President-elect Joe Biden defended his son Hunter Biden amid an ongoing investigation into the younger Biden’s taxes.

During an interview with Stephen Colbert that is scheduled to air on Thursday night, the president-elect sat alongside Dr. Jill Biden and expressed “confidence” in his son.

“I think it’s kind of foul play, but look, it is what it is and he’s a grown man, he is the smartest man I know – I mean from a pure intellectual capacity – and as long as he’s good, we’re good,” Joe Biden said.

When Colbert asked how he would handle attacks from Republicans, Biden said he would be willing to work with critics because it’s what’s best for the country.

The post Joe Biden claims ‘foul play’ in Hunter tax investigation but says he’s ‘not concerned’ first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

In a dramatic primetime moment, the liberal constitutional law scholar reiterated that although he voted for Hillary Clinton, he could not find constitutional justification for the impeachment of a president for non-criminal conduct, or conduct that was not at least “akin” to defined criminal conduct.

“I’m sorry, House managers, you just picked the wrong criteria. You picked the most dangerous possible criteria to serve as a precedent for how we supervise and oversee future presidents,” Dershowitz told the House Democrats, including head House impeachment manager Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.

He said that “all future presidents who serve with opposing legislative majorities” now face the “realistic threat” of enduring “vague charges of abuse or obstruction,” and added that a “long list” of presidents have previously been accused of “abuse of power” in various contexts without being formally impeached.

The list included George Washington, who refused to turn over documents related to the Jay Treaty; John Adams, who signed and enforced the so-called “Alien and Sedition Acts”; Thomas Jefferson, who flat-out purchased Louisiana without any kind of congressional authorization whatsoever; John Tyler, who notoriously used and abused the veto power; James Polk, who allegedly disregarded the Constitution and usurped the role of Congress; and Abraham Lincoln, who suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and others would also probably face impeachment using the Democrats’ rules, Dershowitz said.

“Abuse of power,” he argued, has been a “promiscuously deployed” and “vague” term throughout history. It should remain a merely “political weapon” fit for “campaign rhetoric,” Dershowitz said, as it has no standard definition nor meaningful constitutional relevance.

Dershowitz then said he was “nonpartisan” in his application of the Constitution, and would make the same arguments against such an “unconstitutional impeachment” if Hillary Clinton were on trial — passing what he called the “shoe on the other foot” test.

“Purely non-criminal conduct such as abuse of power and obstruction of Congress are outside the range of impeachable offenses,” Dershowitz said.

He quoted Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Robbins Curtis — one of the two dissenters in the notorious 1857 “Dred Scott v. Sandford” decision and counsel for President Andrew Johnson during his impeachment trial in 1868 — as saying there can be no impeachable offense “without a law, written or unwritten, express or implied.”

Johnson, Dershowitz observed, was impeached for violating the Tenure of Office Act — a statute essentially designed to create the pretext to impeach Johnson. Bypassing the law first, lawmakers expressly recognized that criminal-like conduct was needed for impeachment, Dershowitz argued. (No president had ever been impeached for non-criminal conduct until Trump’s impeachment last year.)

Indeed, a “close review of the history” near in time to the founding of the United States, Dershowitz said, revealed that the founders explicitly wanted to avoid making impeachment so arbitrary and powerful that it effectively created a “British-style parliamentary democracy,” in which presidents served at the pleasure of the legislature.

Dershowitz further suggested that the “rule of lenity,” or the legal doctrine that ambiguities should be resolved in favor of defendants, also counseled toward acquitting the president. The Constitution permits impeachment and removal of presidents for “treason,” “bribery,” and “high crimes and misdemeanors,” but does not clearly define the terms.

Responding to reports that former national security adviser John Bolton has written in his forthcoming book that Trump told him he wanted to link Ukraine aid to an investigation of the Bidens, Dershowitz argued that even an explicit “quid pro quo” would not constitute an impeachable “abuse of power.”

“Nothing in the Bolton revelations, even if true, would rise to the level of an abuse of power, or an impeachable offense,” Dershowitz said. “That is clear from the history. That is clear from the language of the Constitution. You cannot turn conduct that is not impeachable into impeachable conduct simply by using terms like ‘quid pro quo’ and ‘personal benefit.'”

“It is inconceivable,” Dershowitz said, that the framers would have intended such “politically loaded terms” and “subjective'” words without clear definitions to serve as the basis for impeachment.

Fearing a partisan impeachment process, the framers had rejected the offense of “maladministration” as a basis for impeachment, Dershowitz noted, and “abuse of power” was similarly vague.

Dershowitz wrapped up his argument, steeped in historical and textual analysis of the constitution and founding documents, by urging senators to reject the “passions and fears of the moment,” as the framers had similarly warned.

A series of Republican senators lined up to shake Dershowitz’s hand after his presentation concluded.

Hunter Biden in the crosshairs

Separately, Pam Bondi, in a methodical presentation earlier Monday at the impeachment trial, took the fight directly to Hunter Biden — underscoring, again and again, how even media outlets with a left-wing “bias” questioned the younger Biden’s lucrative service on the board of the Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings while his father oversaw Ukraine policy as vice president.

A 2014 Washington Post report, Bondi noted, asserted that the “appointment of the vice president’s son to a Ukrainian oil board looks nepotistic at best, nefarious at worst.”

A 2014 Buzzfeed News article stated that “serious conflict of interest questions” were raised by Biden’s appointment.

A June 2019 ABC News report called it “strange” that Burisma, which was widely accused of corruption, had agreed to pay Hunter Biden’s company “more than a million dollars a year,” just after Biden was kicked out of the Navy allegedly for cocaine possession.

HUNTER BIDEN AGREES TO PAY CHILD SUPPORT IN ARKANSAS CASE

It was hardly surprising given all the media attention, Bondi went on, that career State Department official George Kent flagged Biden’s apparent conflict of interest, but was told essentially not to bother the vice president’s office — or that the Obama administration had prepped former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch for questions about Burisma ahead of her Senate confirmation.

Bondi’s point-by-point defense of Trump’s concerns about the Bidens’ potential corruption came on the second day of Republican arguments.

Fox News has been told that Trump’s defense team will wrap up on Tuesday within a few hours after the trial resumes at 1 p.m. ET. “Everyone should be able to go home for dinner,” a source close to the team told Fox News.

The next phase of the trial, involving 16 hours of written questions that the senators can submit to be answered by Democratic House managers and Trump’s lawyers, will not start until Wednesday. Then, there will be a vote on whether to hear more evidence or witnesses.

The written questions could focus either on legal issues, like the theoretical ones raised by Dershowitz, or factual matters that could prove uncomfortable for Democrats.

“Hunter Biden was paid over $83,000 a month, while the average American family of four during that time each year made less than $54,000,” Bondi, the former Florida attorney general, said incredulously in her remarks.

In his own comments to the Senate, Trump lawyer Eric Herschmann argued that Burisma couldn’t even get its story straight concerning Biden’s duties.

In a May 2014 Burisma news release, the company claimed Biden would head up the country’s “legal unit,” Herschmann observed. “But, on October 13, 2019, Biden’s lawyer said that ‘at no time’ was he in charge of Burisma’s legal affairs.”

Even Hunter has admitted, speaking to ABC News, that he “probably” would not have been on the board of Burisma if he were not the vice president’s son, Bondi noted.

Bondi and Herschmann were arguing that Trump did nothing wrong when, in a July call with Ukraine’s leader, he called for the country to look into Joe Biden’s on-camera admission that he successfully pressured Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor by withholding $1 billion in U.S. assistance to Ukraine.

What Biden didn’t reveal, Bondi said, was that the prosecutor was investigating Burisma at the time — or that Hunter Biden was serving in a highly lucrative role on Burisma’s board.

Republicans reinvigorated

The Trump team’s aggressive arguments on Monday heartened Republicans both inside and outside the Senate chamber.

“Pam Bondi is on the Senate floor nailing Hunter Biden, Joe Biden, and the Obama White House for their role in/handling of Ukrainian corruption,” North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows tweeted. “If it wasn’t obvious already… President Trump was right to press for reform” in Ukraine, he wrote.

In a heated news conference, Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said the proceedings had offered just the “beginning” of “serious evidence of corruption” involving Burisma. Reporters repeatedly interrupted Cruz, and at one point a questioner suggested that Cruz’s children had also benefited from nepotism in obtaining lucrative board roles — even though they’re in elementary school.

Using Democrats’ logic, a stronger case for impeaching former President Obama could be made, Herschmann argued later. He noted that Obama had been caught on camera promising Russia’s president that he would have more “flexibility” on missile defense issues after the 2012 election — an apparent instance of a “quid pro quo” involving politics influencing foreign affairs.

“The president exercises official power. In his role as head of state during a nuclear security summit after asking the Russian president for space, he promised him missile defense can be solved? What else can that mean than in a way that can be solved for the Russians?” Herschmann asked. “He was asking an adversary for space for the express purpose of furthering his own election purposes… ‘after my election, I have more flexibility.’ Obama knew the importance of missile defense in Europe but decided to use it as a bargaining chip.”

Herschmann accused Democrats of overreach by attempting to remove the president by a vote of the Senate.

BOLTON MANUSCRIPT LEAKS JUST AS AMAZON BOOK PREORDERS GO LIVE; TRUMP FIRES BACK

“We, on the other hand, trust our fellow Americans to choose their candidate… and let the American people choose,” he said. “Maybe they’re concerned that the American people like historically low unemployment, maybe the American people like that their 401(k)s have [grown].”

Also speaking on behalf of the president, Ken Starr, whose independent counsel investigation into then-President Bill Clinton resulted in his impeachment, bemoaned what he called an “age of impeachment.” Impeachment, he said, required both an actual crime and a “genuine national consensus” that the president must go. Neither existed here, Starr said.

“It’s filled with acrimony and it divides the country like nothing else,” Starr said of impeachment. “Those of us who lived through the Clinton impeachment understand that in a deep and personal way.”

Trump’s team further challenged Democrats’ claims that Trump’s fears of Ukraine meddling were a “conspiracy theory” — noting that Schiff, D-Calif., had spent years accusing the Trump team of colluding with Russia without any evidence.

Although Democrats — and some news outlets, including The Associated Press — repeatedly claimed that the idea of Ukraine meddling was a “conspiracy theory,” a Ukrainian court has ruled that officials in the country did illegally meddle in the U.S. election. Additionally, a 2017 investigative report by Politico found extensive efforts by Ukrainians to hurt Trump’s presidential campaign.

Biden campaign rapid response director Andrew Bates shot back quickly in a statement to Fox News.

“We didn’t realize that Breitbart was expanding into Ted Talk knockoffs,” Bates said. “Here on Planet Earth, the conspiracy theory that Bondi repeated has been conclusively refuted. The New York Times calls it ‘debunked,’ The Wall Street Journal calls it ‘discredited,’ the AP calls it ‘incorrect,’ and The Washington Post Fact Checker calls it ‘a fountain of falsehoods.’ The diplomat that Trump himself appointed to lead his Ukraine policy has blasted it as ‘self-serving’ and ‘not credible.’ Joe Biden was instrumental to bipartisan and international anti-corruption victory. It’s no surprise that such a thing is anathema to President Trump.”

“We didn’t realize that Breitbart was expanding into Ted Talk knockoffs.”

— Biden campaign rapid response director Andrew Bates

Democrats have accused Trump of seeking to “make up dirt” on the Bidens, and alleged that Trump himself delayed sending aid to Ukraine until the country took a public look at the issue.

Bolton looms large

Meanwhile, senators faced mounting pressure Monday to summon Bolton to testify at the trial, after an excerpt from the former national security advisor’s forthcoming book apparently leaked. According to the manuscript, Trump told Bolton he had suspended aid to Ukraine in exchange for an investigation of the Bidens. The White House strongly denied the claim.

“We deal with transcript evidence, we deal with publicly available information,” attorney Jay Sekulow said. “We do not deal with speculation, allegations that are not based on evidentiary standards at all.”

Prior to his presentation Monday, Dershowitz said that the Bolton issue wouldn’t affect his presentation, centering on constitutional law.

Republican senators have faced a pivotal moment, and pressure was mounting for at least four to buck GOP leaders and form a bipartisan majority to force the issue. Republicans have held a 53-47 majority, and a mere majority vote would be required on the question of witnesses.

“John Bolton’s relevance to our decision has become increasingly clear,” Utah GOP Sen. Mitt Romney told reporters. Maine Sen. Susan Collins, a key moderate swing vote, said she has always wanted “the opportunity for witnesses” and the report about Bolton’s book “strengthens the case.”

At a private GOP lunch, Romney made the case for calling Bolton, according to multiple reports. Other Republicans have said that if Trump’s former national security adviser is called, they will demand reciprocity to hear from at least one of their witnesses. Some Republicans have wanted to call the Bidens.

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Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., appeared unmoved by news of the Bolton book, telling Republicans they would take stock after the defense team concluded its arguments.

McConnell’s message at the lunch, said Indiana GOP Sen. Mike Braun, was, “Take a deep breath, and let’s take one step at a time.”

Fox News’ Brooke Singman, Chad Pergram and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

The post Dershowitz calls out House Dems in Trump’s Senate impeachment trial after Bolton shock waves first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The post Adam Schiff, Democrats under fire for contradictions over Ukraine first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

“Did anyone ever ask you to bribe or extort anyone at any time during your time in the White House?” House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Devin Nunes, R-Calif., asked at one point in Tuesday’s afternoon hearing.

Former National Security Council (NSC) aide Tim Morrison: “No.”

Former U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Kurt Volker: “No.”

Later, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., covered similar ground in asking the witnesses about Trump’s fateful July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky: “Mr. Morrison, you were on that call, and there was no quid pro quo, correct? No bribery? No extortion?”

“Correct,” Morrison replied in response to each question.

“And, Ambassador Volker, I presume you got a readout of the call. … Was there any reference to withholding aid? Any reference to bribery? Any reference to quid pro quo? Any reference to extortion?”

“No, there was not,” Volker replied, again and again.

The answers underscored a problem facing House Democrats as their impeachment inquiry continued into its second week of public hearings: With more witnesses testifying, more soundbites have emerged that may help Republicans and the Trump campaign argue that the proceedings were politically motivated theater, long in the works and foreshadowed openly by Democrats for months, if not years.

Morrison, in another key moment, testified Tuesday afternoon that he understood the transcript of Trump’s call with Ukraine’s leader wound up on a highly secured and classified computer system due to an “administrative error” — not, as Democrats have alleged because the president wanted to hide his conversation.

And, Volker testified repeatedly that he never received any indications at all that there was an improper quid pro quo with Ukraine, in which the Trump administration allegedly sought a probe of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter in exchange for military aid.

As the hearing concluded, President Trump tweeted, “A great day for Republicans, a great day for our Country!”

Ohio GOP Rep. Jim Jordan told Fox News, “This was a very good day for Republicans, for our president.”

“Kind of hard to prove a corrupt quid pro quo theory when the key U.S. policy people, plus the Ukrainians, were never aware of such an arrangement,” Texas GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw added late Tuesday, noting that Ukraine’s president has said he felt no pressure from Trump to open any probes. “Can we go back to governing now, that’d be great thanks.”

Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

A great day for Republicans, a great day for our Country!

Morrison and Volker’s testimony was sought by the GOP, and the two undercut Democrats’ poll-tested claims of White House “bribery” and a cover-up. But, they also raised new questions concerning the administration’s use of the little-discussed code-word-level system that ordinarily held sensitive national-security information. Back in September, a senior Trump administration official acknowledged that White House lawyers directed moving the transcript of the call to the secure system, noting that several of Trump’s previous phone calls with foreign leaders had leaked to the media.

FLASHBACK: LEAK OF VERBATIM TRUMP CALL WITH AUSTRALIA LEADER PROMPTS WHITE HOUSE TO INCREASE SECURITY MEASURES

Morrison previously testified behind closed doors that senior NSC lawyer John Eisenberg had relayed to him that his secretary accidentally put the transcript in the classified system. Morrison said Eisenberg wanted to “restrict access” to the transcript, but maintained that the secretary had apparently misinterpreted that instruction.

“It was represented to me that it was a mistake,” Morrison testified Tuesday, saying he tried to “pull up the package in our system” but was prevented from doing so. When he asked why the transcript was unavailable, he testified that he was “informed it had been moved to the higher classification system” at Eisenberg’s direction. Then, Eisenberg told Morrison that he “gave no such direction” and that it was an “administrative error,” according to Morrison.

Ambassador Kurt Volker, left, former special envoy to Ukraine, and Tim Morrison, a former official at the National Security Council are sworn in to testify before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Nov. 19, 2019, during a public impeachment hearing of President Donald Trump’s efforts to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

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Morrison said to the best of his knowledge, there was no “malicious intent” in the decision to move the transcript to the compartmentalized system, and all essential personnel retained access to the transcript even after it was moved.

Later in the day, Volker made clear he had not seen anything to support Democrats’ contention that Trump improperly withheld foreign aid to Ukraine as a means of forcing an investigation into the Bidens’ dealings in the country.

Instead, Volker suggested — in a moment that the Trump campaign reposted on social media — that Trump’s general hesitation to provide foreign aid, especially to corrupt countries, was the prevailing justification for holding up aid to Ukraine temporarily.

Asked again whether he saw any evidence that Trump had committed “bribery” — the term Democrats have taken to using after focus groups indicated that it would help them sell impeachment to voters — Volker was unequivocal that he had not. In fact, Volker said, Trump never linked any probe of Burisma or the Bidens to any military aid. Hunter Biden sat on Burisma’s board while his father spearheaded Ukraine policy as vice president.

“I have only seen an allegation of bribery in the last week,” Volker said. “I was never involved in anything that I considered to be bribery at all or extortion.”

In one remarkable moment, Volker contradicted a media headline; asked about a Daily Mail story claiming he had “walked back” his testimony and had “now learned” there was a link between U.S. aid and Biden probe, Volker refuted the website outright.

Volker also said he didn’t initially realize the connection between a Trump-sought investigation of Burisma and the Bidens, given that Burisma was seen as a symbol of Ukraine’s endemic corruption problem.

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Hunter Biden was a board member of the Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings, which had been under investigation before then-Vice President Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire the prosecutor in charge. In his call with Zelensky, Trump suggested the Ukrainians look into the circumstances of the prosecutor’s termination, including Joe Biden’s boast that he had the prosecutor fired by threatening to withhold $1 billion in critical aid. “Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution, so if you can look into it…It sounds horrible to me,” Trump said.

In a lengthy opening statement, Volker said he didn’t have any problem with pushing Ukraine to open an investigation into Burisma or corruption.

“It has long been U.S. policy under multiple administrations to urge Ukraine to investigate and fight internal corruption,” Volker said.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent similarly testified behind closed doors last month that he had qualms about Hunter Biden’s lucrative role on the board of Burisma.

However, Volker said he felt a discussion of investigations was “inappropriate” in a July meeting between Ukrainian and U.S. officials at the White House. Volker confirmed others’ testimony that Trump’s European Union ambassador, Gordon Sondland, raised the investigations “in a generic way,” and that then-national security adviser John Bolton immediately ended the meeting.

The meeting happened two weeks before Trump’s momentous summer phone call with Zelensky.

Volker, who resigned in September after becoming embroiled in the scandal, added that he didn’t “understand” at the time that an investigation of Burisma “was tantamount to investigating Vice President Biden.”

“I saw them as very different – the former being appropriate and unremarkable, the latter being unacceptable,” Volker said. “In retrospect, I should have seen that connection differently, and had I done so, I would have raised my own objections.”

Volker added: “The allegations against Vice President Biden are self-serving and non-credible.”

Volker went on to say that during a September dinner with top Ukrainian official Andriy Yermak, he’d discouraged Ukraine from trying to prosecute the country’s previous president. Volker says he warned it would sow deep societal divisions.

Volker said Yermak quipped in response, “You mean like asking us to investigate Clinton and Biden?” Volker claimed he didn’t “quite understand” the head-turning remark and was “kind of puzzled” by it.

Both Volker and Morrison previously gave closed-door interviews to the inquiry: Volker provided investigators with a package of text messages with Sondland and William Taylor, the U.S. chargé d’affaires for Ukraine, who said he grew alarmed at the possible linkage of the investigations to the aid.

For his part, Morrison, who served as the NSC’s senior director of European and Russian affairs, told lawmakers Trump didn’t want tax dollars funding Ukrainian corruption and remarked that he wasn’t concerned Trump’s calls with Ukraine’s leader were tied to his political interests.

Morrison resigned from the NSC last month. In his testimony Tuesday, he said he left on his “own volition” and made the decision “before I decided to testify.”

The testimony from Volker and Morrison followed five hours of testimony earlier in the day with the NSC’s Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and Vice President Pence aide Jennifer Williams, who were each critical of Trump’s conversation with Zelensky.

In a particularly remarkable moment, Vindman testified that he was asked to serve as Ukraine’s defense minister three times — but repeatedly denied the offers — when he traveled to Kiev for the inauguration of Ukraine’s president. Oleksander Danylyuk, the former Chairman of the National Security and Defence Council in Ukraine, reportedly said on Tuesday the offer was “clearly a joke.”

Among the biggest revelations Tuesday morning came when Vindman acknowledged communications with an unnamed intelligence official — during an at-times tense exchange with Republicans, immediately raising apparent questions over whether he could have been a source of information for the anonymous whistleblower who reported the call.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., interjected to express concern that Republicans were trying to out the whistleblower through the questioning. After consulting his attorney, Vindman said, “Per the advice of my counsel, I’ve been advised not to answer the specific questions about members of the intelligence community.”

National Security Council aide Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman is sworn in to testify before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Nov. 19, 2019, during a public impeachment hearing of President Donald Trump’s efforts to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

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Still, Vindman told lawmakers, “I do not know who the whistleblower is.”

That claim didn’t hold water with Republicans and prompted Donald Trump Jr. to accuse Vindman of perjury. “I’d like them to be treated like I would be if I lied to Congress,” he told Fox News late Tuesday.

On the whole, Vindman was largely critical of Trump’s call with Zelensky, describing the investigation “demand” as “improper.” At one point, Vindman described his reaction to Trump’s call as one of “shock.”

“Frankly, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing,” he testified. “In certain regards, my worst fear of how our Ukraine policy could play out was playing out.”

However,  Vindman was caught in an apparent contradiction late in the day by Republican Ohio Rep. Brad Wenstrup. Vindman testified earlier in the day that he did not discuss his concerns about Trump’s July phone call with Morrison, his superior because he was unavailable.

But, under questioning from Wenstrup, Morrison confirmed that Vindman had given him edits of the transcript of the call, on the same day that Vindman testified Morrison was unreachable.

“Frankly, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.”

— NSC’s Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, concerning Trump’s July call with Ukraine’s leader

Arizona GOP Rep. Paul Gosar offered a blunt assessment of Vindman’s testimony, tweeting: “I think people need a reminder:  the democrats said they would impeach starting in December 2016–before @realDonaldTrump was even sworn in.  This is a hearing looking for a reason. It’s corrupt and immoral.  The dude in the uniform is a seditionist.”

Morrison, meanwhile, also said he had heard others express concern that Vindman was a leaker, and could not be trusted with key information. Asked about that allegation, Vindman read from a glowing performance review that described him as an exemplary officer.

The other morning witness, Williams, also expressed concern about Trump’s call with Zelensky, saying, “I found the July 25th phone call unusual because, in contrast to other presidential calls I had observed, it involved discussion of what appeared to be a domestic political matter.”

Until Tuesday, none of the witnesses who have testified at the public hearings had first-hand knowledge of the president’s thinking, which Republicans have used to cast doubt on Democrats’ allegations, but Vindman, Williams, and Morrison all listened in on Trump’s July 25 phone call with Zelensky.

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Morrison said his understanding was that Trump generally was skeptical of foreign aid, and wanted to make sure that taxpayers were “getting their money’s worth.”

“The president was concerned that the United States seemed to bear the exclusive brunt of security assistance to Ukraine,” Morrison said. “He wanted to see the Europeans step up and contribute more security assistance.”

The impeachment inquiry has focused on a possible link between military aid to Ukraine and investigations sought by Trump pertaining to the Bidens and Democrats. The questions arose after the July 25 phone call led to a whistleblower complaint alleging that Trump was trying to pressure Ukraine into helping him.

“As we have heard from other witnesses, when Joe Biden was considering whether to enter the race for the presidency in 2020, the president’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, began a campaign to weaken Vice President Biden’s candidacy by pushing Ukraine to investigate him and his son,” Schiff said in his opening statement.

Nunes opened his remarks by welcoming people to “Act Two of today’s circus,” dismissing the inquiry as a partisan exercise.

WATCH: VINDMAN CORRECTS CONGRESSMAN WHO DIDN’T USE HIS FORMAL MILITARY TITLE

“It’s an ambitious attack to deprive the American people of their right to elect a president that the Democrats don’t like,” Nunes said. “The chairman of this committee claims that democracy is under threat. If that’s true, it’s not the president who poses the danger.”

Morrison, though, suggested the impeachment brouhaha was predictable partisan politics as usual.

“I feared at the time of the call on July 25th how its disclosure would play in Washington’s political climate,” Morrison said in his opening statement. “My fears have been realized.”

Fox News’ Chad Pergram and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ex-ukraine-envoy-nsc-official-testify-in-second-round-of-impeachment-testimony

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The post Morrison, Volker undercut claims of ‘quid pro quo,’ ‘bribery’ and ‘cover-up’ in pivotal day of testimony first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.