Watergate Journo Carl Bernstein: Ukraine Texts Show Trump ‘Mortgaged Our Foreign Policy’ To Benefit Himself Politically
Carl Bernstein, one-half of the journalist duo “Woodward and Bernstein” who covered and broke many jaw-dropping news stories during the Watergate era, said that recent testimony by a former Trump administration envoy uncovered a “grave moment” in the Ukraine scandal.
“We now see a suggestion, maybe more than a suggestion, of a real conspiracy led by the president of the United States and his lawyer, to undermine our electoral process through involving and intimidating a foreign power,” Bernstein said on CNN Friday morning.
President Donald Trump “has mortgaged our foreign policy to his own political interests,” Bernstein added. “This is a grave, grave moment.”
The veteran journalist also stated that the actions by Trump are “undermining” our foreign policy by limiting action that could be taken by Ukraine to stand up against both nations’ shared adversary, Russia. It’s being alleged by many that Trump may have withheld military aide to Ukraine in order to coerce that nation to open up an investigation on Joe Biden, who might be Trump’s political opponent in the 2020 presidential race.
"We are watching a coverup." @carlbernstein draws parallels between the Ukraine controversy and Nixon's Watergate scandal. https://t.co/fmoV9VX1xW pic.twitter.com/R5cowpkFfF
— New Day (@NewDay) October 4, 2019
On Friday, Trump misquoted a Washington Times article, purporting in a tweet that the newspaper had stated that former Ukraine envoy Kurt Volker’s deposition in the House on Thursday had blown a “massive hole” into accusations made against the president. In actuality, the Times had itself been quoting a Republican lawmaker with strong pro-Trump views, as prior reporting from HillReporter.com revealed.
In truth, many view Volker’s testimony as more damaging to the president, particularly due to text message communications he had with an aide to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky. In those communications, it appears as though the administration would only agree to have Trump meet with Zelensky if an investigation into Biden were to happen first.
“heard from White House — assuming President Z convinces trump he will investigate / ‘get to the bottom of what happened’ in 2016, we will nail down date for visit to Washington,” Volker’s text to his Ukrainian counterpart read.