This 2016 letter proves that GOP attacks on Biden over Ukraine are nonsense
Trump’s core argument against Joe Biden is that then-Vice President Biden improperly used the power of his office to get a Ukrainian general prosecutor fired in order to stop him from investigating a Ukrainian gas company that Biden’s son Hunter served on the board of.
The reality is that the Obama administration — as well as many other Western European officials — wanted the prosecutor, a man named Viktor Shokin, removed because he was believed to be trying to stymie anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine. In other words, if anything, Biden’s efforts could have put his son in more legal jeopardy, not less.
Yet the conspiracy theory persists and has been repeated by Trump’s Republican allies on Fox News and in Congress. But it turns out Republicans have failed to mention one important thing: At least three GOP senators at the time also wanted that Ukrainian prosecutor fired.
CNN uncovered a letter dated February 12, 2016, in which Sens. Rob Portman (R-OH), Ron Johnson (R-WI), and Mark Kirk (R-IL), along with several Democratic senators, called for Ukraine’s then-president to “press ahead with urgent reforms to the Prosecutor General’s office and judiciary.” Four days later, Shokin resigned (although he didn’t officially leave until the following month when Ukraine’s Parliament voted him out).
In other words, both Republicans and Democrats in the US — and many European nations — wanted Shokin gone for failing to clamp down on graft.
More:
https://www.vox.com/2019/10/3/20896869/trump-biden-ukraine-2016-letter-portman-johnson
= new reply since forum marked as read
Have not heard one word out of Portman.
