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Wednesday marks 1 year since 9/9/19, when the Intelligence Community's Inspector General notified Congress he'd received an "urgent concern" from a whistleblower & deemed it credible.
That set in motion Trump's impeachment.
Would it today? /1 https://www.lawfareblog.com/inspector-general-intelligence-community-letters-congressional-intelligence-committees
Wednesday marks 1 year since 9/9/19, when the Intelligence Community's Inspector General notified Congress he'd received an "urgent concern" from a whistleblower & deemed it credible.
That set in motion Trump's impeachment.
Would it today? /1 https://www.lawfareblog.com/inspector-general-intelligence-community-letters-congressional-intelligence-committees
The Intelligence Community's Inspector General who took seriously the whistleblower's complaint, persevered when Trump's White House & Justice Department tried to bury it, & ensured Congress learned of it has been forced out by Trump. /2 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/03/us/trump-inspector-general-intelligence-fired.html
The Acting Director of National Intelligence who initially blocked his Inspector General from sharing with Congress the whistleblower complaint but then allowed it to be shared also has been forced out by Trump--replaced by a Trump loyalist. /3 https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-2020-election-russia-intelligence-director-joseph-maguire-putin-a9348936.html
Meanwhile, the Trump officials who tried to bury the whistleblower complaint--at the White House & at the Justice Department--remain. In particular, their resistance to scrutiny over the executive branch & information-sharing with Congress are stronger. /4 https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/09/olc-ukraine-whistleblower-complaint-cover-up.html
Key officials who got the whistleblower complaint to Congress are now gone; key officials who tried to block it remain.
Today, would Congress even receive the letter that, 1 year ago, set in motion impeachment?
Maybe not.
So: what's Trump doing now we don't even know about? /5
Today, would Congress even receive the letter that, 1 year ago, set in motion impeachment?
Maybe not.
So: what's Trump doing now we don't even know about? /5
This is what @rgoodlaw & I warned of on @just_security: "Purges of US officials are a direct extension of Trump’s 3-year project of politicization of the executive, an early move taken by autocrats who seek to exploit election by consolidating power" /END https://www.justsecurity.org/68585/the-friday-night-massacres-broader-context-trumps-redesign-for-american-democracy/
