Bolton Ripped for Reportedly Dropping Impeachment ‘Bombshell’ in New Book

Bradley Cortright January 27, 2020
4 Comments
John Bolton

The New York Times reports that former National Security Advisor John Bolton said President Donald Trump told him he wanted military aid to Ukraine linked to an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden in his forthcoming book.

The report led to a new round of calls for senators to subpoena Bolton as a witness in the Senate trial.

In a series of tweets, Trump denied that he told Bolton he wanted to link aid to an investigation of the Bidens.

“I NEVER told John Bolton that the aid to Ukraine was tied to investigations into Democrats, including the Bidens. In fact, he never complained about this at the time of his very public termination. If John Bolton said this, it was only to sell a book.”

News of the reportedly “bombshell” content of the book didn’t sit well some commentators. 

CNN analyst Asha Rangappa suggested that Bolton may have refused to testify before House impeachment investigators because it would have hurt his book sales.

Conservative commentators suggested that Bolton’s book was designed to hurt the president politically:

Bolton refused to testify in the House probe, telling lawmakers he would take a subpoena to court to decide whether he must comply. But recently, he said he would comply with a subpoena to testify in the Senate’s impeachment trial. 

On Monday, Trump sent out a misleading tweet that suggested House Democrats did not ask Bolton to testify — and therefore missed their window to hear testimony from him.

The House did ask Bolton to testify, but after he vowed to fight it in court they decided against pursuing his testimony.

Democrats have called for Bolton to testify in the Senate trial, but that would require a simple majority of senators to vote to call him as a witness.

It is unclear whether the details from Bolton’s book will sway enough Republican senators to vote to subpoena Bolton.

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Responses

  1. Friend January 27, 2020

    Actually, the House DIDN’T ask Bolton to testify.Trump’s tweet is entirely and factually correct! The House didn’t bother because they.knew they would have to challenge it in court. They knew that precedent would prevail and they’d lose if SCOTUS were invoked.

  2. screwtape January 27, 2020

    Let’s not forget that Bolton himself has not spoken on this.

    Also notice that the key word is “investigation”, not “fabrication”. There’s actually a fire where there’s smoke. Biden himself is well documented bragging about his corruption and abuse of power.

  3. General Confusion January 27, 2020

    Dear Leader:

    If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.

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