“I have news for everybody: get over it. There’s going to be political influence in foreign policy. That is going to happen. Elections have consequences, and the foreign policy is going to change from the Obama administration to the Trump administration.”
Mick Mulvaney
White House Chief of Staff
(Press conference on 10/18/19)
It is absolutely true that the United States pressures other countries to enact policies that we agree with. We often use financial pressure and “carrot and stick” tactics. The difference here is that those actions are taken for America’s national security interest, not for an individual’s personal interest.
“I found the July 25th phone call to be unusual, because in contrast to other presidential calls I had observed, it involved discussion of what appeared to be a domestic political matter.”
Jennifer Williams
Official at the State Department detailed to Vice President Mike Pence
(11/19/19)
“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was probably an element of shock, that maybe in certain regards, my worst fear of how our Ukraine policy could play out was playing out, and how this was likely to have significant implications for U.S. national security.”
U.S. Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman
National Security Counsel Ukraine Expert, Director for European Affairs
(11/19/19)
“In retrospect for the Ukrainians it would clearly have been confusing. In hindsight, I now understand that others saw the idea of investigating possible corruption involving the Ukrainian company Burisma as equivalent to investigating former Vice President Biden. I saw them as very different — the former being appropriate and unremarkable, the latter being unacceptable. In retrospect, I should have seen that connection differently, and had I done so, I would have raised my own objections.”
Kurt Volker
Former US Special Envoy to Ukraine
(11/19/19)
For more info, visit Trump-Ukraine Central
– rob rünt
The Week In Trump 