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Report: Trump Aware of Whistleblower Complaint Before Releasing Ukraine Aid

VOA News

   U.S. President Donald Trump learned about a whistleblower complaint
   regarding his relations with Ukraine before he decided to unfreeze
   nearly $400 million in military aid, according to a New York Times
   report published Tuesday.

   The Times cited two people familiar with the matter, saying White House
   lawyers told Trump about the complaint in late August as they worked to
   determine whether they were required to send it to Congress.

   That battle formed the early stages of what has become the focus of the
   impeachment inquiry now playing out in the House of Representatives.
   Lawmakers received the complaint in late September and made a version
   of it public.

   Since then, the Democrat-led House Intelligence committee has held both
   private and public sessions to hear testimony from current and former
   diplomats and other officials to examine allegations Trump withheld the
   aid to Ukraine to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to
   commit to an investigation of one of Trump's potential opponents in the
   2020 election, Democrat Joe Biden.

   The House Judiciary Committee, which will decide whether to send
   articles of impeachment to the full House for a vote, announced Tuesday
   it would hold its first hearing December 4 and invited Trump to attend.

   The hearing will look into what the committee calls the "Constitutional
   Grounds for Presidential Impeachment."

   The guidelines established by Democratic leaders say Trump and his
   lawyers would be given the chance to question the panel of
   still-to-be-named legal experts who will appear as witnesses.

   Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler sent a letter to the White
   House inviting Trump to attend, calling it "not a right, but a
   privilege or a courtesy."

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