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If you get a chance check out the A-Block, on Chris Hayes ALL IN, tonight. Mr Hayes did a very good job breaking down this important Impeachment-evidence story, into an understandable way.
If not, then check out this same evidence here, although in a much more verbose, technical exposition. I’ve tried to highlight some of the more significant segments in the next few quotes.
Exclusive: Unredacted Ukraine Documents Reveal Extent of Pentagon’s Legal Concerns
by Kate Brannen, justsecurity.org — January 2, 2020
“Clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold.”
This is what Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), told Elaine McCusker, the acting Pentagon comptroller, in an Aug. 30 email, which has only been made available in redacted form until now. It is one of many documents the Trump administration is trying to keep from the public, despite congressional oversight efforts and court orders in Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation.
Earlier in the day on Aug. 30, President Donald Trump met with Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to discuss the president’s hold on $391 million in military assistance for Ukraine. Inside the Trump administration, panic was reaching fever pitch about the president’s funding hold, which had stretched on for two months. [...]
McCusker followed up in an email to OMB asking if this had gone through the Defense Department’s general counsel, indicating an early concern about the legality of these actions. When it released this email to the Center for Public Integrity, the Justice Department redacted this simple question from McCusker.
[...]
The readout includes this line, which makes it clear the hold on Defense and State Department Ukraine funding came at the president’s direction:
OMB noted that the President’s direction via the Chief of Staff in early July was to suspend security assistance to Ukraine including by blocking the $115 [Foreign Military Financing] congressional notification and by halting execution of the $250M FY19 USAI programs.
[...]
On Aug. 9, McCusker wrote to senior OMB officials, including Sandy and Duffey:
“As we discussed, as of 12 AUG I don’t think we can agree that the pause ‘will not preclude timely execution.’ We hope it won’t and will do all we can to execute once the policy decision is made, but can no longer make that declarative statement.”
The Pentagon’s warning: We’re running out of time.
[...]
Elaine McCusker, the acting Pentagon comptroller, in a series of emails warned the OMB that what they were doing was violating the Impoundment Control Act of 1974. This law was put in place after Richard Nixon withheld Congressionally-authorized Funding, as a means of retaliation.
As the whole scheme was about to bust wide open, Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), turned the tables on McCusker. Duffey escalated the situation by bringing more people into the discussion, as he proceeded to blamed McCusker for not releasing the Ukriane funds — the same funds Duffey had previously been telling her to keep “on pause” on the “clear direction from POTUS” ...
Duffey, adding OMB and Pentagon lawyers to the recipients list, and in a formal and lengthy letter that was quite different from the way he’d addressed McCusker all summer, chastised her and the Defense Department for dropping the ball, saying that if and when the hold is lifted, and DOD finds itself unable to obligate the funding, it would be DOD’s fault.
“As you know, the President wanted a policy process run to determine the best use of these funds, and he specifically mentioned this to the SecDef the previous week. OMB developed a footnote authorizing DoD to proceed with all processes necessary to obligate funds. If you have not taken these steps, that is contrary to OMB’s direction and was your decision not to proceed. If you are unable to obligate the funds, it will have been DoD’s decision that cause any impoundment of funds.”
Essentially: You guys screwed up. Not us.
McCusker responded:
“You can’t be serious. I am speechless.”
Needless to say the career professional was besides herself — now that she was being blamed for that violations of law, they she had been warning the OMB about for weeks.
“You can’t be serious. I am speechless.”
I think we all are. Or at least we should be.
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And all of this was gleaned from the heavily-reacted FOIA documents that Center for Public Integrity acquired, before the Public Documents well ran dry. Undoubtedly once again on IMPOTUS orders.
Imagine the Coverup story they would tell, in their unredacted public-records intended format.
Congress needs to hear directly from Duffey and McCusker. As well as from Esper, Pompeo and Bolton — who as we now know were very much trying to warn Trump too, that withholding the Ukraine funds, was in a word “illegal”.
If our laws and the rules of evidence still matter in America, these witnesses to Trump’s illegal scheme and its subsequent Coverup — NEED TO BE HEARD.
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Friday, Jan 3, 2020 · 3:49:39 AM +00:00 · jamess
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Correction: Concerning the FOIA redactions.
The JustSecurity.org article states this:
Since then [release almost 300 pages of emails to the Center for Public Integrity in response to a FOIA lawsuit], Just Security has viewed unredacted copies of these emails, which begin in June and end in early October. Together, they tell the behind-the-scenes story of the defense and budget officials who had to carry out the president’s unexplained hold on military aid to Ukraine.