Trump called Pelosi to ask if they could 'work something out' hours before launch of impeachment inquiry
President Donald Trump reportedly asked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi if they could "work something out" just hours before she announced a formal impeachment investigation.
Trump is said to have made the request in a phone call with Pelosi on Tuesday, enquiring if they could "do something about this whistleblower complaint." The president was referring to fresh allegations against him that he pressured the Ukrainian president to look for dirt on his Democratic political rival Joe Biden.
Pelosi, however, shot down Trump's plea, according to NBC News political correspondent Heidi Przybyla, who said she had seen a transcript of the conversation.
Przybyla, while speaking to MSNBC's 'The Beat with Ari Melber', said: "The president actually said to Nancy Pelosi: ‘Hey, can we do something about this whistleblower complaint? Can we work something out?"
And Pelosi responded to the request, saying: "Yes, you can tell your people to obey the law." Przybyla added: "She quickly swatted that down and made it clear it is full steam ahead.”
Pelosi, later on Tuesday, announced that Democrats were going ahead with an official impeachment inquiry. The House speaker, in a statement, said that Trump had crossed a line by allegedly asking Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate discredited corruption claims about Biden’s son Hunter. The move comes after Pelosi had resisted calls of an impeachment investigation into Trump from some members of her party for months. “The president must be held accountable. No one is above the law," Pelosi said before announcing the impeachment probe.
A report on Monday stated that Trump's conversation with Zelensky in July came days after he had personally ordered his staff to withhold nearly $400m (£320m) in military aid to Ukraine. Subsequently, the White House authorized the release of a “fully declassified and unredacted” transcript of his call to the Ukrainian leader. The transcript will be released publicly on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Trump admitted bringing up Biden, the frontrunner of the Democratic 2020 election, during the phonecall, however, he insisted that their conversation was "totally appropriate."
The US president's discussion about Biden came to light after an intelligence service whistleblower lodged a formal complaint about it.