Yes, Dear, Donald Trump Did Commit a Crime
In spite of the GOP’s constant repetition of the phrase “Yeah, but that’s not impeachable,” Trump did, in fact, commit a crime by holding up the money for Ukraine.
While all of the Democratic Party and more than half of the country are convinced that Donald Trump has committed an impeachable act, up until yesterday there was no hard proof of that.
The Republican Party’s chief line of defense has been a steady stream of, “So what?” Even those on the right who admit that the infamous phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky was improper insist that there was no crime committed.
Gregg Jarrett of Fox News ranted that Trump could not be impeached because the Founding Fathers were clear that only a real, honest-to-God lawbreaking could be considered an impeachable offense.
“As I argued in an earlier column, Trump’s request that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky assist in an official and ongoing Justice Department investigation launched by Attorney General William Barr is neither criminal nor unusual.”
Trump’s acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, absolutely brushed off the President’s used of his private, unelected, non-cabinet member lawyer to carry out international relations. He said,
“You may not like the fact that Rudy Giuliani was involved. That’s great. That’s fine. It’s not illegal. It’s not impeachable. The President gets to use who the President wants to use.”
Not a crime. No crime here. Nothing to see folks, so move along.
There should be no impeachment, the right keeps saying. He didn’t break any laws. There was no crime!!
Of course, the Constitution does not state that impeachment is only for criminal acts.
In fact, the phrase used by the famous Founders was this:
Article 2, Section IV of the United States Constitution says this:
Funny that nobody in the GOP has been saying that Trump hasn’t committed any misdemeanors.
But they are all about proclaiming the pointlessness and triviality of the current impeachment because THERE WAS NO DAMN CRIME!!!
Well, guess what, folks?
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) of the United States of America just released an official, actual, legal report that included these words:
“Faithful execution of the law does not permit the President to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law. OMB withheld funds for a policy reason, which is not permitted under the Impoundment Control Act (ICA). The witholding was not a programmatic delay. Therefore, we conclude that the OMB violated the ICA.”
Yeah.
The OMB broke the law.
And who is in charge of the OMB under Donald J. Trump?
Mick Mulvaney, that’s who.
The very same Mickey Mulvaney who is also Trump’s Chief of Staff and chief apologist.
So there you have it.
Given the fact that the entirety of the GOP defense thus far has been the claim that there was no crime, this sure as hell looks like a smoking gun to me.
Yes, Virginia, there is a criminal in the White House. And he needs to have his sorry ass removed from there as soon as possible.
The Founding Fathers would have insisted.
