At a news conference held at the United Nations in New York, President Trump hit back at Democrats who yesterday announced that they would be opening an impeachment inquiry into him over a July 25th phone call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky in which he requested that Ukraine work with AG Barr to investigate potential presidential opponent Joe Biden.
Trump said that he will be fully transparent and the whistleblower who caused this entire kerfuffle to speak to Congress, but also demanded that Democrats provide transparency with regard to Joe Biden, his son Hunter Biden, and a letter sent by three Democratic Senators to Ukraine.
Republicans say Biden forced the firing of a Ukrainian prosecutor who was investigating possibly shady business dealings his son Hunter was involved with. And three Democratic Senators, Bob Menendez, Dick Durbin, and Patrick Leahy, sent a letter to Ukraine’s prosecutor general demanding that Ukrainian officials comply with the Mueller investigation, a move that Trump says is the same as his requesting an investigation into Biden. Trump says that the actions of Biden and the Senators are equal or worse to anything he said on his call with President Zelensky of Ukraine.
Trump’s comments show how the White House and Republicans plan on dealing with the ongoing impeachment crisis – attack Democrats for their own faults, and reveal any hypocrisy on the part of those leading impeachment hearing against President Trump. Earlier in the day, Trump showed this strategy in a tweet. Trump wrote “I have informed @GOPLeader Kevin McCarthy and all Republicans in the House that I fully support transparency on so-called whistleblower information but also insist on transparency from Joe Biden and his son Hunter, on the millions of dollars that have been quickly and easily taken out of Ukraine and China. Additionally, I demand transparency from Democrats that went to Ukraine and attempted to force the new President to do things they wanted under the form of political pressure.”
President Trump added that he would gladly release a transcript of the first phone call he had with President Zelensky in April, saying it was an “innocent” call.
President Trump also told reporters that Democratic leadership is going forward with impeachment proceedings because they are concerned about internal poll numbers showing Trump beating any potential Democratic opponents in the 2020 election.