Trump tried to cover up his campaign’s contacts with a Russian national—which, at very least, constituted a violation of federal law.
Federal law prohibits campaigns from soliciting or accepting anything of value from a foreign national.
2016
- Donald Trump publicly called on Russia to find Hillary Clinton’s “missing” emails on July 27, 2016. Five hours later, Russian hackers attacked Clinton’s personal office for the first time.
- In the middle of the 2016 election, Trump’s son was invited to meet with a Russian national regarding “information that would incriminate Hillary and…would be very useful to” Donald Trump. Donald Trump Jr. was told it was “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.” Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort took the meeting.
- Paul Manafort and Rick Gates met with Konstantin Kilimnik, likely a Russian spy, multiple times in the summer of 2016 to provide him with internal campaign polling data detailing the Trump campaign’s midwestern strategy.
2020
- Trump used U.S. military aid to pressure Ukraine to interfere in the 2020 elections and must be impeached because no one is above the law.
- He illegally withheld $400 million dollars of military aid to Ukraine and in a call with the President of Ukraine, asked them to “do us a favor” by investigating Joe Biden’s family and a debunked conspiracy theory (that has been pushed by Russian intelligence) alledging Ukraine hacked the DNC’s computer servers.
- White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney admitted in a press conference that Trump had withheld military aid to Ukraine to pressure them to investigate his rivals for the 2020 election. He told the public to “Get Over it” as the White House does this “All the time”. Other State Department officials made it clear to the Ukrainian government that the aide would not be released unless the Ukrainians investigated the Biden family for the purpose of helping Trump win re-election.
- Trump told the press that, in addition to Ukraine, China should investigate the Bidens specifically and said “If they [China] do what we want, we have tremendous power” in ongoing trade negotiations.
- Multiple witnesses confirmed in the public impeachment hearings before the House Intelligence Committee that Trump was attempting to bribe and extort Ukraine into helping his reelection.