The Liberal Gun Club Forum

House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff has issued a press release and a subpoena to the acting Director of National Intelligence over a subject that looks deeply concerning. A month ago, someone inside the U.S. intelligence community filed a whistleblower complaint alleging a “flagrant problem” or “violation of the law.” That complaint appears to have been aimed directly at actions by acting DNI Joseph Maguire. Since that filing, the Inspector General for the intelligence community has looked into the matter and found that it’s not only “credible,” but an “urgent concern.”

A month later, this urgent concern about a flagrant violation is still being hidden by Maguire. The clock ran out for Maguire to release this whistleblower report on Sept. 3. But he did not release it. In fact, he didn’t even let Congress know that there was such a report.

As Schiff notes, even if the original report didn’t allege a violation of the law, the failure to release the report absolutely is a violation of the law. This instance is both extremely serious and utterly unprecedented.

“A Director of National Intelligence has never prevented a properly submitted whistleblower complaint that the IC IG determined to be credible and urgent from being provided to the congressional intelligence committees. Never. This raises serious concerns about whether White House, Department of Justice or other executive branch officials are trying to prevent a legitimate whistleblower complaint from reaching its intended recipient, the Congress, in order to cover up serious misconduct.

Not only is the violation “flagrant,” not only did the Inspector General find it “urgent,” but there’s good reason to think that the whistleblower is talking about action that directly implicates Donald Trump or others in the White House.

The House only learned about the complaint on Sept. 9 when the Inspector General’s office informed the Intelligence Committee chairs that he was evaluating the report. Schiff immediately requested a copy of the complaint. Even at that point, the matter was far from routine. It’s not unusual for someone to file such a report, or for the Inspector General to take a look. It is unusual for Congress not to be informed that there had been such a report.

When things really started going off the rails was when Maguire refused to hand over the complaint before the deadline. And then the Inspector General declared that the matter was serious, and urgent, and Maguire still refused to produce either the complaint or the evaluation.

Possibly even more concerning are the grounds on which Maguire argued he could do something that no past DNI has done: He refused to produce the complaint by saying it contained “potentially privileged communications.” Which sparked Schiff to issue a new demand for the complaint and this bold declaration.

The Committee can only conclude, based on this remarkable confluence of factors, that the serious misconduct at issue involves the President of the United States and/or other senior White House or Administration officials. This raises grave concerns that your office, together with the Department of Justice and possibly the White House, are engaged in an unlawful effort to protect the President and conceal from the Committee information related to his possible “serious or flagrant” misconduct, abuse of power, or violation of law.

The whistleblower complaint that has triggered a tense showdown between the U.S. intelligence community and Congress involves President Trump’s communications with a foreign leader, according to two former U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

Trump’s interaction with the foreign leader included a “promise” that was regarded as so troubling that it prompted an official in the U.S. intelligence community to file a formal whistleblower complaint with the inspector general for the intelligence community, said the former officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

It was not immediately clear which foreign leader Trump was speaking with or what he pledged to deliver, but his direct involvement in the matter has not been previously disclosed. It raises new questions about the president’s handling of sensitive information and may further strain his relationship with U.S. spy agencies. One former official said the communication was a phone call. The White House declined to comment late Wednesday night. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence and a lawyer representing the whistleblower declined to comment. Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson determined that the complaint was credible and troubling enough to be considered a matter of “urgent concern,” a legal threshold that requires notification of congressional oversight committees.

But acting director of national intelligence Joseph Maguire has refused to share details about Trump’s alleged transgression with lawmakers, touching off a legal and political dispute that has spilled into public view and prompted speculation that the spy chief is improperly protecting the president. The dispute is expected to escalate Thursday when Atkinson is scheduled to appear before the House Intelligence Committee in a classified session closed to the public. The hearing is the latest move by committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) to compel U.S. intelligence officials to disclose the full details of the whistleblower complaint to Congress. Maguire has agreed to testify before the panel next week, according to a statement by Schiff. He declined to comment for this article.

The inspector general “determined that this complaint is both credible and urgent,” Schiff said in the statement released Wednesday evening. “The committee places the highest importance on the protection of whistleblowers and their complaints to Congress.”

The complaint was filed with Atkinson’s office on Aug. 12, a date on which Trump was at his golf resort in New Jersey. White House records indicate that Trump had had conversations or interactions with at least five foreign leaders in the preceding five weeks. Among them was a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin that the White House initiated on July 31. Trump also received at least two letters from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during the summer, describing them as “beautiful” messages. In June, Trump said publicly that he was opposed to certain CIA spying operations against North Korea. Referring to a Wall Street Journal report that the agency had recruited Kim’s half brother, Trump said, “I would tell him that would not happen under my auspices.”

Trump met with other foreign leaders at the White House in July, including the prime minister of Pakistan, the prime minister of the Netherlands and the emir of Qatar. Trump’s handling of classified information has been a source of concern to U.S. intelligence officials since the outset of his presidency. In May 2017, Trump revealed classified information about espionage operations in Syria to senior Russian officials in the Oval Office, disclosures that prompted a scramble among White House officials to contain the potential damage.

Statements and letters exchanged between the offices of the DNI and the House Intelligence Committee in recent days have pointed at the White House without directly implicating the president. Schiff has said he was told that the complaint concerned “conduct by someone outside of the Intelligence Community.” Jason Klitenic, the DNI general counsel, noted in a letter sent to congressional leaders on Tuesday that the activity at the root of the complaint “involves confidential and potentially privileged communications.”

The dispute has put Maguire, thrust into the DNI job in an acting capacity with the resignation of Daniel Coats last month, at the center of a politically perilous conflict with constitutional implications.

Schiff has demanded full disclosure of the whistleblower complaint. Maguire has defended his refusal by asserting that the subject of the complaint is beyond his jurisdiction. Defenders of Maguire disputed that he is subverting legal requirements to protect Trump, saying that he is trapped in a legitimate legal predicament and that he has made his displeasure clear to officials at the Justice Department and White House. After fielding the complaint on Aug. 12, Atkinson submitted it to Maguire two weeks later. By law, Maguire is required to transmit such complaints to Congress within seven days. But in this case, he refrained from doing so after turning for legal guidance to officials at the Justice Department.In a sign of Atkinson’s discomfort with this situation, the inspector general informed the House and Senate intelligence committees of the existence of the whistleblower complaint — without revealing its substance — in early September. Schiff responded with almost immediate indignation, firing off a letter demanding a copy of the complaint and warning that he was prepared to subpoena senior U.S. intelligence officials. The DNI has asserted that lawyers determined there was no notification requirement because the whistleblower complaint did not constitute an urgent concern that was “within the responsibility and authority” of Maguire’s office.

Legal experts said there are scenarios in which a president’s communications with a foreign leader could rise to the level of an “urgent concern” for the intelligence community, but they also noted that the president has broad authority to decide unilaterally when to classify or declassify information. Revealing how the United States obtained sensitive information could “compromise intelligence means and methods and potentially the lives of sources,” said Joel Brenner, former inspector general for the National Security Agency.

It was unclear whether the whistleblower witnessed Trump’s communication with the foreign leader or learned of it through other means. Summaries of such conversations are often distributed among White House staff, although the administration imposed new limits on this practice after Trump’s disclosures to Russian officials were revealed.

Democrats are trying to get the complaint turned over to Congress, with the details still unknown.
However, some reports allege that Mr Trump asked Mr Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden and his son Hunter - who previously served on the board of a Ukrainian gas company - in return for continued US military support.

Joe Biden is currently the frontrunner to be the Democratic candidate competing against Mr Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

No-one in Ukraine's presidential administration wants to talk about the 25 July phone call between Mr Trump and Mr Zelensky, or respond to the claims that Mr Trump asked Ukraine to investigate his possible opponent in 2020 in return for continued US military support. There are a few circumstantial clues.

Firstly, the Ukrainian readout of the call refers to Mr Trump being "convinced" that the new government will "complete (the) investigation of corruption cases, which inhibited the interaction between Ukraine and the USA". Is that a diplomatic reference to the US president asking for a probe into Mr Biden?

There's then the question as to why President Trump has kept Ukraine's new leader at arms' length since his election in April. Some $250m in US military assistance for Ukraine was mysteriously held up by the White House this summer, and a long-mooted visit for President Zelensky to Washington has still not materialised.

Is Ukraine's leader being punished for refusing to play ball?

Meanwhile, Mr Giuliani gave an interview to CNN where he both confirmed, and denied, that he had asked Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden. He explained the contradiction by saying that he had asked Ukraine "to look into the allegations that related to my client, which tangentially involved Joe Biden in a massive bribery scheme".

Mr Trump and his fellow Republicans have questioned whether it represented a conflict of interest that Hunter Biden had served on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company. In May, Ukraine's prosecutor general said there was no evidence of wrongdoing by Joe or Hunter Biden.

TrueTexan wrote: Sun Sep 15, 2019 11:51 am YT it's what the Wall Street bankers and other corporations want. Follow the money.

YankeeTarheel wrote: Fri Sep 20, 2019 10:13 am

TrueTexan wrote: Sun Sep 15, 2019 11:51 am YT it's what the Wall Street bankers and other corporations want. Follow the money.

What they really want, that Trump is NOT giving them, is stability and predictability. WS and competent business leaders HATE unpredictability and HATE Trump's wild swings back and forth. One day he's beating the drum for war, the next he's backing off. He attacks THE biggest and healthiest economy in the nation, then swings to something else. He creates chaos which is why they aren't supporting him, they are WORRIED!

I would guess the ONE person who has passed through the Trump regime they'd like to see as President would be Rex Tillerson, not Steve Mnuchin or any of the clowns like Price or Pruit.
Trump is the anti-Tillerson businessman--a failure vs a success.

I'm not pushing Tillerson for President but I can assure you that Wall Street would be doing high-fives if someone like him were President, not Trump the chump.

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A defiant President Donald Trump said on Friday that whatever he told Ukraine’s prime minister about seeking dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden wasn’t important.

As reported by CNN’s Jim Acosta, the president told reporters in the Oval Office that “it doesn’t matter what I discussed” recently with Ukrainian Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk, and then pivoted to attacking Biden.

“Someone ought to look into Joe Biden,” the president said.

President Donald Trump’s White House counsel has reportedly been personally involved in keeping Congress from reviewing a whistleblowing report involving Ukraine.

“The revelation that Trump pushed Zelensky to pursue the Biden probe, which was first reported by The Wall Street Journal, represents the most detailed account so far of the president’s conduct that prompted a U.S. intelligence official to file a whistleblower action against the president,” The Washington Post reported Friday. “The disclosure comes amid new details about the White House’s role in preventing Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire from complying with Congressional demands for the material in the complaint.”

In addition to confirming the WSJ report, The Post also furthered the story with new reporting on the role of the White House in the scandal.

“White House Counsel Pat Cipollone has been engaged in the matter since shortly after the whistleblower action surfaced, officials said, helping to identify legal obstacles to the sharing of information that could be politically damaging to Trump,” The Post reported. “Cipollone’s involvement reveals a more direct White House role in the dispute than has previously been reported.”

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin confirmed on Sunday that the White House does have a transcript of President Donald Trump’s call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky.

During an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press, host Chuck Todd asked Mnuchin if he had an objection to Congress’ request to see a transcript in which Trump allegedly asks Zelensky to open an investigation into Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.

While confirming that a transcript of the call exists, Mnuchin said that House Democrats have no right to see it.

“What I have a problem with is Congress asking for a transcript between world leaders,” he told Todd. “I think that those are confidential discussions and that’s a difficult precedent.”

“He says he said nothing inappropriate, so why not release the transcript?” Todd pressed.

“Because, again, I think that these are confidential discussions between world leaders and world leaders expect that they’re going to be kept confidential,” Mnuchin said. “It has nothing to do with this call per se.”

President Donald Trump told reporters Friday that he hasn’t read a complaint filed by a whistleblower in the intelligence community that reportedly arose from concern about a “promise” he made to a foreign leader. But he also said that “everybody’s read it,” adding: “They laugh at it.”

“Everybody” could be a stretch. The complaint has not been released to congressional leaders, who are demanding to see it.

Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson determined that the whistleblower complaint, initially filed Aug. 12, was a matter of “urgent concern.” But so far Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire has refused to share the complaint or even significant details of the filing with lawmakers, which is typically standard procedure.

Mike Pompeo Backs Rudy Giuliani’s Role Siccing Ukraine On Trump Rival Joe Biden

ecretary of State Mike Pompeo on Sunday said he approved of President Donald Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani “inserting himself in foreign affairs” and pressing Ukrainian officials to investigate Trump’s political rival Joe Biden.

Pompeo, however, wouldn’t say if the State Department was providing support for Giuliani in his interactions with Ukrainian officials.

“I’m not going to talk about that,” Pompeo told “Face The Nation” host Margaret Brennan.

Pompeo made his statement of support for Giuliani hours before Trump’s admission on Sunday that he raised corruption allegations against Biden and his son Hunter during a July phone call with Ukraine’s newly elected leader, President Volodymyr Zelensky, at a time when the U.S. had suspended military aid.

Trump told Zelensky he should work with Giuliani on the matter, according to a whistleblower complaint about the president’s conduct, although Trump on Sunday didn’t confirm Giuliani’s role.

“Is it appropriate for the president’s personal attorney to be inserting himself in foreign affairs like this?” Brennan asked Pompeo.

Pompeo responded: “If there was election interference that took place by the vice president, I think the American people deserve to know.”

It wasn’t clear what Pompeo meant by “election interference” linked to Biden. Trump has alleged that Biden as vice president tried to block a corruption probe into a Ukrainian company linked to his son Hunter. But a Ukrainian official announced early this year that there was no evidence of wrongdoing by either Biden. Trump hasn’t mentioned anything about election interference by Biden.

“We know there was interference in the 2016 election,” Pompeo said Sunday.

Former special counsel Robert Mueller determined in his investigative report earlier this year that the Russian government “interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion” in an attempt to aid Trump.

But Pompeo was likely referring to Giuliani’s evidence-free conspiracy theory about the election. He has claimed that a Ukrainian journalist whose information helped convict former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort on fraud and conspiracy charges was part of a Democratic plot to impact the election. Manafort is serving seven years in federal prison.

Trump admitted Sunday he “largely” discussed corruption — and Biden and his son ― with Zelensky after deriding the press for days about “fake” stories. Trump’s actions are triggering renewed calls for his impeachment.

Giuliani has acknowledged discussing Biden and his son with Ukrainian officials and has repeatedly made accusations of wrongdoing by both, but Schiff said direct involvement by Trump in pressuring Ukraine would be much more significant. The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump asked Zelensky about eight times to investigate Biden’s son. “It’s one thing when done by the court jester, another when done by the man who would be king,” Schiff said. He added that it was not necessary to find an “explicit quid pro quo” — Trump making U.S. aid to Ukraine conditional on its government trying to find dirt on the younger Biden — in order for the president to have committed a grave breach.

The Trump administration has been accused of pressuring the newly-elected Ukrainian president to open an investigation into the business dealings of Biden's son, Hunter Biden. Ukrainian leaders decided against opening the investigation and the Trump administration withheld military aid. Following bipartisan pressure from Congress, the military aid was eventually released, along with an extra $140 million.

"Explain how, all of a sudden, when the aid got released, more money showed up. Where did that money come from?" Todd asked Mnuchin during a segment on NBC's Meet the Press. "There was $250 million and they got an additional $140 million that they didn't expect. Do you have any idea where that came from?" "It was appropriated money, it came through the State Department," the Treasury Secretary responded.

"They didn't know they were getting this money. Is there any indication why they got the money when they did?" Todd pressed, to which Mnuchin shot back: "I'm not sure it's correct for you to say they didn't know they got the money."

"The president said he was surprised to get it," Todd explained. "The president of Ukraine said he was surprised to get an additional $140 million dollars. He said it was a pleasant surprise but that he was surprised."

"I think he was referring to his expectations as opposed to necessarily a surprise," Mnuchin said. "You're getting into details again. These are foreign policy issues. They've been discussed at the National Security Council at the principles level. These were not connected issues."

"Do you have any problems with Congress looking into any of this?" Todd asked.

"What I have a problem with is Congress asking for a transcript between world leaders," Mnuchin responded.

highdesert wrote: Tue Sep 24, 2019 12:16 pm I just hope before this gets too big and Democrats start writing articles of impeachment based on this, that House committees have done their own investigating of Joe & Hunter Biden and Ukraine. The last thing I want to see is the impeachment bandwagon barreling down the highway at 100 mph and then find out that there was some credence to the story. Trump would ride that all the way to reelection.