Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday accused President Trump of “bribery” in his dealings with Ukrainian leaders, linking the president’s actions to the Constitution’s impeachment clause even while emphasizing that Democrats remain undecided on whether they’ll draft impeachment articles.
“That is in the Constitution, attached to the impeachment proceedings,” Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol.
She then explained the basis for the charge, which stems from a whistleblower’s complaint that has since been supported by numerous government officials, that Trump leveraged U.S. military aid to Kyiv to secure political favors from Ukrainian leaders.
“The bribe is to grant or withhold military assistance in return for a public statement of a fake investigation into the elections,” she said. “That’s bribery.”
Pelosi declined to say if the bribery charge would become an article of impeachment, insisting Democrats — even as they move ahead with their investigation — have not concluded Trump committed impeachable offenses.
“We haven’t even made a decision to impeach,” she said. “That’s what the inquiry is about. And when the committees decide that, then they will decide what the articles are.”
“But I am saying, that what the president has admitted to, and says it’s ‘perfect,’ I said it’s perfectly wrong,” she added. “It’s bribery.”
Pelosi’s comments arrived as some Democrats are urging their colleagues to abandon the Latin phrase that’s dominated their impeachment inquiry up to now — “quid pro quo” — in favor of language like “bribery” and “extortion” that carries more direct connotations of explicit criminality.
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JUST IN: Pelosi: Trump committed "bribery" in dealings with Ukraine https://t.co/o9PDaJBHZ0 pic.twitter.com/SFB7W0OCGR
— The Hill (@thehill) November 14, 2019
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