A US budget official told the Pentagon to “hold off” on military aid to Kiev 90 minutes after a controversial telephone call between US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, according to an internal e-mail.
The e-mail was part of a series published by the investigative nonprofit Center for Public Integrity.
Trump is accused of withholding US$400 million in assistance to Ukraine to push Kiev to investigate his political rival former US vice president Joe Biden.
Photo: Reuters
“Based on guidance I have received and in light of the administration’s plan to review assistance to Ukraine... please hold off on any additional DoD [Department of Defense] obligations of these funds,” US Office of Management and Budget official Michael Duffy wrote in an e-mail to Pentagon officials.
The e-mail is time-stamped 11:04am — an hour and 31 minutes after Trump’s controversial July 25 telephone call with Zelenskiy ended, according to a summary of the conversation released by the White House.
“Given the sensitive nature of the request, I appreciate your keeping that information closely held to those who need to know,” Duffey added.
Republicans defended the move in a Dec. 2 US House of Representatives staff report, saying that it was “not unusual” for foreign aid to be delayed, the Center for Public Integrity said.
Republican US Senator Ron Johnson on Sunday told ABC’s This Week that the “new e-mails don’t shed any new light” on Trump’s rationale for withholding aid to Ukraine.
“The president was concerned about whether or not America’s hard-earned taxpayer dollars should be spent into a country where there’s been proven cases of corruption,” he said.
Meanwhile, top US Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer called the e-mails “explosive” in a tweet on Sunday, denouncing Trump’s refusal to let certain White House officials testify.
“If nothing is wrong with withholding the aid, why didn’t Michael Duffey want anyone to know about what he was doing?” Schumer wrote.
The e-mail “is all the more reason why we need Duffey and others to testify in a Senate trial.”
Democratic US Senator Amy Klobuchar echoed Schumer’s sentiment on CNN’s Face the Nation on Sunday.
“If the president is so innocent and shouldn’t be impeached, why is he afraid to have these people come forward?” the presidential hopeful said.
Trump was on Wednesday last week impeached by the US House for abuse of power and obstruction of the US Congress.
Despite testimony from 17 officials that Trump leveraged his office for political gain, the US president has maintained his innocence throughout the impeachment inquiry — denouncing it as an “attempted coup” and an “assault on America.”
He faces a trial in the Senate, possibly next month.
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