WaPo:
U.S. envoy says he was told release of Ukraine aid was contingent on public declaration to investigate Bidens, 2016 election
“Amb. Sondland also told me that he now recognized that he had made a mistake by earlier telling the Ukrainian officials to whom he spoke that a White House meeting with President Zelensky was dependent on a public announcement of investigations — in fact, Amb. Sondland said, ‘everything’ was dependent on such an announcement, including security assistance,’” Taylor told House investigators…
“He drew a very specific direct line from President Trump to the withholding of foreign aid and the refusal of a meeting,” between Trump and the new Ukrainian leader, Wasserman Schultz said, “directly related to both insisting on Zelensky publicly say that he’ll have an investigation, that they will investigate.”
Dan Balz:
New testimony undercuts Trump’s claim of no quid pro quo on Ukraine. How will Washington respond?
The closed-door testimony by the United States’ senior diplomat in Ukraine significantly changes the discussion about whether President Trump withheld military assistance to compel a foreign government to investigate one of his political rivals.
It is no longer a question of whether this happened. It is now a question of how the president explains it and how lawmakers — especially Republicans — choose to respond to it.
Michelle Cottle/NY Times:
The Unraveling of Mick Mulvaney
The White House chief of staff, still “acting” after all these months, should never have been cast in the role of spin doctor.
But, in Mr. Mulvaney’s defense, he should never have been put in this position. The guy who’s doing the dirty work should not also be the guy expected to go out and defend it to a roomful of journalists. That’s what a press secretary is for — preferably a professional steeped in the dark art of ensorcelling the Fourth Estate.
Seriously, does anyone think Sarah Huckabee Sanders, in her turn as Mr. Trump’s chief spinner, would have been goaded into admitting a presidential quid pro quo and then admonish everyone for being naïve about that sort of thing? Of course not. She was too adept at dodging, deflecting and flat-out lying to blurt out such an inconvenient truth. If nothing else, she would have pleaded ignorance of the details — which would have been a tougher sell for Mr. Mulvaney given his role as a recurring character in the Ukraine shenanigans.
James Hohmann/WaPo:
Reversals on G-7 and potentially Syria show Trump buckles in the face of enough Republican pressure
THE BIG IDEA: President Trump backs down when confronted with criticism from congressional Republicans if it’s loud enough and he fears he could lose support from his base.
National Rifle Association leaders have told Trump that he’d lose the support of gun owners if he threw his weight behind universal background checks. This helps explain why he’s backed down after calling for stricter background checks in the immediate aftermath of multiple mass shootings. This weekend, Trump nixed plans to host the G-7 summit at his Doral golf club not because it gave Democrats fodder for an article of impeachment but because key Republicans told him they couldn’t defend it. The president appears to be repeating this pattern with Syria.
These are all illustrations that conservative lawmakers have more leverage over the White House than they seem to think, especially with impeachment votes looming. “I’ve said this to the president as recently as this week: We have to be in friend-making mode,” former New Jersey governor Chris Christie said Sunday on ABC. “There’s a time to be combative, and there’s a time to be in friend-making mode vis-a-vis your own party.”
Amber Phillips/WaPo:
A few Republican cracks on impeachment are showing
Republicans who don’t want to ditch Trump are protected by the fact that impeachment and, to a lesser extent, quid pro quos are subjective. The Constitution says a president can be impeached for “high crimes and misdemeanors,” but Congress determines what that means. There doesn’t have to be evidence of an actual crime, but there also isn’t a definite bar a president has to meet to be impeached.
And where some legal experts see a clear quid pro quo in that Ukraine phone call (“I would like you to do us a favor though,” Trump says), Graham doesn’t. Despite indicating Thursday afternoon there was a quid pro quo, acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney that afternoon tried to clean up his comments in a statement, and kept backtracking on “Fox News Sunday,” saying: “I never said there was a quid pro quo, ’cause there isn’t.”
As Bill Taylor’s testimony makes its way thru the media filter, the Republican immediate reaction will be less important than the public’s eventual reaction.
Bloomberg:
Trump Seeks to Alter Course After Missteps on Impeachment, Doral
In all, the distractions may do little to slow the torrent of negative news from the Democratic-led House impeachment investigation.
As more officials defy the White House and troop up to Capitol Hill to testify, a growing number of Republican lawmakers have started to equivocate in their support, and more Americans are backing Trump’s removal from office.
Fifty percent of Americans now support his impeachment while 44% oppose, according to the polling average tabulated by FiveThirtyEight, which also estimated Trump’s approval rating to 41.5%.
These are bad number for him, and the new CNN poll (yesterday) emphasises this:
And btw Nancy Pelosi’s fav/unfav is 44/46 in this poll. That’s a pretty high number considering they’ve been running against her for a decade.
This also interesting:
The idea of Rs out to protect Trump while Ds think Trump committed impeachable offenses has stuck with the public. Republicans are losing the argument.
Commonwealth Fund (a repeat for me because of its importance) has a nice summary and comparison of different reform plans.
Helaine Olen/WaPo:
Fantasy politics for Democratic moderates
There’s a popular fable among a number of Democratic candidates for president: A moderate agenda has a better chance of passing than a more ambitious one. Former vice president Joe Biden, for example, made his ability to work with Republicans a central part of his election plank. “I’ve worked across the aisle to reach consensus,” he said when he announced his run for president. He’s stuck with that talking point ever since. The problem, in Biden’s view, is Trump and Trump alone. “With Trump gone, you’re going to begin to see things change,” he claimed a few months back about Republican politicians.
Then there’s Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who raised more than $1 million immediately after she attacked Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) during the October debate, and her ambitious legislative agenda, arguing “the difference between a plan and a pipe dream is something that you can actually get done.” The same is true for South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who is also the recipient of renewed attention. And Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.)? “We can fight a losing battle for Medicare-for-all,” he said on Monday. “We can continue to not address the fact that when the economy grows it only grows for the top 10 percent. We can continue to live in a country where the education system reinforces the income inequality rather than liberating people from it. We can continue to live in a state of climate denial. Or we can actively go to work on behalf of the American people.”
Please. All of this is the definition of wish fulfillment as politics. Think of it as fantasy politics for moderates.
And overseas via WaPo:
Boris Johnson Loses a Critical Brexit Vote, Throwing the Process Into Further Disarray
Lawmakers voted to support Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s deal in principle, but then, more importantly, rejected his timetable — a yes/no result that creates further confusion over what happens next.
Before Tuesday’s votes in Parliament, Johnson argued that speed was of the essence. Let’s get it done.
Slow down, warned the skeptics. The British economy is at stake.
The skeptics won the day.
They voted 322 to 308 to reject Johnson’s request for an accelerated timetable.
BoJo loses a lot of these votes.