If you have been following the news, it will be evident to you that the current impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump is a rapidly developing story with new revelations surfacing every day.
There are still several aspects of the president’s call with the Ukrainian president that have not been verified or fully released yet. Furthermore, there are several conflicting reports as to what actually happened.
Therefore, as with many Americans, our opinion on this affair and how Congress should act going forward is based on the most up-to-date information and could change depending on future developments.
First of all, we recognize that military aid was withheld from Ukraine. The reason behind this was to investigate corruption claims surrounding the war against Russian-backed insurgents.
According to the Department of Defense reports, the funding was released in early September after U.S. concerns about corruption were addressed and bipartisan congressional pressure was applied to the White House. We also acknowledge that the timing of the decision may have seemed suspicious in lieu of the leaked phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Despite these suspicions, on Oct. 1, President Zelensky said “It is impossible to put pressure on me … many people try to influence me, but I am the president of an independent Ukraine.” This interview came during a meeting with President Trump at the United Nations. Zelensky also said that he has never spoken to or met with Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who has been very vocal about launching an investigation into Hunter Biden’s role on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company.
Here we get to the heart of the matter: the Bidens. In 2014, both Hunter and Joe Biden were pictured golfing with Ukrainian gas executives. Although Joe Biden has said that he “has never spoken” to his son about his overseas business dealings, this is in direct contradiction to Hunter Biden’s comment that he and his father did in fact discuss business ventures while he was an executive for Burisma. In 2016, Joe Biden even acknowledged on camera that while he was vice president, he successfully pressured Ukraine to fire top prosecutor Viktor Shokin while Shokin was investigating Burisma and threatened to “withhold $1 billion in United States loan guarantees” if Shokin was not fired.
Most egregiously, The Federalist, an online conservative magazine, reported that “the intelligence community inspector general admitted it changed its policy and its whistleblower form after an anti-Trump complainant alleged that Trump broke the law.”
This, we believe, calls into question the motives behind the unnamed whistleblower and the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community, as well as the legality of the release of the call in late August. The IGIC should be investigated for potentially committing a crime because releasing information before it has been declassified or deemed an “urgent threat” is a violation of federal law.
That being said, we want to close by reminding our readers that individuals within the Democratic Party have been calling for impeachment since the first year of Trump’s presidency. And now that they smell blood in the water, they are moving in full-force to take down Trump.
It is still too early to make any kind of final judgment on the legality of the president’s actions. However, considering current developments, we do not believe that President Trump should be impeached, nor do we believe that there is enough evidence to prove that he committed a crime. We urge everyone to do their own research and formulate their own opinion. Don’t let anyone, not a whistleblower, nor Congress, nor the media, think for you.