Or to be precise:
Hello!
“This is my most disturbing day in Congress so far.”
“It was very damning for the president.”
“You could hear a pin drop in the room.”
“This wasn't just a smoking gun, it was a smoking cannon.”
These were just some of the comments Democratss_ made after Bill Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, gave testimony yesterday as part of the ongoing impeachment inquiry.
In prepared remarks, obtained by the New York Timeses^_, Taylor described both a regular and “highly “irregular” channel for U.S.-Ukraine policy, the latter being steered by President Donald Trump’s private attorney Rudy Giuliani. He also explicitly spelled out a quid pro quo, where the Trump administration withheld aid and a meeting at the White House for President Volodymyr Zelensky until Ukraine announced an investigation into a company that had hired Hunter Biden:
• “By mid-July it was becoming clear to me that the meeting President Zelensky wanted was conditioned on the investigations of Burisma and alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections. It was also clear that this condition was driven by the irregular policy channel I had come to understand was guided by Mr. Giuliani.”
•
• "All that the OMB staff person said was that the directive [to withhold aid] had come from the president to the chief of staff to OMB.”
•
• "Ambassador Sondland told me that President Trump had told him that he wants President Zelenskiy to state publicly that Ukraine will investigate Burisma and alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.”
•
• “Ambassador [to the European Union Gordon] Sondland also told me that he now recognized that he had made a mistake by earlier telling the Ukrainian officials to whom he spoke that a White House meeting with President Zelensky was dependent on a public announcement of investigationsin fact, Ambassador Sondland said, ‘everything’ was dependent on such an announcement, including security assistance.”
While the allegations aren’t anything really new--a lot of this was covered in the original anonymous whistleblower’s report—the fact that America’s top diplomat in Ukraine laid out such detailed information that seems to point to a quid pro quo was astounding to many Democratic lawmakers.
But the Mueller report should serve as a warning about getting too hung up on the “quid pro quo” phase.
Trump often repeated the phrase “no collusion” when it came to the Russia investigation. Collusion, however, is not a specific legal offense and Mueller instead said he investigated if there was a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia. While no evidence was found of a conspiracy, Mueller did not exonerate the president on obstruction of justice. Trump, however, continued to repeat the phrase “no collusion, no obstruction,” despite that being inconsistent with Mueller’s findings.
With a president that can turn an entire news cycle from the use of a single word (see: lynching), it’s important to remember that articles of impeachment, if drafted, could be written in any number of ways and may not use the exact “quid pro quo” phrase to describe the Ukraine situation.
But if Democrats rely too heavily on the phrase now without including it in impeachment articles, it opens them up to further attacks from Trump that there was no quid pro quo after all, even if that’s exactly what’s described.
Tara Francis Chan is a senior editor, politics at Newsweek. You can reach her on Twitter @taramfrancisis_ or by email, [email protected]^.