The Boston Globe - 05.19.2019

OCTOBER 5, 2019 11

The request for records
from a sitting vice president is
unusual in its own right, and
Pence’s office quickly signaled
he would not comply. In a let-
ter to Pence, the chairmen of
three House committees wrote
that they were interested in
“any role you may have played”
in conveying Trump’s views to
Ukraine. They asked for a
lengthy list of documents de-
tailing the administration’s
dealings with Ukraine, to be
produced by Oct. 15.
“Recently, public reports
have raised questions about
any role you may have played
in conveying or reinforcing the
president’s stark message to
the Ukrainian president,” said
the letter to Pence, signed by
Representatives Adam B. Schiff
of California, the Intelligence
Committee chairman; Eliot L.
Engel of New York, the Foreign
Affairs Committee chairman;
and Elijah E. Cummings of
Maryland, the Oversight and
Reform Committee chairman.
Katie Waldman, Pence’s
press secretary, promptly said
that “given the scope, it does
not appear to be a serious re-
quest but just another attempt
by the ‘Do Nothing Democrats’
to call attention to their parti-

uTRUMP
Continued from Page 1

san impeachment.”

How the White House,

which has routinely rejected

congressional demands of this

kind, responds this time could

significantly shape the im-

peachment investigation going

forward. The subpoena was is-

sued after the White House

missed a Friday deadline Dem-

ocratshadimposed tovolun-

tarily comply with their re-

quests. Under normal circum-

stances, the White House

could claim materials refer-

enced in both requests were

privileged, using that as a de-

fense in court.

But that will not help

Trump’s case on Capitol Hill.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the

chairmen leading the inquiry

have consistently warned the

White House that noncompli-

ance with their requests will be

viewed as obstruction of Con-

gress, a potentially impeach-

able offense in and of itself.

Trump said he will formally

object to the impeachment in-

quiry while acknowledging

that House Democrats ‘‘have

the votes’’ to proceed.

The White House was ex-

pected to send a letter to Pelosi

arguing that Congress cannot

conduct an impeachment in-

vestigation without first hav-

ing a vote to authorize it. The

letter was expected to say the

administration won’t cooper-

ate with the probe without that

vote.

Trump said the resolution

would likely pass, but he pre-

dicted it would backfire on

Democrats.

‘‘I really believe that they’re

going to pay a tremendous

price at the polls,’’ he said.

Lawmakers from both par-

ties continued to try to make

sense of a tranche of text mes-

sages among US diplomats and

a top aide to the Ukrainian

president that were released

late Thursday. Those texts

called into question the truth-

fulness of Trump’s claim there

had been no quid pro quo at-

tached to his pressing Ukraine

to investigate former vice pres-

ident Joe Biden, his son, and

other Democrats. At the time,

Trump had held up $391 mil-

lion in security aid earmarked

for Ukraine.

Also Friday, Senator Mitt

Romney of Utah, one of the

few Republicans critical of the

conduct at the center of the im-

peachment inquiry, issued a

statement condemning

Trump’s comments a day earli-

er inviting China as well as

Ukraine to investigate the

Bidens.

“When the only American

citizen President Trump sin-

gles out for China’s investiga-

tion is his political opponent in

the midst of the Democratic

nomination process, it strains

credulity to suggest that it is

anything other than politically

motivated,” Romney said.

Meanwhile, Wisconsin Sen-

ator Ron Johnson, who made

several visits to Ukraine this

year, said Trump directly told

him not to tell the newly elect-

ed president, Volodymyr Zel-

ensky, the US aid would be

forthcoming. The Republican

senator said Friday in Sheboy-

gan that he realized he ‘‘had a

sales job to do’’ after Trump

blocked his suggestion, accord-

ing to the Milwaukee Journal

Sentinel.

Johnson separately told The

Wall Street Journal that he

pressed Trump about a poten-

tial quid pro quo, and said the

president flatly denied any

connection over the aid and

the Biden investigation.

“He said — ‘Expletive delet-

ed — No way. I would never do

that. Who told you that?” the

Wisconsin senator recalled of

his Aug. 31 phone call with

Trump. Johnson said he

learned of the possible trade-

off from the US ambassador to

the European Union, Gordon

Sondland.

The actions came amid an-

other day of developments in

the impeachment investiga-

tion. For more than six hours,

the House Intelligence Com-

mittee questioned Michael At-

kinson, the intelligence com-

munity inspector general who

first fielded the whistle-blower

complaint that has spurred the

formal impeachment inquiry.

A new complaint would po-

tentially add further credibility

to the account of the first whis-

tle-blower, a CIA officer who

was detailed to the National Se-

curity Council at one point. He

said that he relied on informa-

tion from more than a half-doz-

en American officials to com-

pile his allegations about

Trump’s campaign to solicit for-

eign election interference that

could benefit him politically.

Specifically, he said Trump

and his personal lawyer, Rudy

Giuliani, had pressed Ukraine

to conduct the investigations,

potentially using the prospect

of a meeting the new Ukraini-

an president badly wanted

with Trump and withholding

the security aid as leverage to

secure the investigations. The

White House tried to cover up

aspects of the events, the com-

plaint said.

Material from the Associated

Press is included in this report.

manded a combat unit, the 44-
year-old Luria said she felt she
had to stay true to the oath she
first took to protect the Consti-
tution when entering the Naval
Academy at 17 years old.
Luria and six other moder-
ate, first-term House Demo-
crats with military and national
intelligence backgrounds who
won districts long held by Re-
publicans wrote an opinion
piece in The Washington Post
last week declaring the allega-
tions about Trump’s actions
with Ukraine “are a threat to all
we have sworn to protect.”
Their decision to back the call
for a formal impeachment in-
quiry was a major factor in
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s
decision to move ahead with
one.
With Congress on recess this
week, Luria visited local busi-
nesses, appeared on national
television, and faced constitu-
ents’ questions. When Scott
Taylor, the Republican con-
gressman she defeated in 2018,
alleged on Twitter that Pelosi
had used the moderate Demo-
crats as cover for the impeach-
ment move, Luria responded by
inviting Taylor to her town hall
meeting at New Hope Baptist
Church.
As people arrived Thursday,
they passed by tables where
pamphlets with the Constitu-
tion were neatly arranged. At-
tendees were asked to write
questions on cards color-coded
by subject. Yellow for public
safety. Blue for health care. Pur-
ple for impeachment.
An associate pastor and a
volunteer of the church read

uLURIA
Continued from Page 1

the questions out loud.

“I want to thank you for your

patriotic decision on impeach-

ment inquiry,” one person

wrote, while another asked:

“When are you going to get off

the Pelosi wagon and stop the

impeachment BS?”

Luria responded that she

was not moving to impeach

Trump, but simply to open an

investigation.

“If we are going to do an in-

quiry, that is an investigation to

find facts,” Luria said. “If you

are saying we don’t have facts,

then we need to do an investi-

gation to find facts, and that is

exactly what I am calling for.”

Her comments often trig-

gered a roar of applause from

the crowd as some waved

American flags, and she re-

ceived a few standing ovations.

Others booed her answers or

gave her the thumbs down. But

Luria dispatched the questions

with military precision.

“We have an election every

two years, so if you don’t like

who is representing you, you

can vote them out of office,” she

fired back at one point, contest-

ing a claim that Democrats

were engaged in a power grab.

Back in Washington, anoth-

er day of turmoil over impeach-

ment had just taken place, as

Trump asked China to investi-

gate Joe Biden’s son and insist-

ed he did no wrong in request-

ing Ukraine to do the same.

Luria said it all reinforced

her difficult decision to push for

the probe. “I think it’s repre-

hensible, and I don’t think that

we can allow it,” she told report-

ers before the town hall.

Since 2011, this area had

been a Republican stronghold.

Her suburban waterfront dis-

trict is dominated by Norfolk

Naval Station and home to one

of the country’s largest veteran

populations. Navy ships cut

across the water and fighter jets

through the air. Trump won the

district by three percentage

points in 2016. But last year, a

national Democratic wave fu-

eled by women and minorities

angered by Trump helped Luria

upset Taylor.

The White House reportedly

plans to target voters in moder-

ate districts such as Luria’s to

rally support for the president.

Pelosi feared such problems

in swing districts when she for

months remained hesitant to

go for a formal impeachment

inquiry, opting for a more grad-

ual approach through the

courts and ongoing congressio-

nal probes. But the op-ed by Lu-

ria and other lawmakers helped

spur Pelosi to move.

Luria said she texted other

women in a close-knit group of

former military and CIA offi-

cers — self-dubbed “The Ba-

dasses” — to let them know she

planned to come forward on

impeachment.

Taylor did not attend Luria’s

town hall meeting. Reached in

Bogotá, Colombia, where he

spoke at a conservative confer-

ence, he said it was “disgusting”

for Luria to use her military cre-

dentials to justify her decision.

“It’s irresponsible, it’s divi-

sive, and it tells her voters that

their votes are irrelevant,” Tay-

lor said.

Across her district, people

who weren’t burned out on

Washington controversy had

polarized views on Trump’s im-

peachment. Behind the cash

register at a store selling flip

flops near the Virginia Beach

boardwalk, Janae DeSantis, a

single mother and personal

trainer, said she had stopped

watching politics, just as she

had her favorite reality TV

shows.

“As long as it keeps getting

popular ratings, they will keep

it around,” she said of the im-

peachment frenzy. “ ‘American

Idol’ is still playing and that

should have been off the air

years ago.”

In York County, the most Re-

publican part of the district,

people were quicker to criticize

Biden, Pelosi, or House Intelli-

gence Committee Chairman

Adam Schiff than Trump.

Junior Cox, 73, owns Cox-

ton’s Gold Team Collision Cen-

ter body shop, one of the busi-

nesses to which Luria paid a

surprise visit on Thursday. He

said he did not talk with her

about impeachment, but he

was vehemently opposed to her

decision on it. “All they do is

scream and fight,” he said of

Democrats and the impeach-

ment inquiry. “They’re haters.”

But plenty of impeachment

backers turned out at Luria’s

town hall to show their support

for her call for an inquiry, in-

cluding some who had wanted

her to do it earlier. Carol White,

73; Debbie Polak, 65; and Patti

Wilson, 67, said they knocked

on doors and registered voters

in the 2018 campaign, and re-

mained hopeful Luria will hold

on to her seat.

“We have even more respect

for her now,” Polak said.

Reach Jazmine Ulloa at

[email protected].

By Andrew E. Kramer

NEW YORK TIMES

KYIV — Ukraine’s top prose-

cutor said Friday he would au-

dit several important cases pre-

viously handled by his prede-

cessors, including a criminal

case involving the owner of a

natural gas company that em-

ployed a son of former vice

president Joe Biden.

The development came

amid an impeachment inquiry

against President Trump con-

nected to a request he made to

the Ukrainian president during

a July phone call asking him to

investigate Biden, a Democrat-

ic presidential candidate, and

his son’s work in Ukraine.

The prosecutor’s announce-

ment raised questions about

whether Ukraine was bowing

to public and private pressure

from the president of the Unit-

ed States, on which it has de-

pended on for millions of dol-

lars in aid. But it did not — by

design, analysts of Kyiv’s tactics

in the crisis say — answer those

questions.

Meanwhile, Chinese For-

eign Minister Wang Yi said Fri-

day that China ‘‘will not inter-

fere in the internal affairs of the

US,’’ after Trump urged Beijing

to probe his political rival Joe

Biden.

“[W]e trust that the Ameri-

can people will be able to sort

out their own problems,’’ the

Global Times, a party-affiliated

newspaper, reported Wang as

saying.

On Thursday, Trump told re-

porters at the White House that

‘‘China should start an investi-

gation into the Bidens, because

what happened in China is just

about as bad as what happened

with Ukraine.’’

His request for China to as-

sist in an investigation into

Biden, who is running for the

2020 Democratic nomination

for president, came as Wash-

ington and Beijing prepare for

trade talks next week.

‘‘I have a lot of options on

China,’’ Trump said Thursday,

‘‘but if they don’t do what we

want, we have tremendous

power.’’

As pressure from allies of

Trump mounted over the sum-

mer to start the investigation,

Ukraine’s president and aides

avoided any public commit-

ment to doing so, kicking down

the road any move that would

signal taking sides in US poli-

tics.

The audit, which the gener-

al prosecutor’s office said in a

statement must be completed

before any decision is taken on

an actual investigation, could

stretch on for months, or even

until the end of the US presi-

dential election next year, ana-

lysts said.

“This could go on for a long

time,” said Volodymyr Fesenko,

director of the Penta analytical

center. “I don’t think the prose-

cutor is going to be rushing

with this. It’s better not to hur-

ry.”

The prosecutor general,

Ruslan Ryaboshapka, who took

office in August, said he intend-

ed to review 15 cases in all, in-

cluding high-profile investiga-

tions of wealthy Ukrainians —

among them the owner of natu-

ral gas company Burisma Hold-

ings, where Biden’s son Hunter

served on the board until earli-

er this year.

Ryaboshapka said at a news

conference in Kyiv on Friday

that the Biden name “may be”

in the cases now under review.

In deciding to initiate the au-

dit, he said, “the key words

were not Biden and not Buris-

ma.”

Ukrainian officials have for

months been threading a nee-

dle in discussing the case relat-

ed to the elder Biden, a leading

contender in next year’s presi-

dential election. They have

tried to signal to Trump and his

allies that the issues will be in-

vestigated, even as they tried to

telegraph to Democrats that

they were not bending to

Trump’s pressure.

At the same time, the prose-

cutor’s announcement signaled

some attention to an issue

Trump raised in the phone call

in July and had repeated pub-

licly: a Ukrainian government

investigation of a case touching

on a likely opponent in next

year’s election.

Trump’s July phone call

with President Volodymyr Zel-

enskyofUkraineiscentralto

the formal House committee

impeachment inquiry called by

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The inquiry is examining

whether Trump betrayed his

oath of office and the nation’s

security by seeking to enlist the

aid of a foreign power to tar-

nish a political rival.

Material from the Washington

Post was used in this report.

PARKER MICHELS-BOYCE/WASHINGTON POST

Representative Elaine Luria spoke with her constituents after a town hall meeting at a church in Virginia Beach.

Rumblings in a GOP bastion

Ukraine to review

case of firm with

ties to Biden’s son

Auditpartof

wide-ranging

investigation

Investigators seek more information from White House

‘Thiscouldgoon

foralongtime.I

don’tthinkthe

prosecutorisgoing

toberushingwith

this.It’sbetternot

tohurry.’

VOLODYMYR FESENKO

Director of the Penta analytical

center

ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

A spokeswoman for Vice President Mike Pence called the

investigation a “partisan impeachment.”