amy Berman Jackson. During jury selection on Tuesday, Stone left the courtroom with a bout of food poisoning." Mrs. McC: Or so he said. ~~~

~~~ Josh Gerstein & Darren Samuelsohn of Politico call Stone's trial "the Cliff Notes version of the Mueller report." Their five takeaways from the trial opening are helpful.

Yashar Ali of the Huffington Post: "The much-anticipated book 'A Warning,' reportedly written by an unnamed senior White House official, claims that high-level White House aides were certain that Vice President Mike Pence would support the use of the 25th Amendment to have ... Donald Trump removed from office because of mental incapacity. According to the exposé, which is written by someone that The New York Times and the publisher of the book say is a current or former senior White House official, using the pen name 'Anonymous,' highly placed White House officials did a back-of-the-envelope tally of which Cabinet members would be prepared to sign a letter invoking Section 4 of the 25th Amendment.... The discussions about invoking the 25th Amendment took place, according to the book, soon after FBI Director James Comey was fired by the president.... Months later, in an interview with the CBS newsmagazine '60 Minutes,' Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, who was later fired by the president and remains the target of a federal criminal investigation, confirmed that [Deputy AG Rod] Rosenstein had discussed the idea of invoking the 25th Amendment with Cabinet members."

U.S. Aid Goes to the Hallelujah Chorus. Yeganeh Torbati of ProPublica: "Decisions about U.S. aid are often no longer being governed by career professionals applying a rigorous review of applicants and their capabilities. Over the last two years, political pressure, particularly from the office of Vice President Mike Pence, had seeped into aid deliberations and convinced key decision-makers that unless they fell in line [by awarding grants to pence's favorite Christian groups], their jobs could be at stake.... ProPublica viewed internal emails and conducted interviews with nearly 40 current and former U.S. officials and aid professionals that shed new light on the success of Pence and his allies in influencing the government's long-standing process for awarding foreign aid.... The Trump administration's efforts to influence USAID funding sparked concern from career officials, who worried the agency risked violating constitutional prohibitions on favoring one religion over another. They also were concerned that being perceived as favoring Christians could worsen Iraq's sectarian divides.... USAID regulations state that awards 'must be free from political interference or even the appearance of such interference and must be made on the basis of merit, not on the basis of the religious affiliation of a recipient organization, or lack thereof.' Last month, USAID announced two grants to Iraqi organizations that career officials had previously rejected. Political appointees significantly impacted the latest awards...." Thanks to Anonymous for the link. ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Are we to think of these grants as more "virtuous" than Trump's extortion of Ukraine because pence doesn't benefit directly from aid directed to Christian organizations? (Of course, if these become known as "pence grants," then he does prosper politically as much as Trump would benefit from "dirt on the Bidens.") Both types of "favors" are illegal, too.

Presidential Race 2020

Indications Joe Biden Is Out of It:

(1) With Donald Trump out of the way, you're going to see a number of my [Republican] colleagues have an epiphany. Mark my words. -- Joe Biden, Wednesday

(2) Joe Biden, meanwhile, spent the evening with a small group of ultra-wealthy donors, at a fundraiser hosted by a fracking developer and a health care industry executive. He used his time there to go after Warren for being 'elitist.' -- P.D. Pepe, as part of her commentary in yesterday's thread

Senate Race 2020. James Arkin of Politico: "Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions will run for his old Senate seat in Alabama, mounting a stunning comeback attempt a year after he resigned amid a torrent of criticism and mockery from ... Donald Trump. Sessions is expected to announce his campaign Thursday, according to multiple Republicans familiar with his decision. He has been considering a bid for weeks, and his announcement would come just ahead of the Friday deadline to file for the Senate race.... The former attorney general's rocky relationship with Trump is the main obstacle to his return to the Senate.... Sessions will have to earn back Trump's support, or at least overcome his ire, to be successful in the crowded primary. [Doug] Jones [D-Ala.] is the most vulnerable senator up for reelection in 2020, and a number of Republicans are already running -- and competing to be seen as Trump's biggest supporter."

Election 2019

Bruce Schreiner of the AP: "Republican Gov. Matt Bevin asked Wednesday for a recanvass of Kentucky election results that showed him more than 5,000 votes behind Democrat Andy Beshear, who discounted the challenge and began preparing to take office.... Bevin said any information turned up won't be 'followed through on' until after the recanvass -- an indication he could seek further review of the election results. Kentucky's secretary of state, Alison Lundergan Grimes, scheduled the recanvass for Nov. 14. A recanvass is a check of the vote count to ensure the results were added correctly.... With 100% of precincts reporting, Beshear led by a little over 5,000 votes out of more than 1.4 million counted, or a margin of less than 0.4 percentage points. That's inside the margin that would trigger a recount in most states, and it's AP policy not to call races that could go to a recount. Although there is no mandatory recount law in Kentucky the AP is applying that same standard here." ~~~

~~~ Jeremy Peters & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "... a claim from the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel -- that Mr. Trump helped lift Gov. Matt Bevin of Kentucky from a 17-point deficit in the polls to nearly even in Tuesday's election -- took the president's practice of crediting himself to a new level. 'No one energizes our base like @realDonaldTrump,' Ms. McDaniel said in a late-night tweet on Tuesday. She also included the polling deficit, which did not match up with the vast majority of public polls or internal surveys conducted by campaigns in the weeks before the election or with the Republican Party's own recent surveys.... But public and internal Republican Party polls suggested the race had been extremely close before Mr. Trump arrived.... Other Republicans on Wednesday echoed Ms. McDaniel's comment, which aligns with the effort by Mr. Trump and his allies to build up and maintain an aura of political invulnerability that does not always match reality."

Don & Jared's Saudi Friend Is Spying on U.S. Citizens. Daisy Nguyen & Brian Melley of the AP: "Saudi Arabia, frustrated by growing criticism of its leaders and policies on social media, recruited two Twitter employees to spy on thousands of accounts that included prominent opponents, prosecutors alleged Wednesday. The complaint unsealed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco detailed a coordinated effort by Saudi government officials to recruit employees at the social media giant to look up the private data of Twitter accounts, including email addresses linked to the accounts and internet protocol addresses that can give up a user's location. It appeared to link Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the powerful 34-year-son of King Salman, to the effort. The accounts included those of a popular critic of the government with more than 1 million followers and a news personality. Neither was named." The Washington Post story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ MEANWHILE, we learned in September that "... Donald Trump has privately and repeatedly expressed opposition to the use of foreign intelligence from covert sources, including overseas spies who provide the US government with crucial information about hostile countries.... Trump has privately said that foreign spies can damage relations with their host countries and undermine his personal relationships with their leaders." Mrs. McC: Either this is turn-the-other-cheek Christian philosophy, or Trump wants to build Trump Tower Riyadh, Trump Tower Moscow & Club Trump on a beach in North Korea. Or maybe it's just an honor-among-thieves thing.

News Lede

CNN pieces together what is known about what happened to a U.S.-Mexican family who were attacked in Mexico.

The Commentariat -- November 6, 2019

Many thanks to safari for all he did today. I'm back for now, but there's still some question -- possibly to be answered later in the week -- as to how things will go from here. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie ~~~

     ~~~ Update: Many thanks also to all you well-wishers. I'm not all stitched up, but I got a "conditional" release. Also, thanks to everyone who linked to news stories. I caught most of them below, but I didn't give you credit, as I dove right in to adding some links before I took the time to read today's Comments.

All the readers of RealityChex are wishing Marie a speedy recovery. Time zones don't allow me to include yesterday's election results, but here's a slimmed down version of today's news. Feel free to add to the info. with links in the comments section. --s

Some of what follows may be a little retro, as I'm trying catch up here.

Stefan Becket & Grace Segers of CBS News: "The House committees leading the impeachment inquiry released the transcript of testimony by the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, William Taylor, who raised questions about whether the U.S. was withholding military aid to Ukraine to pressure the country to open investigations into President Trump's political rivals.... In his testimony, Taylor described a concerted effort to use U.S. leverage to get Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to commit to opening investigations into debunked allegations of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election, as well as the gas company Burisma, which had hired former Vice President Joe Biden's son in 2014. Taylor said these efforts came via an 'irregular, informal channel of U.S. policy-making' consisting of Rudy Giuliani, then-special envoy Kurt Volker, Energy Secretary Rick Perry and U.S. Ambassador to the E.U. Gordon Sondland. He said he became aware of the parallel policy-making paths when working to schedule a phone call with Zelensky in late June. Taylor said Sondland 'cut out' other officials who would normally participate in the call and 'requested that the call not be transcribed.'" The page includes a ScribD reproduction of the text of Taylor's testimony. ~~~

~~~ Adam Edelman of NBC News: "The top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, Bill Taylor, told House impeachment investigators last month that ... Donald Trump directed officials to tie military aid to Ukraine to demands that the country open political advantageous probes, according to a transcript of his testimony made public Wednesday.... Taylor said he and others 'sat in astonishment' as a White House Offic of Management and Budget official said during a July 18 inter-agency call that Trump had ordered a hold on military assistance to Ukraine, according to the transcript.... Taylor laid out in painstaking detail how U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland had told him that Trump was 'adamant' that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy himself publicly announce the Biden and 2016 investigations -- but that Trump nonetheless felt such an arrangement would not constitute a quid pro quo." ~~~

~~~ New York Times reporters are analyzing & highlighting Taylor's testimony. Michael Shear: "Mr. Taylor has become one of the star witnesses for the Democratic-led impeachment effort, appearing first in public hearings that will begin next week. That is partly because in his closed-door testimony, Mr. Taylor referred repeatedly to notes and memos, bolstering investigators' confidence in his recollections. Those documents could provide new and potentially explosive avenues of investigation for Democrats as they march toward writing articles of impeachment." Mrs. McC: Taylor's testimony, and his notes, are surely the reason Gordon Sondland had to, ah, "amend" his perjury testimony. Stories on Sondland's "amendment" linked below.

Trump's Impeachment Defense: Lie, Lie & Lie Again. Toluse Olorunnipa & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "Standing before a crowd of supporters this week in Lexington, Ky., President Trump repeated a false claim he has made more than 100 times in the past six weeks: that a whistleblower from the intelligence community misrepresented a presidential phone call at the center of the impeachment inquiry that threatens his presidency.... It's a form of gaslighting that has become the central defense strategy for the president as he faces his greatest political threat yet. But the approach is coming under increasing strain as congressional Democrats release transcripts and prepare to hold public hearings presenting evidence that directly undercuts Trump's claims.... He has also pushed other specious arguments in his harried attempt to counter the growing evidence from witnesses implicating his administration in a quid pro quo scheme linking military aid to Ukrainian investigations targeting Democrats."

Dartunorro Clark of NBC News: "Public hearings in Congress will begin next Wednesday in the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said Wednesday. The open hearing on Nov. 13 will hear testimony from career diplomat William Taylor and State Department official George Kent and another on Friday will hear testimony from ousted Ukraine Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. Schiff said there will be additional announcements of witnesses[.]"

Adam Schiff in a USA Today op-ed: "The president's corrupt pressure [on Ukraine] to secure its interference in our election betrayed our national security and his oath of office.... In the past few weeks, and despite the White House's continued obstruction, we have learned a great deal about what occurred.... What we have found, and what the American people will soon learn ... is that this is about more than just one call.... [W]e now know that the call was just one piece of a larger operation to redirect our foreign policy to benefit Donald Trump's personal and political interests, not the national interest.... [T]he Founders who devised our government understood that someday, a president might come to power who would fail to defend the Constitution or would sacrifice the country's national security in favor of his own personal or political interests, and that Congress would need to consider such a remedy. Tragically, that time has come." --s

** Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "A critical witness in the impeachment inquiry offered Congress substantial new testimony this week, revealing that he told a top Ukrainian official that the country likely would not receive American military aid unless it publicly committed to investigations President Trump wanted. The disclosure from Gordon D. Sondland, the United States ambassador to the European Union, in four new pages of sworn testimony released on Tuesday, confirmed his involvement in essentially laying out a quid pro quo to Ukraine that he had previously not acknowledged. The testimony offered several major new details beyond the account he gave the inquiry in a 10-hour interview last month." The NBC News story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Andrew Desiderio >& Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Gordon Sondland, a key witness in the impeachment inquiry, revealed that he told a top Ukrainian official that hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid would 'likely' be held up unless the country's government announced investigations into ... Donald Trump's political rivals -- a major reversal from his previous closed-door testimony. The acknowledgment of a quid pro quo is an explosive shift that threatens to upend claims by the president's allies that military aid was not used as a bludgeon to advance his domestic political interests." --s ~~~

~~~ Tierney Sneed & Matt Shuham of TPM: "Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the EU, told House investigators about how he first got involved in Ukraine policy, the directive he received from President Trump to 'talk to Rudy' about Ukraine, and how the demands that Giuliani was seeking of Ukraine grew more 'insidious' over time.... In a dramatic turn, Sondland submitted revised testimony this week to clarify what he told the Ukrainians about a freeze on military aid.... Sondland recounted a previously reporting May 23 meeting with Trump, Energy Secretary Rick Perry and others, in which Trump gave the order that they talk to his personal lawyer about their dealings in Ukraine.... 'He just kept saying: Talk to Rudy, talk to Rudy,' Sondland said. Sondland said he didn't know what Trump was talking about, 'other than, he said: Ukraine is a problem.'... Sondland ... clarified that it was actually Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and then-National Security Advisor John Bolton who had sanctioned the move [to get involved in Ukraine]." --s

Marianne Levine of Politico: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday that the Senate would acquit ...Donald Trump if an impeachment trial were held today." --s

Zachary Basu of Axios: "Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said that he will not read any of the transcripts released Tuesday by the House committees conducting the impeachment inquiry, telling CBS News: 'I've written the whole process off.... I think this is a bunch of B.S.'... Graham ... told reporters on Sept. 25: 'If you're looking for a circumstance where the president of the United States was threatening the Ukraine with cutting off aid unless they investigated his political opponent, you'd be very disappointed. That does not exist.'" --s ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Very responsible, Lindsey. See no evil, hear no evil, give evil a pass. That oath you took about upholding & defending the Constitution is soooo overrated.

Betsy Swan & Erin Banco of the Daily Beast: "... Donald Trump promised 'unwavering' support to Ukraine in a May 29 letter congratulating its new president on his election victory. He also invited President Volodymyr Zelensky to the White House, saying the invitation was a sign of the United States' 'commitment' to the young democracy. Trump's letter, which a senior congressional aide shared with The Daily Beast, points to a sharp contrast between Trump's official, warm communications with Zelensky and the moves he actually wanted from Kyiv. The letter, dated May 29, is published here for the first time.... Over the course of the next two months, it became clear to State Department and White House officials that something was preventing a meeting between Trump and Zelensky.... In his infamous press conference last month, acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said the letter to Zelensky was merely a 'courtesy.'"

Cristina Marcos of the Hill: "House Democrats want to hear testimony from acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney in their impeachment inquiry after he acknowledged Thursday that the administration held up military aid to Ukraine until Kiev launched a political investigation requested by President Trump. The three House committees running the impeachment inquiry -- Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Oversight -- had issued a subpoena to Mulvaney earlier this month for documents. The deadline for the records is Friday." (Also linked yesterday.)

David Ignatius of the Washington Post: "Since the investigation began into President Trump's machinations in Ukraine, one of the most disturbing questions has been: Where is Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, who's supposed to shield his diplomats from political interference? And now we have the answer: Pompeo, in recent months, has essentially been in hiding, protecting himself while his subordinates took the hit -- evidently hoping to preserve his influence with Trump. Sometimes his deflections and denials have been outright misleading. Pompeo has badly tarnished his reputation in accommodating Trump. He joins the long list of those damaged by their service to this president.... [After Pompeo failed to prevent Trump from firing her,] Trump's groundless attacks against [Marie] Yovanovitch continued, as did Pompeo's silence.... When a transcript of the menacing July [25] call [between Trump & Zelensky] was released Sept. 25, Yovanovitch felt personally threatened, and she again asked for help. Pompeo said nothing publicly in her defense [and claimed on TV that his top aide Michael McKinley had not asked him to support Yovanovitch, even tho McKinley testified he had done so three times]. It's deeply troubling to see a powerful person such as Pompeo who is silent in the face of lies and who takes no action to protect his subordinates from wrongdoing." ~~~

~~~ Lauren Lantry of ABC News: "Newly released testimony of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's former senior adviser directly contradicts Pompeo's remarks in an interview last month on ABC's 'This Week.' According to deposition transcripts released by House Democrats on Monday, Pompeo aide Mike McKinley told lawmakers under oath that he approached Pompeo three separate times to voice his concerns over the State Department's lack of support for Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch.... When asked what Pompeo's response was, McKinley said that the secretary said nothing.... But in an Oct. 20 interview on "This Week," Pompeo denied McKinley ever expressed his concerns." --s ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: I would remind you here that Pompeo reportedly keeps a Bible open on his desk, which he claims to consult daily. I guess he missed all those instructive passages about helping others. Looks as if Mike is more a "prosperity gospel"-type.

Julia Davis of the Daily Beast: "Standing beside an approving Donald Trump at a rally in Kentucky on Monday night, Republican Sen. Rand Paul demanded the media unmask the whistleblower whose report about the president's alleged abuse of power dealing with Ukraine sparked impeachment proceedings. American news organizations resisted the pressure, but -- in a 2019 re-play of 'Russia, if you're listening' -- Kremlin-controlled state media promptly jumped on it. Shortly after Sen. Paul tweeted out an article that speculated in considerable detail about the identity of the whistleblower -- with a photograph, a name, and details about the purported political history of a CIA professional -- Russian state media followed suit. As if on cue, the Kremlin-controlled heavy hitters -- TASS, RT, Rossiya-1 -- disseminated the same information. But unlike Rand Paul, one of the Russian state media outlets didn't seem to find the source -- Real Clear Investigations -- to be particularly impressive, and claimed falsely that the material was published originally by The Washington Post. This was the most egregious, but certainly not the only example of Kremlin-funded media cheerleading for Trump's fight against impeachment as proceedings against him unfold with growing speed." ~~~

     ~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: If we had a real Justice Department -- and apparently we don't -- said DOJ would open a criminal case against Li'l Randy for outting the whistleblower, if indeed he has done so. Whistleblowers are protected under law, & Randy is not a journalist; he is a Senator who swore to uphold the Constitution & the laws.

Josh Kovensky of TPM: "Even as the impeachment inquiry gains momentum, Ukrainians who stand to benefit from probes into discredited allegations about the Bidens and the 2016 election have not stopped pushing for investigations. Andrii Telizhenko, a former Ukrainian diplomat who has peddled allegations of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 elections to help the Democrats, met with Rudy Giuliani in New York City -- last week.... NBC reported on Monday that a group of parliamentarians in Ukraine are reviewing the possibility of creating an investigative commission to examine allegations, such as those peddled by Telizhenko, of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 election. One Ukrainian MP who is pushing for the commission's creation is Oleg Voloshyn, a former foreign ministry official who worked with Paul Manafort while he was a political consultant in the fledgling Eastern European nation." --safari: If Biden were ever elected, Benghaaaazi would dwarf in comparison to what the GOP is cooking up in Ukraine. (Also linked yesterday.)

Lachlan Markey of The Daily Beast: "Allies of President Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani are circulating opposition research on Steve Bannon after the former White House strategist questioned Giuliani's work for the president and suggested he should be replaced." --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Darren Samuelson & John Gerstein of Politico: "Only minutes after the first potential juror took the witness stand, Roger Stone abruptly left the courtroom, apparently ill [from food poisoning]. Moments later, a spectator started moaning and collapsed. Everyone from the judge to the spectators -- which included alt-right media activist ;Milo Yiannopoulos -- was left baffled. It was a fittingly unpredictable opening to the trial of the longtime conservative.... Stone is fighting charges he lied to Congress and obstructed its 2016 Russia investigation, and Tuesday was slated for jury selection." --s

Would You Stay up Till 3 am for This? Lachlan Markay & Asawin Suebsaeng of the Daily Beast: "As Rudy Giuliani upended U.S.-Ukraine relations with a campaign of shadow diplomacy that landed his client..., Donald Trump, on the verge of impeachment, he was also exploring a gig as a television pitchman for an anti-fraud company run by two of the men he enlisted to dig up dirt on Trump's political foes in Ukraine. The company was called Fraud Guarantee, and it was run by Lev Parnas and David Correia, who were both arrested last month and charged with criminal violations of campaign-finance law -- charges to which both have pleaded not guilty. Parnas and Correia had used Fraud Guarantee to funnel hundreds of thousands of dollars to Giuliani, with whom they worked closely as he sought to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden in Ukraine and advance their own business interests in the country. According to two sources..., Parnas and Correia had plans to ... make [Giuliani] into Fraud Guarantee's spokesman and public face. Both sources described a key part of the plan: a television infomercial featuring Giuliani extolling the virtues of Fraud Guarantee and its services. Parnas and Correia wanted the ad campaign to start airing on U.S. cable-news channels shortly after Giuliani was finished representing Trump in matters pertaining to Special Counsel Robert Mueller's two-year investigation."

Jamie Ross of The Daily Beast: "[In a tweet] Donald Trump offered to send the U.S. military to Mexico to wage 'WAR' against drug cartels after an ambush left at least nine American moms and kids dead on Monday." --s

Sarah Burris of RawStory: "Over the weekend, President Donald Trump attended the UFC mixed martial arts match at Madison Square Garden where he brought several Republican leaders and members of his family. Like the World Series, Trump was booed there too, though not as loudly. Now the Washington Post is reporting that the Republican National Committee shelled out $60,000 for Trump to attend the event with his friends and family." --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Ursula Perano of Axios: "Trump International Hotel & Tower Chicago is struggling to bring in business amid political backlash against the president, the Washington Post reports. Where it stands: County documents show profits between 2015 and 2018 for the hotel have fallen 89%, from $16.7 million to $1.8 million." --s

Corporate Swamp Creatures. Sarah Okeson of DC Report: "The attorney[James Danly] Trump nominated for a seat on a federal commission that oversees pipeline construction and other energy projects wants to impose the legal equivalent of the three monkeys that see no evil in assessing how oil and gas companies are destroying our planet.... Danly used [his] hands-off approach in a case involving the Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. when he and other commission attorneys said that limitations in the Natural Gas Act ;meant the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission didn't have to look at possible greenhouse gas emissions.... Danly has been influenced ;by the Federalist Society, the same people who helped bring us Brett Kavanaugh and are stacking the appellate courts with closed-minded, right-wing justices. The Senate Committee on Energy & Natural Resources is scheduled to consider his nomination on Tuesday." --s

Brett Forrest of the Wall Street Journal: "Erik Prince, a private security contractor and informal adviser to President Trump, is in discussions to purchase a Ukrainian aerospace manufacturer that the U.S. is trying to prevent China from buying.... The Trump administration has approached Mr. Prince and at least one other potential buyer from the private sector about Motor Sich..., a leading maker of helicopter and airplane engines.... [T]he U.S. wants to scuttle its pending sale to a group of Chinese companies to keep Beijing from acquiring vital defense technology.... In recent weeks, Mr. Prince has discussed the company with Ukrainian officials and visited the company's main plant, according to people briefed on the matter.... Mr. Prince ... is the executive director and deputy chairman of Frontier Services Group, a Hong Kong- and Beijing-based private security contractor." Article firewalled --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Amy Knight of The Daily Beast: "Following a recent conference of foreign security and law enforcement agencies, the head of Russia's State Security Service, the FSB, made the surprising announcement that Russia and the United States have resumed cooperation on cybersecurity.... In response to queries about [Gen. Alexander] Bortnikov's statement, spokespersons for both the CIA and the DEA told The Daily Beast that they had no comment, and the FBI has not responded at all." --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Sean Naylor of Yahoo! News: "A U.S. withdrawal from Syria will strain the links that the U.S. intelligence community has painstakingly built with both Iraqi and Syrian Kurdish forces, according to current and former government officials with long experience in the Middle East.... A U.S. withdrawal from Syria would place the United States' ability to get ... intelligence at risk and could result in the compromise of some U.S. intelligence techniques, according to current and former government officials.... 'We could be blind, especially if we're not cultivating those relationships in eastern Syria,' said a former U.S. government official with close ties to the Kurds." --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Ross Barkan of the Guardian: "For the millions who feel enraged and despondent over Trump's ennobling of white supremacists or his insidious environmental and immigration policies, trying to remain an informed citizen can amount to an exercise in psychic torture. It's not easy reading, every day, about the degradation of whatever democratic norms America has left.... What recourse, then, do citizens have against a deranged, all-powerful executive who can lay waste to the planet many times over? Election Day is still a full year away. In the absence of a vote, all that is left is protest. If it all feels, at times, irrelevant to Trump's band of Republican nihilists, there is still a necessity to taking action, to demonstrating mass resistance against such hate." --s (Also linked yesterday)

Elections 2019

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Democrats won complete control of the Virginia government for the first time in a generation on Tuesday and claimed a narrow victory in the Kentucky governor's race, as Republicans struggled in suburbs where President Trump is increasingly unpopular. In capturing both chambers of the legislature in Virginia, Democrats have cleared the way for Gov. Ralph S. Northam, who was nearly driven from office earlier this year, to press for measures tightening access to guns and raising the minimum wage that have been stymied by legislative Republicans. In Kentucky, Gov. Matt Bevin, a deeply unpopular Republican, refused to concede the election to his Democratic challenger, Attorney General Andy Beshear. With 100 percent of the precincts counted, Mr. Beshear was ahead by 5,100 votes. Mr. Beshear presented himself as the winner, telling supporters that he expected Mr. Bevin to 'honor the election that was held tonight.'" ~~~

~~~ Philip Bailey & Joe Sonka of the Louisville Courier Journal: "Kentucky Senate President Robert Stivers threw another wrench into the state's razor-thin gubernatorial outcome late Tuesday night, saying that the legislature could decide the race. Stivers' comments came shortly after Gov. Matt Bevin refused to concede to Attorney General Andy Beshear, who led by roughly 5,100 votes when all the precincts were counted. 'There's less than one-half of 1%, as I understand, separating the governor and the attorney general,' Stivers said. 'We will follow the letter of the law and what various processes determine.' Stivers, R-Manchester, said based on his staff's research, the decision could come before the Republican-controlled state legislature. Under state law, Bevin has 30 days to formally contest the outcome once it is certified by the State Board of Elections. Candidates typically ask for a re-canvass of voting machines and a recount first." ~~~

     ~~~ How Stivers & Cohort May Try to Overturn the Election Results. Kate Riga of TPM: "Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes (D) explained the 'antiquated' procedure, found in the state's constitution, to TPM....

~~~ Robert Costa of the Washington Post: "Democrats' claim of victory Tuesday in Kentucky's gubernatorial race, as well as the Democratic takeover of the Virginia state legislature, left Republicans stumbling and increasingly uncertain about their own political fates next year tied to an embattled and unpopular president. Many allies of President Trump rushed to explain away the poor performance of incumbent Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin (R) as an anomaly, while other GOP veterans expressed alarm about the party's failure in a state where Trump won by nearly 30 percentage points in 2016 -- and where he just campaigned this week. Although Bevin was controversial and widely disliked, he was also a devotee of the president, embracing Trump's agenda and his anti-establishment persona. And in the contest's final days, Bevin sought to cast his candidacy as a bulwark against House Democrats' impeachment inquiry of Trump."

Julia Terruso of the Philadelphia Inquirer: "The political forces that shaped last year's midterm elections showed no signs of abating Tuesday, as voters turned on Republicans and establishment Democrats alike in races from Philadelphia and Scranton to the suburbs of Delaware and Chester Counties.... Locally, Democrats will hold all five seats on the Delaware County Council, a Republican stronghold since the Civil War, and also assumed a majority on the legislative body in Chester County. In Bucks County, Democrats captured the Board of Commissioners for the first time since 1983. And in Philadelphia, a third-party insurgent candidate weakened an already marginalized GOP by securing one of the at-large City Council seats reserved for minority parties -- a seat Republicans have held for decades."

Jennifer Bendery of the Huffington Post: "Juli Briskman, who famously flipped off ... Donald Trump's motorcade in a viral 2017 photo, won her race Tuesday night for a seat on the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors in Virginia. Briskman, a former marketing executive and local Democratic activist, unseated eight-year incumbent Republican Suzanne Volpe. She will represent the Algonkian District on the board, which serves more than 400,000 residents.... Briskman made national news in October 2017 when a White House photographer traveling with the president snapped a picture of her riding her bicycle and giving the middle finger to Trump's motorcade as it passed her.... Her employer at the time, government contractor Akima LLC, fired her over the photo. Briskman went on to sue Akima LLC. In the meantime, one of her friends set up a GoFundMe page for Briskman, a single mom of two, which raised a whopping $142,000." ~~~

~~~ Paul Schwartzman of the Washington Post (via the Bangor Daily News): Briskman "acknowledged that her notoriety helped her raise $150,000 for the race.... As it turns out, Briskman's district includes a certain golf course owned by a certain president." Mrs. McC: That would be the Trump National Golf Club. Let's hope Briskman can find something wrong with the club's tax status or something. Put some $$$ on that middle finger.

Chantal Da Silva of Newsweek: "For the first time in nearly 40 years, Democrats have taken control of Columbus, Indiana -- the hometown of Vice President Mike Pence. On Tuesday, Columbus voters saw four Democrats elected to City Council seats, with only three Republican incumbents claiming re-election victory."

Hadas Gold & Donie O'Sullivan of CNN: "A controversial policy allowing politicians to run false ads on Facebook will extend to the United Kingdom as the country prepares to vote in a historic December election, Facebook confirmed to CNN Business. The policy is being championed by Facebook executive Nick Clegg, the former deputy prime minister of the United Kingdom who himself once complained about 'lies' spread during the 2016 Brexit referendum." --s (Also linked yesterday.)

Damian Carrington of the Guardian: "The world's people face 'untold suffering due to the climate crisis' unless there are major transformations to global society, according to a stark warning from more than 11,000 scientists.... The statement was a collaboration of dozens of scientists and endorsed by further 11,000 from 153 nations. The scientists say the urgent changes needed include ending population growth, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, halting forest destruction and slashing meat eating." --s

Beyond the Beltway

Florida. Where Not to Live. Antonia Farzan of the Washington Post: "The librarians of Citrus County, Fla., had what seemed like a modest wish: A digital subscription to the New York Times. For about $2,700 annually, they reasoned, they could offer their roughly 70,000 patrons an easy way to research and catch up on the news. But when their request came before the Citrus County commission last month, local officials literally laughed out loud. One commissioner, Scott Carnahan, declared the paper to be fake news.' 'I agree with President Trump,' he said. 'I will not be voting for this. I don't want the New York Times in this county.' In a move that is generating intense online backlash, all five members of the commission agreed to reject the library's request. The discussion took place Oct. 24, the same day the Trump administration announced plans to cancel federal agencies' subscriptions to the Times and The Washington Post. While there's no apparent connection -- the Citrus County meeting began several hours before the Wall Street Journal broke the news of the new edict -- the controversy unfolding in central Florida highlights how politicians nationwide are parroting the president's disparaging rhetoric about the media." (Also linked yesterday.)

Way Beyond

Syria. Juan Cole: "The semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northeast Syria today accused Turkish forces of conducting ethnic cleansing campaigns in the Kurdish region they have occupied between Tel Abyad and Ra's al-Ayn.... The Kurds called on the United Nations to intervene to stop the ethnic cleansing, and urged it not to fall for the Turkish ploy of bringing in its mercenaries and characterizing them as 'refugees.' Despite an agreement between Turkey and Russia that Ankara would halt its invasion, Foreign Policy reports that Turkey is attempting to go deeper into Syria than the 20 miles it had agreed upon, which will result in more Kurds being displaced." --s (Also linked yesterday)

U.K. Dan Sabbagh & Luke Harding of the Guardian: "Boris Johnson was on Monday night accused of presiding over a cover-up after it emerged that No 10 refused to clear the publication of a potentially incendiary report examining Russian infiltration in British politics, including the Conservative party [before the coming elections, despite being approved for release]...Fresh evidence has also emerged of attempts by the Kremlin to infiltrate the Conservatives by a senior Russian diplomat suspected of espionage, who spent five years in London cultivating leading Tories including Johnson himself. It can now be revealed that Sergey Nalobin -- who once described the future prime minister as 'our good friend' -- lives in a Moscow apartment block known as the 'FSB house' because it houses so many employees from the Kremlin's main spy agency ... Committee members were ... briefed on an extraordinary -- and for a while an apparently successful -- attempt to penetrate Conservative circles by Nalobin, who instigated a pro-Kremlin parliamentary group, the Conservative Friends of Russia. Conservative Friends of Russia held its 2012 launch party in the Russian ambassador's Kensington garden, with about 250 Russian and British guests present, including Tories who went on to play a prominent role in the referendum campaign." --s (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Patrick Wintour of the Guardian: "Universities are not adequately responding to the growing risk of China and other 'autocracies' influencing academic freedom in the UK, the foreign affairs select committee has said. The report, rushed out before parliament is suspended pending the election, finds 'alarming evidence' of Chinese interference on UK campuses, adding some of the activity seeking to restrict academic freedom appears to be coordinated by the Chinese embassy in London." --s