The Trump Impeachment Inquiry: Latest Updates

The Trump administration has started to circle the wagons by formally refusing to cooperate with investigations led by Democrats that could pave the way to impeachment. But the White House’s strategy could prove risky, especially if Democrats are successful in characterizing it as an effort to obstruct justice.

In a letter sent on Tuesday evening, the top lawyer for the White House said that the president and his administration will not participate in ongoing investigations run by House Democratic leaders. The letter also dismissed Democrats’ efforts to gather information about Mr. Trump’s dealings with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine as partisan and illegitimate.

The standoff sets up a clash between two branches of government, and forces Democrats to consider how and whether to move forward with impeachment.

Mr. Trump on Wednesday continued to dismiss the whistle-blower’s claims at the heart of the impeachment investigation, saying on Twitter that he was owed an apology by the whistle-blower.

— Zach Montague

Read more: White House Declares War on Impeachment Inquiry, Claiming Effort to Undo Trump’s Election

As The Times’s Nicholas Fandos reported on Tuesday, a White House official who listened to Mr. Trump’s July phone call with Ukraine’s leader described it as “crazy,” “frightening,” and “completely lacking in substance related to national security,” according to a memo written by the whistle-blower at the center of the Ukraine scandal who spoke to the official.

The White House official was “visibly shaken by what had transpired,” the whistle-blower, a C.I.A. officer, wrote in his memo, one day after Mr. Trump pressured Mr. Zelensky.

A palpable sense of concern had already taken hold among at least some in the White House that the call had veered well outside the bounds of traditional diplomacy, the officer wrote.

“The official stated that there was already a conversation underway with White House lawyers about how to handle the discussion because, in the official’s view, the president had clearly committed a criminal act by urging a foreign power to investigate a U.S. person for the purposes of advancing his own re-election bid in 2020,” the C.I.A. officer wrote.

Read more: Trump’s Ukraine Call Was ‘Crazy’ and ‘Frightening,’ Official Told Whistle-Blower

  • President Trump repeatedly pressured President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine to investigate people and issues of political concern to Mr. Trump, including former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Here’s a timeline of events since January.

  • A C.I.A. officer who was once detailed to the White House filed a whistle-blower complaint on Mr. Trump’s interactions with Mr. Zelensky. Read the complaint.

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