At UN, Trump to face questions about Iran, Ukraine, allies

NEW YORK (AP) — Faced with growing tumult at home and abroad, President Donald Trump heads into his three-day visit to the United Nations this week hoping to lean on strained alliances while fending off questions about whether he sought foreign help to damage a political rival.

Trump’s latest U.N. trip comes after nearly three years of an “America First” foreign policy that has unsettled allies and shredded multinational pacts.

A centerpiece of this year’s U.N. schedule will be a Monday session on climate change that Trump plans to skip.

Instead, he will address a meeting about the persecution of religious minorities, particularly Christians, an issue that resonates with Trump’s evangelical supporters.

The president arrived in New York on Sunday against a backdrop of swirling international tensions, including questions about his relationship with Ukraine , the uncertain future of Brexit, the U.S. trade war with China, stalled nuclear negotiations with North Korea and a weakening global economy.

The most immediate challenge may be Iran.

Trump will try to convince skeptical global capitals to help build a coalition to confront Tehran after the United States blamed it for last week’s strike at a Saudi Arabia oil field.

“Well, I always like a coalition,” Trump said Friday, before going on to complain that under the old Iran nuclear deal, “everyone else is making money and we’re not.”

Trump’s fulfillment of a campaign promise to exit the Iran nuclear deal has had wide ripple effects, leading Tehran to bolster its nuclear capabilities and dismaying European capitals who worked to establish the original agreement.

French President Emmanuel Macron, in particular, has been trying to lead Trump back to a deal and has suggested that the U.S. president meet with Iranian leader Hassan Rouhani on the sidelines of the U.N. meetings.

Trump said Sunday that while “nothing is ever off the table completely” he had no intention of meeting with Rouhani.

Tensions between Washington and Tehran spiked after a Saudi Arabia oil field was partially destroyed in an attack that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo blamed on Iran and deemed “an act of war.”

Now Trump will try to enlist wary world leaders in a collective effort to contain Iran.

“He needs to win over traditional allies to do what traditional allies do, to band together against common threats,” said Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The attacks last weekend in Saudi Arabia are precisely the kind of thing that the U.N. was intended to address, to create rules for international behavior and opportunities for collective action.”

Ukraine also looms large on Trump’s schedule. Even one week ago, a one-on-one meeting with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy would have been seen largely as an afterthought.

But Trump’s meeting on Wednesday with Zelenskiy will come just days after revelations that the president urged his Ukrainian counterpart in a July phone call to investigate the activities of the son of former Vice President Joe Biden. Trump said he was concerned about corruption; Democrats frame his actions as an effort to pressure Zelenskiy to dig up damaging material on a potential 2020 rival.

That pressure is the subject of a whistleblower’s complaint that the administration has refused to turn over to members of Congress, setting up a showdown with Democrats.

Trump is defending himself against the intelligence official’s complaint, asserting that it comes from a “partisan whistleblower,” though the president also said he doesn’t know the whistleblower’s identity.

He insisted Sunday his conversation with Zelenskiy was “absolutely perfect.” But Democrats believe it shows that Trump is emboldened to seek foreign help for his reelection effort.

There are plenty of other concerns in the mix during Trump’s U.N. visit, including the U.S. trade war with China.

But China’s Xi Jinping is not expected to attend, nor are several other prominent world leaders, including Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Among the nations whose leaders Trump plans to meet in New York: Iraq, Poland, Egypt, Pakistan, South Korea and Japan. He will also meet with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, clinging to power after failed attempts to steer his nation out of the European Union.

Trump’s annual address to the General Assembly is scheduled for Tuesday. Two years ago, he used the moment to deride North Korea’s Kim Jong Un as “Little Rocket Man” and threaten to destroy North Korea.

A year ago, he drew laughter when he used his speech to recite his administration’s accomplishments.

His theme this year, according to aides, will be to reassert America’s determination to uphold its sovereignty and independence, especially on issues of national security.

But others may push a different path.

“There’s an attempt to push back against the unilateralism, against the isolationism, against the populism that has affected not only the United States but other countries as well,” said Jeffrey Feltman of the Brookings Institution. “I don’t know how effective this will be, but it’s an example of how some of our traditional allies are organizing themselves in response to the feeling that the United States, the U.K., that other sort of major engines in the U.N. system no longer are pressing the accelerator.”

Biden's campaign likely coming to an end -- thanks to Clinton-linked Ukraine bombshell, Nunes says

California Rep. Devin Nunes predicted on Fox News' "Sunday Morning Futures" that Joe Biden's campaign is likely coming to an end -- all because of newly resurfaced reports about his possible misconduct in Ukraine that "first originated back when Hillary Clinton was trying to make sure Biden didn’t get in the race."
The top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee made the claim as The Des Moines Register/CNN/Mediacom poll showed Sen. Elizabeth Warren surging ahead of Biden as the first choice of 22 percent of the voters surveyed, while Biden was the first choice of 20 percent of the voters. Biden held a 9-point lead over Warren in the poll as recently as June.
Nunes, speaking to anchor Maria Bartiromo, said a whistleblower's allegation that President Trump had acted inappropriately during a July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will ultimately backfire, and shine a light on Biden's own possible misconduct. CNN later acknowledged that the whistleblower had no first-hand knowledge of the call, and a top Ukrainian official on Saturday defended Trump's actions.
"These stories first originated back when Hillary Clinton was trying to make sure Biden didn’t get in the race," Nunes said. "So now that these have been resurrected, I don’t know who came up with the scheme -- maybe this whistleblower really is not a partisan. We want to hear from that whistleblower, but it sure looks like the scheme has backfired. And, like I said, it looks like this is the end of Biden’s campaign. I really do... his lead is basically down to zero."
Late Sunday, Trump echoed Nunes' comments, and emphasized that Biden recently bragged about pressuring Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor when he was vice president. At the time, the prosecutor was probing a company closely linked to Biden's son, Hunter.
"Sleepy Joe Biden ... forced a tough prosecutor out from investigating his son's company by threat of not giving big dollars to Ukraine," Trump wrote on Twitter. "That's the real story!"
Nunes said the ever-deepening schism in the Democratic Party over whether to impeach the president -- highlighted late Saturday when New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called it a major "scandal" that Democrats hadn't yet voted to impeach -- would help Trump in 2020.
"The more I think that they’re out there promoting this kind of craziness and silliness, the more that the American people are put off, and the more likely President Trump is reelected,” Nunes added.
There were parallels, Nunes said, with Democrats' ultimately debunked claims that the Trump campaign had colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential election.
"This has all the hallmarks of the Russia hoax," Nunes said. "Something leaks out. ... and then it's the same reporters that report on it, the same reporters that reported on the Russia hoax. Then you move forward, and what happens? Then supposedly they come and testify -- and the night before they testify, the whistleblower who supposedly doesn't want anybody to know who this person is, or what information they have, well, it's spilled all over the pages of the Washington Post" the day before Congress was briefed on the matter.
"Whoever came up with this scheme -- it looks like somebody was trying to deflect what Biden did back in 2015," Nunes said. "This scheme seems to have backfired on Biden. I mean, Biden's already dropping in the polls."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, speaks during the EU-Ukraine summit press conference in Kiev, Ukraine, Monday, July 8, 2019. ( AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Trump had repeatedly asked Zelensky to investigate Hunter Biden, the former vice president's son who had a key role in a natural gas firm that was being investigated by a Ukrainian prosecutor as part of a corruption probe.
At a conference two years after he left office, Joe Biden openly boasted about successfully pressuring Ukraine to fire that prosecutor when he was vice president.
Unverified reports circulated on left-leaning media outlets claiming that Trump could have even promised something improper in exchange for Ukraine's compliance, although the Journal reported there was no "quid-pro-quo" involved.
Trump acknowledged Sunday that he had communicated with Zelensky about Biden, and that the conversation concerned "the corruption taking place and largely the fact that we don't want our people like Vice President Biden and his son [contributing] to the corruption already in the Ukraine." However, the president and top officials maintained Sunday that nothing inappropriate occurred on the call.
DNI Inspector General Michael Atkinson said in a Sep. 9 letter to the House Intelligence Committee that the whistleblower complaint "appeared credible" and related to an "urgent" matter. But the DNI general counsel said days later that, after consulting with the DOJ, the matter did not meet the legal definition of an “urgent concern," and was not subject to mandatory disclosure to Congress.
“Furthermore, because the complaint involves confidential and potentially privileged communications by persons outside the Intelligence Community, the DNI lacks unilateral authority to transmit such materials to the intelligence committees,”  Jason Klitenic, the DNI general counsel, wrote.
Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire will testify before the House Intelligence Committee at an open hearing on Thursday.
"At that time, we expect him to obey the law and turn over the whistleblower’s full complaint to the Committee," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement Sunday afternoon. "We also expect that he will establish a path for the whistleblower to speak directly to the House and Senate Intelligence Committees as required by law."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., suggested Sunday that impeachment may be on the table, if certain demands are not met ahead of Wednesday's whistleblower hearing. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Pelosi also seemingly threatened that she would back impeachment if her demands were not met, in a potentially major shift to her wait-and-see approach thus far: "If the Administration persists in blocking this whistleblower from disclosing to Congress a serious possible breach of constitutional duties by the President, they will be entering a grave new chapter of lawlessness which will take us into a whole new stage of investigation."
Trump's conversation came as the White House was holding up $250 million in military aid for Ukraine. The president has said he wants European countries to pay more for their own defense, and denied delaying any military aid funding.
The whistleblower's allegation could prompt scrutiny of the Obama administration's Ukraine policy. Joe Biden has explained on camera that in March 2016, he privately threatened then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko that the U.S. would withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees from Ukraine if its top prosecutor was not fired.
“I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion,'" Biden recounted telling Poroshenko at a Council on Foreign Relations event. "I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.'"
“Well, son of a b-tch, he got fired," Biden continued, after assuring Poroshenko that Obama knew about the arrangement. "And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.”
It remained unclear if this was directly tied to the prosecutor's probe into the company linked to Hunter Biden, as other countries reportedly wanted the prosecutor out as well.
And earlier this year, The Hill reported that the U.S. Embassy in Kiev, under the Obama administration, took the unusual step of pressuring prosecutors there to drop a probe into a group closely linked to liberal megadonor George Soros.

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden speaks at an LGBTQ Presidential Forum in the Sinclair Auditorium on the Coe College campus in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Friday, Sept. 20, 2019. (Rebecca F. Miller/The Gazette via AP)

Then, in April, Ukrainian law enforcement officials said they had a slew of evidence of collusion and wrongdoing by Democrats, and that they have been trying to share this information with U.S. officials in the Justice Department.
A 2017 investigation by Politico found that Ukrainian officials not only publicly sought to undermine Trump by questioning his fitness for office, but also worked behind the scenes to secure a Clinton victory. Trump told Fox News that the allegations of possible Clinton-Ukraine collusion were "big" and vowed they would be reviewed by the DOJ.
Additionally, attention focused anew on President Obama's hot-mic comment to then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at a nuclear disarmament summit in March 2012, in which Obama was overheard saying he would have more "flexibility" to negotiate with Russia after the November 2012 election.
"The longer we talk about what the Bidens did in Ukraine, the better," said Barry Bennett, a former Trump campaign adviser, who dismissed those who believe Trump will pay a political price for the latest controversy.
Meanwhile, Biden on Saturday denied he has ever spoken to Hunter about his business in Ukraine and called Trump's actions an "overwhelming abuse of power."
“Trump’s doing this because he knows I’ll beat him like a drum, and he’s using the abuse of power and every element of the presidency to try to do something to smear me,” Biden told reporters in Iowa.
But Trump, on Sunday, pointed out that Biden's claim was seemingly inaccurate. Hunter Biden told the New Yorker previously that he and his father had spoken “just once” about it.
“And now he made a lie when he said he never spoke to his son,” Trump said. “Of course you spoke to your son!”
Trump added: "No quid pro quo, there was nothing. It was a perfect conversation. ... The conversation I had was largely congratulatory, with largely corruption, all of the corruption taking place and largely the fact that we don't want our people like Vice President Biden and his son creating the corruption already in the Ukraine and Ukraine has got a lot of problems. The new president is saying that he's going to be able to rid the country of corruption, and I said that would be a great thing, we had a great conversation."
Trump went on to say the latest allegations are "just as ridiculous as the others," branding it "the Ukraine Witch Hunt" — a nod to former Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe.
"Will fail again!" Trump tweeted.
Fox News' Ronn Blitzer, Fox Business Network's Maria Bartiromo and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Trump visits Ohio factory with Australia's prime minister, touts economy

President Trump visited Ohio, a state essential to his 2020 reelection strategy, with Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison, taking the stage at a recycled-paper factory Sunday evening to highlight the United States’ investment partnership with the country.
Trump and Morrison visited the new factory in Wapakoneta, which is being opened by Anthony Pratt, an Australian businessman investing billions of dollars in the United States to create thousands of manufacturing jobs. Wapakoneta is about an hour north of Dayton.
"If it wasn't for your presidency, this mill would not be here today," Pratt said, praising the Trump administration's economic and tax policies.
“Today we celebrate the extraordinary economic partnership between our nations and we proudly declare that Pratt Industries and this great, great state of Ohio is open for business,” Trump said as he addressed the cheering crowd at the new Pratt Industries plant, which was still under construction. He added, “Australia is one of our most important allies and trading partners with more than 65 billion dollars in trade between our nations last year.”

President Trump and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison shaking hands at Pratt Industries on Sunday in Wapakoneta, Ohio.  (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

He added, “Unlike so many other nations, Australia upholds the principles of fair and reciprocal trade.”
People in Ohio crowded into the hot factory and chanted "USA" when the president talked about products displaying the words "Made in America." The plant is expected to open in a couple of weeks and has offered jobs to veterans, which Trump highlighted as he addressed the crowd on Sunday.
“I am especially excited to announce that one in four workers at this plant is a veteran,” Trump said. The audience responded with cheers.
Trump said, “Over the next decade, Pratt Industries is creating 5000 new jobs in the United States. This massive new investment is made possible by the historic tax cuts and tax credits that we signed into law.”
Trump had nothing but praise for the Australian prime minister, who also praised the U.S. president.

President Trump speaking as Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, center, and Pratt Industries chairman Anthony Pratt watched during a factory tour Sunday. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

“The president and I are here today because we believe in jobs, we believe in the way jobs transform lives,” Morrison said, adding, “What we are celebrating here is jobs.”
He also pointed out America's 3.7-percent unemployment rate, saying, “That is an amazing achievement, Mr. President, the lowest unemployment rate we have seen in the United States for a very, very long time.”
The president and first lady Melania Trump hosted Morrison and his wife, Jennifer, at a state dinner on Friday night, two days before the Ohio visit.
Earlier Sunday, Trump visited Texas and met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to highlight the growth of U.S. exports to India and billions of dollars spent by India on U.S. defense equipment. Neither mentioned trade tensions on Sunday.
Trump and Modi clasped hands as they walked across the stage in a packed NRG Stadium in Houston, sending an apparent message of unity between the world's two largest democracies.
The president also discussed border security on Sunday, an important campaign issue for Texas, which shares a border with Mexico.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Helen Raleigh: China has already lost the trade war. Here's why

China already lost in the trade war with the U.S. Although you will never hear Chinese authorities, especially President Xi Jinping, admit it as such, the evidence is everywhere and only becoming more compelling by the day.
Reuters recently reported that based on the Chinese government's own data, China's economic slowdown has worsened in August, with "growth in industrial production is at its weakest in 17-1/2 years amid spreading pain from a trade war with the United States and softening domestic demand. Retail sales and investment gauges worsened too." Despite such poor readings, Premier Li Keqiang insists that China is still on track to achieve 6 to 6.5 per cent growth rate this year.
Given the Chinese government's tendency to present a rosier economic picture to satisfy political goals, most China watchers believe that Li's statement was an about-face, and that the actual economic situation is much worse.
Researchers at the Brookings Institute estimated that China had inflated its GDP growth rate by close to 2 percent every year between 2008-2016. So in reality, China hasn't seen a 6 percent growth rate for nearly a decade (someone should send a copy of this to Premier Li). Moreover, the actual size of the Chinese economy was an estimated $10.9 trillion, 18 percent lower  than the officially stated $13.4 trillion, as of 2018.

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President Donald Trump's trade tariffs struck the Chinese economy when it was already declining and the effects have been devastating. The tariffs have not only reduced imports from China , but also caused foreign companies to shift their supply chain out of China. Beijing had hoped that  its stimulus measures, including tax cuts and easy credits to local governments and big businesses, would reduce or even eliminate  anticipated negative impacts on the Chinese economy. However, the latest data are a wakeup call that those stimulus measures were not sufficient enough to absorb the blow from the trade war.
Beijing can't count on Chinese consumers to stimulate economic growth either because of rising pork prices. Pork is a staple food for Chinese households. Since the trade war began, China had imposed higher tariffs on agricultural products from the U.S., with the tariff on pork rising from 12 to 62 percent. China hoped that causing pain to U.S. farmers would pressure Trump to back off his trade war. That strategy failed spectacularly in two ways. First, while U.S. farmers are suffering and are critical of the trade war, their support for the president is growing. Bloomberg reports that, "about 67 percent of farmers are saying that they’d back Trump for reelection in 2020."

President Trump's trade tariffs struck the Chinese economy when it was already declining and the effects have been devastating.

Second, China's own hog industry is experiencing the worst African swine fever in decades. The government has been criticized for its ineffective measures to stamp out the epidemic. It is estimated that China could lose up to 50 percent of its pig population by the end of 2019. Pork prices have spiked by more than 46 percent so far, and some experts predict the price increase may be over 80 percent by next year. This spike has pushed prices for other types of meat higher as well, increasing inflation pressure to the overall economy. This has hindered Chinese consumers' willingness and capacity to spend in other areas. Given the pivotal role pork plays in the Chinese diet, the country could potentially experience social unrest if the pork price continues to skyrocket while the supply continues to be sparse.
China exempted U.S. farm products, including soybean and pork, from additional tariffs, effective Sept. 17. This announcement was seen widely as a goodwill gesture ahead of the October trade talks between U.S. and China. But this seems to be a desperate, self-serving measure, because all the other pork exporting countries combined couldn't fill China's supply shortage. Simply put, China has a need of pork from the U.S., and its suspension from additional tariffs is, in essence, a tactical and indirect acknowledgment that it won’t be able to sustain this trade fight for much longer.
If China had hoped that it could simply wait until Trump loses the 2020 presidential election to get out of the trade war, it has to think again. At the most recent Democrat presidential debate, not a single candidate proposed to remove the trade tariffs Trump imposed on China. So even if Trump loses, China likely would not get someone friendlier in the White House.
It also doesn't help that, after Iran attacked Saudi oil facilities this month, oil prices spiked and may stay elevated. Nathaniel Taplin of the Wall Street Journal called China “the biggest loser of rising oil prices,” because it is the world's largest crude oil importer. A combination of higher oil and food prices will not only increase pressure on an already slowing Chinese economy, but will also make some of China's go-to stimulus measures, such as the devaluation of its currency, more risky. Ironically, China has poured billions into the Iranian economy through China's "One Road One Belt" initiative. Chairman Xi probably didn't expect the Iranian regime to pay him back this way.
The U.S. and China will resume trade talks in October and China will continue to act tough in these negotiations, but its rhetoric won't hide the fact that China has already lost the trade war.

AOC Dumb Cartoons

Rep. Perry: ‘smoke’ to Biden reports

Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden works the grill during the Polk County Democrats Steak Fry, Saturday, Sept. 21, 2019, in Des Moines, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

A GOP lawmaker said as the nation’s top diplomat, the president has broad discretion regarding his conversations with foreign leaders.
Representative Scott Perry said Saturday, reports focus on the president’s effort to curb alleged corruption, not the alleged corruption itself.
He adds, with congressional oversight and aides on the line, he doesn’t believe the president would act inappropriately.
However, the Pennsylvania lawmaker said there’s at least “smoke” when it comes to accusations of self-dealing involving the Bidens that warrant a further look.
He even said Ukraine was offering the U.S. information about the incident during the prior administration, but wasn’t accepted.

Democrats blast latest Trump crisis. But what will they do?

WASHINGTON (AP) — A whistleblower’s complaint over President Donald Trump’s interactions with a foreign leader is testing the political and practical power Democrats can use against a Republican in the White House who so brazenly ignores protocol and presidential norms.

Democrats were unanimous in their condemnation of Trump for going to extraordinary lengths to tear down a chief political rival by asking the new leader of Ukraine to investigate the son of former Vice President Joe Biden. But even as calls for impeachment amplified — Elizabeth Warren blasted Congress as “complicit” in Trump’s transgressions — there were no signs that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would move quickly to try to remove the president.

Allies of Biden, the early front-runner in the Democratic presidential primary, seized on the developments to portray him as the candidate Trump least wants to face next fall.

But the controversy could just as easily revive interest in the business activities of Biden’s son, which would do little to further his campaign. Taken together, the developments bear a striking resemblance to the tumult of the 2016 campaign, in which Trump was accused of enlisting a foreign power to help him win an election.

The president on Saturday denied any wrongdoing, and his most vocal allies and critics were energized. Political operatives in both parties suggested that for many increasingly numb to a constant sense of crisis, the fresh explosion of political drama may not seem so alarming.

One thing is becoming clear: Trump is more than willing to cast aside norms to gain a political advantage.

Jesse Ferguson, a Democratic strategist and former top aide to Hillary Clinton, said the country “has to be ready for the president to try to weaponize the government against them in a way we’ve never seen before in American history.”

The president on Saturday embraced the parallels to the 2016 campaign and predicted he would prevail again in 2020.

Trump said the latest allegations from a government whistleblower are “just as ridiculous as the others,” branding it “the Ukraine Witch Hunt” — a nod to former special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe, which he mocked as a “witch hunt.”

“Will fail again!” Trump tweeted.

The complaint from the intelligence community whistleblower is based on a series of events, including what sources now say is Trump’s conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. The conversation happened on July 25, just a day after Mueller wrapped up his own work by testifying on Capitol Hill.

Trump urged Zelenskiy to probe the activities of Biden’s son Hunter, who had worked for a Ukrainian gas company, according to a person who was briefed on the call.

For legal scholars and ethics watchdogs, the interaction between Trump and the foreign leader is seen as nothing less than a pressure campaign that cuts to the core of the nation’s public corruption and bribery laws. It came as the White House was holding up $250 million in military aid for Ukraine. Even if there was no quid-pro-quo from the president, the conversation could be seen by legal experts as improper.

“It appears that the president might have used his official powers — in particular, perhaps the threat of withholding a quarter-billion dollars in military aid — to leverage a foreign government into helping him defeat a potential political opponent in the United States,” wrote lawyer George T. Conway III, who is married to a top Trump adviser, and Neal Katayal, a Georgetown University law professor and former acting solicitor general, in an op-ed in The Washington Post. “If Trump did that, it would be the ultimate impeachable act.”

Campaigning in Iowa on Saturday, Joe Biden said the president “deserves to be investigated,” but he stopped short of calling for impeachment.

“He’s using the abuse of power and every element of the presidency to try to do something to smear me,” Biden told reporters.

Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., said Trump’s actions show “Joe Biden is correctly perceived by President Trump as the greatest threat to his re-election.”

It’s less clear whether the situation may ultimately hurt Biden, who has claimed the moral high ground in his 2020 campaign. When speaking about his experience as vice president, Biden often says he’s most proud of the lack of scandal during his eight years in the Obama White House. Trump’s allies hope that the focus on Biden’s involvement in Ukraine may begin to chip away at his squeaky clean image.

“The longer we talk about what the Bidens did in Ukraine, the better,” said Barry Bennett, a former Trump campaign adviser, who dismissed those who believe Trump will pay a political price for the latest controversy.

The questions about Hunter Biden have circulated for years, particularly in conservative circles, after he was hired in 2014 by Burisma Holdings, whose founder had been a political ally of Russia-friendly former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. At the time questions were raised about whether the Ukrainian firm was seeking to gain influence with the Obama administration through its employment of Joe Biden’s son.

This year, Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph Giuliani revived interest in the issue and said he reached out directly to the Ukrainian government.

Joe Biden said he’s never spoken to his son about his overseas business dealings. Hunter Biden has denied the claims that he used his influence with his father to aid Burisma, saying the criticism is false and stoked by far-right political critics.

While Sen. Warren and other Democrats say there’s no choice but to start impeachment proceedings, other Democrats have been reluctant to launch a process they say could scare away more moderate and centrist voters, especially for lawmakers in Congress.

Pelosi showed no signs of moving off her position that Congress must continue to investigate the administration and not start impeachment proceedings unless the American public demands it. Instead, she said that Trump faces “repercussions” if the whistleblower’s allegations prove true and she said it’s time to change the law to make sure future presidents can be indicted for wrongdoing.

Democratic strategist Jefrey Pollock, who was a pollster for former presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand, suggested that the latest explosive allegations against the Republican president would have little impact on the broader 2020 debate.

“To date, no scandal has seemed to impact Donald Trump on its own,” Pollock said. “And the fact that this one involves a political rival I suspect is no different.”

__

Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe and Tom Beaumont in Des Moines, Iowa, and Stephen Braun in Washington contributed to this report.

Carol Roth: Stop scaring our kids – the world is NOT about to end and we are NOT all about to die

NYC students recently cut class for a climate change strike as more and more young people want to bring attention to the issue.

Children today should be enjoying their youth. They arguably live in the greatest time ever, with unparalleled access to information, connectivity around the globe, advances in health care and tremendous opportunity. But instead of embracing optimism, the adults in their lives are filling them with fear.
In the last few weeks, from town halls on climate change to “climate justice” marches, I have seen scores of children – some teens, some squarely of elementary school-age – proclaim their anxiety about the world ending.
Depending on the source, children are being told that if we don’t act right now to solve one particular “crisis” or another, we will all be dead in anywhere from 18 months to 12 years. That’s not a message of hope and optimism that kids should be embracing.

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While it is great for children to learn to be responsible global citizens and take care of our planet, there’s a positive and responsible way to communicate that.
I recall in my own childhood celebrating Earth Day, where we raised money to help plant more trees (something that actually helps the environment, by the way) and learned about recycling, all without having the living daylights scared out of us.
Adults can deliver the message of taking care of the planet and have an impact doing so with positive language and outcomes instead of nihilistic ones.
While I am not a psychologist (and I don’t play one on TV, either), I do believe that for kids, who are developing mentally, having this fear communicated to them during this critical time of their lives is abusive. Worse, it is done by parents, schools, the media and politicians alike. Everyone needs to immediately get a grip.
I remember when adults acted like adults instead of fear-mongers. Back in the 80s, when network television ran the nuclear war movie “The Day After,” there were warnings that it wasn’t appropriate for children and our parents wouldn’t let us watch it.
Now, the adults who are supposed to be shielding kids from unlikely doomsday scenarios are forcing those beliefs upon them and using the kids as political pawns.
It’s not just the climate change fear. I am not the first one to note that school shooter drills are also an unnecessary form of fear theater that does far more harm than good.
While any school shooting is one too many and more needs to be done to ensure school safety, planting the security threat in kids’ heads with practice drills surely creates needless trauma with no evidence of better outcomes.
Negativity is all around us, from mainstream media to social media. It’s not healthy for us to be constantly consuming a negative information diet, particularly when the general outlook for life is so robust. We need more gratitude towards the abundance, opportunities and advancements that surround us.
As an adult, if you want to mire yourself in pessimism, that’s your choice. But please, leave the kids out of it.

AOC calls out Dems for caution on Trump impeachment, signaling possible renewed feud with Pelosi

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has apparently reached a boiling point over moderate House Democrats’ caution regarding the prospect of impeaching President Trump.
The go-slow approach is personified by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, with whom Ocasio-Cortez has had an often contentious relationship since the freshman lawmaker arrived in Washington just eight months ago.
The New York Democrat told her more than 5 million Twitter followers late Saturday that the Democrats’ “refusal” to seek the removal of the president was a “bigger national scandal” than what she alleged was the president’s “lawbreaking behavior.”
Calls for impeachment have grown louder from some Democrats in the wake of last week’s news that a purported “whistleblower” had expressed concern about a phone call said to have taken place between President Trump and the leader of Ukraine, in which Trump allegedly sought information about 2020 Democratic frontrunner Joe Biden, whose son Hunter Biden had business dealings in Ukraine.
Soon after Ocasio-Cortez posted her Saturday comment, she received a response from James Fallows, the noted author, journalist and former speechwriter for President Jimmy Carter, who asserted that Ocasio-Cortez was overstating the case in criticizing members of her own party for exercising restraint regarding impeachment.
“IMO, this is ‘false equivalence’ of its own sort,” Fallows wrote. “What Trump is doing remains objectively the biggest threat, scandal, and problem.
“Second-ranking: the silent acquiescence of the GOP Senate.
“Then: it’s time for the House to act.”
Ocasio Cortez doubled down in her response to Fallows.
“It is one thing for a sitting president to break the law,” she wrote. “It’s another to let him.
“The integrity of our democracy isn’t threatened when a president breaks the law. It’s threatened when we do nothing about it.
“The GOP’s silence & refusal to act shouldn’t be a surprise. Ours is.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s online outburst followed remarks earlier in the day by fellow progressive and 2020 presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who took a veiled shot at Pelosi, the standard-bearer among Democrats of a “wait and see” approach regarding potential action against the president.
"Donald Trump did everything he could to obstruct justice,” Warren said at an event in Iowa. “I read all 448 pages [of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the Russia investigation] and when I got to the end, I called for the impeachment of Donald Trump.
“Congress failed to act,” Warren added, “and now Donald Trump has shown that he believes he is above the law. He has solicited another foreign government to attack our election system.”
Just over a week ago, Pelosi had lashed out at reporters when they repeatedly asked her about impeachment at a news conference.
“Impeachment is a very divisive measure,” a clearly frustrated Pelosi said, “but if we have to go there, we have to go there and we can't go there unless we have the facts. And we’ll follow the facts and follow the obstruction the president is making ... and make a decision when we’re ready.
“That’s the only question, that’s all I’m going to say about this subject, and there's nothing different from one day to the next,” she added.
The struggles experienced by the 79-year-old Pelosi, a three-decade member of Congress from California, have included frequent clashes with Ocasio-Cortez, 29, and other progressive – and aggressive – young lawmakers who were swept into office during last year’s midterm elections. The progressives’ push for far-left policies, including Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal, as well as their vocal opposition to President Trump, have been at odds with the moderates’ typically lower-key approach to getting things done.
Pelosi and Ocasio-Cortez appeared to reach a truce of sorts after a closed-door meeting in July, in which both sought to ease infighting that some Democrats viewed as counterproductive. The meeting was soon followed by the departure of Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti.
But with Ocasio-Cortez’s Twitter posts that began late Saturday, it appears the truce with Pelosi – at least regarding impeachment – may be over.
Fox News’ Sam Dorman and Adam Shaw contributed to this story.

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