Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, undercut on Thursday President Trump’s long-maintained position that there was no quid pro quo with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during their phone call in July. Mulvaney’s admission stunned White House officials, and Trump himself, who later authorized a second statement which tried to walk back Mulvaney’s damaging comments.
When The New York Times reported Wednesday that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff had been made aware of the now-public whistleblower complaint before it was received by the Intelligence Community Inspector General, conservative media and allies of President Trump seized the opportunity to discredit the ongoing impeachment inquiry and allege coordination.
President Trump’s reelection campaign released a memo suggesting that TV producers should think twice about booking guests who previously spoke of evidence of collusion between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia.
“Inauthentic” Russian-linked Facebook accounts and pages were found to have bought ~3,000 ads on the social media site.