• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Watchdog: WH violated law by freezng Ukraine aid

Status
Not open for further replies.
JacksinPA

JacksinPA

Supporting Member
DP Veteran
Monthly Donator
Joined
Dec 3, 2017
Messages
26,290
Reaction score
16,771
Gender
Male
Political Leaning
Progressive
Watchdog: White House violated law in freezing Ukraine aid

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House violated federal law in withholding security assistance to Ukraine, an action at the center of President Donald Trump’s impeachment, a federal watchdog agency said Thursday.

The Government Accountability Office said in a report that the Office of Management and Budget broke the law in holding up the aid, which Congress passed less than a year ago, saying “the President is not vested with the power to ignore or amend any such duly enacted law.”
==================================================
It's sickening that Trump will likely get a pass on being a tyrant.
 
JacksinPA said:
Watchdog: White House violated law in freezing Ukraine aid

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House violated federal law in withholding security assistance to Ukraine, an action at the center of President Donald Trump’s impeachment, a federal watchdog agency said Thursday.

The Government Accountability Office said in a report that the Office of Management and Budget broke the law in holding up the aid, which Congress passed less than a year ago, saying “the President is not vested with the power to ignore or amend any such duly enacted law.”
==================================================
It's sickening that Trump will likely get a pass on being a tyrant.
Click to expand...



The GAO appears to be wrong.

OMB says there was 'legal consensus' on withholding Ukraine aid

Rachel Semmel, a spokesperson for the Office of Management and Budget, said Monday that the administration followed "routine practices and procedures" in putting a hold on hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine.

“To be clear, there was a legal consensus at every step of the way that the money could be withheld in order to conduct the policy review," Semmel said. "OMB works closely with agencies on executing the budget. Routine practices and procedures were followed.”
Click to expand...

OMB says there was '''legal consensus''' on withholding Ukraine aid
 
I love that republicans including Rush and Sean scramed that Obama was a dirty Chicago politician and now we have a real Chicago like mafia boss in the White House and they will defend him to their deaths.

Trump's supporters have no shame.
 
JacksinPA said:
Watchdog: White House violated law in freezing Ukraine aid

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House violated federal law in withholding security assistance to Ukraine, an action at the center of President Donald Trump’s impeachment, a federal watchdog agency said Thursday.

The Government Accountability Office said in a report that the Office of Management and Budget broke the law in holding up the aid, which Congress passed less than a year ago, saying “the President is not vested with the power to ignore or amend any such duly enacted law.”
==================================================
It's sickening that Trump will likely get a pass on being a tyrant.
Click to expand...

Even though the Gov't Accountability office is non-partisan.. watch the trumpee's scream about them being all "angry democrats" or the "deep state"!
 
Obama got a pass, too. Yawn.
 
Piglet said:
"She."

And, she said it long before the GAO came up with his story.
Click to expand...


There's no such thing as US Hunter Biden policy.
 
Time to inject some fact and reasoning into this whole GOA nothingburger.

Snippets from this article: GAO: Trump violated the Impoundment Control Act in hold on Ukraine aid

Read the whole report, however, and one finds the glaring issue with this conclusion, which is that the administration didn’t have an obligation to release the funds on any specific date in the fiscal year. All they needed to do was to make sure the money got spent by the last day of the budget cycle.

In this case, the money did get spent within the budget year. The aid may not have gone out as quickly as Congress intended or as the administration first planned, but as long as it got spent, there’s no violation. And contra the GAO’s take, delays for non-programmatic reasons don’t violate the ICA as long as it doesn’t go past the same fiscal year as the appropriation.

Under the agreement of both the executive and legislative branches in 1974, this is a civil matter, not a “high crime or misdemeanor.” It’s an absurdly picayune basis for removing an elected president, the head of a co-equal branch of government.

Even if it did, though, Congress proposed the remedy for such failures within the ICA itself, as I noted last month when the issue first got raised. The remedy is to sue the administration to force it to spend the funds, not to criminally prosecute the president over it…
Click to expand...

So...don't count on the House Managers raising this issue during the impeachment trial. The only place you are going to hear about it is from the Trump-hating media. It'll soon be forgotten.
 
Cardinal said:
Hot Air. :lol:
Click to expand...

If you don't have a factual or reasoned dispute with anything that was said in the article...

You are dismissed. (see my sig)
 
Cardinal said:
Hot Air. :lol:
Click to expand...

The problem with relying on sites like "Hot Air" is they are ignorant of the actual laws... The funds WERE NOT spent within the fiscal year. This is trivial to determine with lots of publicly available records. Magically saying "the funds are released" does not satisfy the law...
 
Mycroft said:
If you don't have a factual or reasoned dispute with anything that was said in the article...

You are dismissed. (see my sig)
Click to expand...

You were dismissed when you posted an article from Hot Air. I thought that was implied. (see my sig).
 
BlueTex said:
The problem with relying on sites like "Hot Air" is they are ignorant of the actual laws... The funds WERE NOT spent within the fiscal year. This is trivial to determine with lots of publicly available records. Magically saying "the funds are released" does not satisfy the law...
Click to expand...

The problem with sites like "Hot Air" is that they exist in an alternate reality that bears little resemblance to our own.
 
Cardinal said:
The problem with sites like "Hot Air" is that they exist in an alternate reality that bears little resemblance to our own.
Click to expand...

And that people take the author of the article, Ed Morrissey, as some kind of expert in federal appropriations law....

Ed Morrissey - Wikipedia
 
prometeus said:
Because a blog says so?
Click to expand...

Now, now... I don't know if you had a chance to check on Mr. Morrissey's credentials but he is a graduate of Cerritos High School and a former call center manager...
 
BlueTex said:
Now, now... I don't know if you had a chance to check on Mr. Morrissey's credentials but he is a graduate of Cerritos High School and a former call center manager...
Click to expand...
Well then, thanks for the heads up. This new information changes everything and like the old saying goes the more things change, the more they stay the same...
 
Piglet said:
The GAO appears to be wrong.
OMB says there was '''legal consensus''' on withholding Ukraine aid
Click to expand...

The discussion in these email etc seem to indicate an exceptionally narrow reading of what there could've been consensus on.

Exclusive: Unredacted Ukraine Documents Reveal Extent of Pentagon’s Legal Concerns - Just Security

Lots and lots and lots concerns about running a foul of their legal obligations if OMB & WH continued on their path.
People worried about CYA over the delays.
 
Simon W. Moon said:
Do you think it's reasonable for the OMB to provide testimony about this matter?

It seems to be somewhat relevant to the matter at hand.
Click to expand...

If called, sure. But, this was released long before the GAO comment so the GAO comment is, for all intents and purposes, null and void.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom