U.S. Rep. Sean Maloney supports Trump impeachment query
"These allegations go to the heart of the oath I took," Maloney said Tuesday. "There comes a time to put your country first."
Newburgh /
| 24 Sep 2019 | 06:33
U.S. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (NY-18) (
)
U.S. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (NY-18) on Tuesday expressed his support for impeachment proceedings after reports that President Donald Trump had a phone conversation with the president of Ukraine in which he discussed investigating former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.
The House is moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry. "We’re going to hold the President accountable," said Maloney.
Maloney is a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and occupies a seat Trump narrowly won. New York's 18th Congressional District includes Orange and Putnam counties in addition to parts of Westchester and Dutchess counties. Maloney released the following statement:
“I have had a high bar for putting the country through an impeachment inquiry, especially so close to an election. But these allegations go to the heart of the oath I took. There comes a time to put your country first. Unless the Intelligence Committee immediately receives both the whistleblower complaint, and the recordings of any calls – and they dispel these charges – I am prepared to pursue an impeachment inquiry of the President. The old Trump song and dance won’t cut it this time.”
In a series of tweets on Tuesday, he said:
"This has nothing to do with the Mueller report, nothing to do with the 2016 elections. This is new information, and it’s our job to act accordingly. Impeachment is a last resort."
"Unless the president can dispel these allegations, we must pursue impeachment. He’s left us with no choice -- we can’t allow him to ride roughshod over the Constitution."
"No American president, Democrat or Republican, can muscle a foreign leader, threatening withdrawal of the U.S. military, to kneecap a political opponent. I'm pleading with my Republican colleagues to take this seriously."
"We have never been in a place like this before. It has nothing to do with the Mueller report, it has nothing to do with the 2016 election ... this is new information & it could not be more serious."
Nick Langworthy, chair of the New York GOP, blasted Maloney and U.S. Antonio Delgado (NY-19), both Democrats, for "joining the impeachment mob."
"The radical left’s endless obsession with trying to take out President Trump and derail his agenda will be rejected by the voters who want their representatives to focus on making their lives better, not their own power," he said in a statement. "This reckless decision will rightfully go down as the one that cost them their seats.”
Seeking foreign help to investigate rival
(AP) Republicans remained largely silent amid reports that the president pressured Ukraine's leader to help investigate political rival Joe Biden at the same time the White House was withholding $250 million in aid to the Eastern European nation.
Trump acknowledged Monday that he didn't want to give money to Ukraine if there were corruption issues. His comments raised further questions about whether he improperly used his office to pressure the country into investigating the former vice president and his family.
"It's very important to talk about corruption,'' Trump told reporters as he opened meetings at the United Nations. "If you don't talk about corruption, why would you give money to a country that you think is, is corrupt?''
Trump has sought, without evidence, to implicate Biden and his son Hunter in the kind of corruption that has long plagued Ukraine. Hunter Biden worked for a Ukrainian gas company at the same time his father was leading the Obama administration's diplomatic dealings with Kyiv. Though the timing raised concerns among anti-corruption advocates, there has been no evidence of wrongdoing by either the former vice president or his son.
The matter is under new scrutiny following the whistleblower's mid-August complaint, which followed Trump's July 25 call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. The person who filed the complaint did not have firsthand knowledge of the call, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Lawmakers are demanding details of the complaint, but the acting director of national intelligence has refused to share that information, citing presidential privilege.