The whistleblower memo to the heads of congressional intelligence committees released this morning outlines a concerted effort by the White House to cover up President Trump’s July 25 phone conversation with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.
Senior White House officials tried to “lock down” all details of a phone call between Trump and the Ukrainian president, according to a whistleblower complaint against the president.
In the call, Trump pushed Zelensky to investigate his leading domestic political rival, Joe Biden.
The newly released complaint says the call transcript was not stored in the usual computer system.
Instead it was stored in a separate system used for classified information.
Sen. Ron Johnson has no issues with Trump’s call with Zelensky, but he does have a problem if records of the call were restricted.
In an interview, the Wisconsin Republican, pointed to a reporter’s copy of the whistleblower report, singling out Page 3, which alleged that White House officials treated records of the Zelensky call differently than other calls.
According to the whistleblower complaint, White House officials “had intervened to lock down all records of the phone call” and were directed to move electronic transcripts to a more secure electronic system.
“I would not be happy. We’ll find out exactly what transpired here. To me, of all this stuff, that’s the part that concerns me,” Johnson said.
Trump acknowledged that he personally blocked nearly $400m in military aid to Ukraine days before he spoke to Zelensky, but denied that it was to pressure the Ukrainian leader into investigating Biden.
The release of the whistleblower complaint came as US lawmakers on the House of Representatives intelligence committee began to question President Trump’s top intelligence official on the issue. Acting National Intelligence Director Joseph Maguire had initially refused to share the complaint with Congress.
President Trump has dismissed the impeachment proceedings as a “hoax” and a “witch-hunt”, and has been tweeting after the complaint was publicly released.
But under questioning by the House committee on Thursday, Maguire said he believed the whistleblower had acted in “good faith” and “did the right thing”.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) accused the White House today of a “coverup.”
Trump lashed out at Democrats minutes after the explosive whistleblower report was made public, and he urged Republicans to “STICK TOGETHER” as another dramatic day in Washington unfolded.