Acting ambassador to Ukraine William B. Taylor Jr. had told colleagues it was “crazy” to hold up aid for “help with a political campaign.”
In roughly two dozen diplomatic and trade efforts, Trump has landed a handful of victories and floated some mystifying non-starters. Greenland, anyone?
Russia fills the U.S. vacuum in Syria and gains leverage over strategic Ukraine, whose new leader is tarnished by dealings with Trump
Expanding on the lexicon of outrage and victimhood honed during the probe into Russian interference in the last election, President Trump is invoking the muskets-and-ramparts idioms of the country’s beginnings.
Volker’s resignation came as congressional Democrats scheduled an interview with him next week.
Democrats are working against an unofficial deadline of the end of the year to complete impeachment proceedings that currently focus on Trump’s request for ‘a favor’ during a July telephone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“He’s made me more famous and I’ve made him more famous,” Trump jokes of the leader at the center of a House impeachment inquiry.
Trump spoke as he comes under mounting scrutiny over his purported attempts to pressure Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his family.
The president defended his conduct in pressing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate unsubstantiated allegations of corruption by the former vice president and his family.
President Trump announced the trip at the start of a Cabinet meeting, at which he also renewed his false claim that Democrats are responsible for “loopholes” that led to his family separation policy at the U.S.-Mexico border.