Pelosi to Trump: Cooperate with impeachment inquiry

Bloomberg

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is telling the White House to be honest and cooperate with an impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump, saying “don’t make this any worse than it already is.”
“Speak the truth. Honor your oath of office to the Constitution of the United States,” Pelosi said in an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes” when asked what her message is to the White House. “And let us work together to have this be a unifying experience, not a dividing one for our country.”
Trump tweeted that he wants “to meet not only my accuser, who presented SECOND & THIRD HAND INFORMATION, but also the person who illegally gave this information.”
The whistle-blower who filed a complaint that sparked the inquiry is under federal protection out of fear for his or her safety, CBS said, citing a letter it obtained.
The news programme also said the whistle-blower’s lawyers sent a letter to Joseph Maguire, the acting Director of National Intelligence, thanking him for activating “appropriate resources” to ensure their client’s safety — and saying that “certain individuals” are offering a $50,000 bounty for their client’s identity.
Mark Zaid, an attorney for the whistle-blower, said on Twitter that CBS “completely misrepresented contents of our letter” but didn’t say how. He posted a copy of the letter online, and said discussions remain ongoing for the whistleblower to testify to Congress while ensuring protections to keep the person’s identity confidential.
60 Minutes, in a subsequent tweet, said it stands by its sources and reporting.
Trump has disparaged the whistle-blower and suggested that anyone who provided information is “close to a spy” and perhaps guilty of treason.
“It’s hard to describe how dangerous and loathsome that invitation to violence is,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff said on
“60 Minutes.”
Trump loyalists have taken up the cause too; senior White House adviser Stephen Miller on Sunday disparaged the whistle-blower’s complaint as a “seven-page little Nancy Drew novel,” a reference to the fictional teenage sleuth.
Pelosi launched a formal impeachment inquiry of Trump after a series of damaging revelations, including that the president withheld military aid
to Ukraine before asking Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate top Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden during a July phone call. Trump called Pelosi before she announced the impeachment inquiry to assure her the call had been “perfect,” she said.

‘All Speed’
Schiff, whose committee is leading the investigation into the Ukrainian matters, said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that his panel has an agreement with the whistle-blower to testify and expects that to happen “very soon,” depending on how quickly the security-clearance process for his or her lawyers can be completed.
Zaid said on Twitter that no agreement has been reached with Congress “on contact with the whistle-blower” and discussions “remain ongoing.”
The California Democrat has promised that Democrats will be “moving forward with all speed” on the impeachment inquiry, even with Congress on a two-week recess. He said on
“60 Minutes” that the committee intends to subpoena Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani for documents this week and may want him to testify.
Giuliani initially said on ABC he wouldn’t cooperate with Schiff’s investigation, then said he would consider it — and if Trump wants him to testify, “of course I’ll testify.”
Trump’s allies argue that the president did nothing wrong, and that Democrats are moving to impeach Trump because they can’t defeat him for re-election in 2020.
“Why would we move forward with impeachment?” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California said
on “60 Minutes.” “There’s not something that you have to
defend here.”