NYT: Ukraine President Was Prepared To Do Trump’s Bidding In Fear Of Losing Aid | Hardball | MSNBC

In an explosive report, The New York Times reveals that President Zelensky was so desperate that he was prepared to deliver a message that he would investigate the Bidens in an interview scheduled with CNN. Unwilling to lose the military aid he badly needed, Zelensky decided to bow to Trump's demands. Aired on 11/8/19.
» Subscribe to MSNBC:

MSNBC delivers breaking news, in-depth analysis of politics headlines, as well as commentary and informed perspectives. Find video clips and segments from The Rachel Maddow Show, Morning Joe, Meet the Press Daily, The Beat with Ari Melber, Deadline: White House with Nicolle Wallace, Hardball, All In, Last Word, 11th Hour, and more.

Connect with MSNBC Online
Visit msnbc.com:
Subscribe to MSNBC Newsletter:
Find MSNBC on Facebook:
Follow MSNBC on Twitter:
Follow MSNBC on Instagram:

NYT: Ukraine President Was Prepared To Do Trump’s Bidding In Fear Of Losing Aid | Hardball | MSNBC

65 comments

  1. Whackjob 45 has corrupted every dept of American Government for his own personal enrichment …Time for accountability & exposing of the lies in PUBLIC!

    1. I’m looking forward to PUBLIC HEARINGS & hope the Republicans are READY. After all they demandeded it. Remember ?

  2. Rudy is getting all lawyered up. He has 3 on retainer so far. He has largely disappeared from view, probably at attorneys’ insistance.

    1. Liberalovsky Fredo Moscowitch Have a downvote L.F. Moscow-witch. Even your handle tells us all we need to know about you.

    2. Poor rudy will lose all the money he extorted from the Ukraines to his army of lawyers. Gosh I feel sad for him. /S

    3. @Bruce Boring 13K times? You idiots have entered into the deepest realm of fantasy. I hope you are able to find your way back with your tears in 2020 when Trump is victorious.

    4. @JOE actually it is over 14000 times now your master has been busy if you dont know he lies every time he opens his mouth then you are either willfully ignorant or incredibly stupid

  3. It truly is amazing how Republicans continue to stand with the President, I guess Trump was right about shooting somebody on 5th Avenue.

    1. Why is ti amazing that they ( republicans ) continue to stand with the president ? They are republicans aren’t they ?

    2. @El Tigre I’m a conservative recent ex repub and wont stand for anyone as corrupt as dump. The republican party is over, something I’m very angry about.

  4. That’s exactly the kind of behavior one would expect from someone who isn’t “feeling any pressure”.

  5. I have Ukrainian friends & feel bad for the Ukrainian President & the Ukrainian people. Russia has been plotting against the Ukraine for a long time & without America in its corner its future doesn’t look good. Russia will never be able to put the freed Ukrainian Genie back into the gulag & back under its jackboot.

    1. Since the RNC first changed the plank on the Republicans Ukrainian position… this has been in the works! and it has cost the lives of an estimated 70 some Ukrainian soldiers, on the line with Russian invaders, because the aid was withheld… Zelenskiy was desperate, people were dying, and it shows that he was about to cave and announce an investigation into the false conspiracy theory for the benefit of the Trump 2020… Impeachment is too good… people, our allies, have died for a political party!

    2. @Laurence Mallick This was a clever strategy by putin. If Ukraine caved, it would have been a signal to the rest of the world that Ukraine remains corrupt and cannot be trusted. In fact guliani had been working towards that goal for some time. Zelensky needs to find a way to navigate the treacherous political waters without compromising the countries integrity.

  6. Black mail am not surprised, It wasn’t his first time, He’s a straight up Criminal, And a pathetic liar ! 🤔

    1. These certainly are politically motivated investigations.
      The dems used alphabet agencies and foreign powers to spy on, smear, and impeach Trump, and interfere in the 2016 election.
      This needs to be investigated.
      I am 60 years old and “impeachment is imminent” is the headline of the longest news cycle I have ever seen, since before Trump was inaugurated.

    2. @David Primeau MAYBE BECAUSE HE’S ALWAYS BREAKING THE LAW, THEY LET HIM GET AWAY WITH ONE CRIME, AND HE GOES AND COMMIT ANOTHER, THEY CAN’T LET HIM DESTROY AMERICA, WITH HIS ON GOING CRIME SPREES, PUTTING OUR NATIONAL SECURITY IN DANGER, AND OUR DEMOCRACY ! 🤔

  7. This headline is only news to stupid people. Mind you, all those Republicans who said, “But, but, but Zelensky said everything was fine! No pressure!” weren’t being stupid; they were just being dishonest. They knew full well why he needed to not rock the boat, and so did anyone with a brain.

    1. The msm just keeps recycling the same crap, the entire American political system is corrupt and rotten. Staggering how cowardly and crawling so many Senators are in the US, it’s stomach churning to watch them crawl to a pos like Trump. No wonder the US hasn’t won a war since WW2 if that’s all the spine Americans have.

    2. wolfman02 … Zelensky and his people were vulnerable.
      Ukraine soldiers were being killed.
      Trump shook Zelensky down because there was an asymmetry of power between Trump and Zelensky.
      And because America has given the president too much power.

    3. @Denyze – That’s exactly right, and there’s more. As you say, Zelensky needed that aid, and he knew he wasn’t gonna get it if he angered Trump. And Zelensky KNOWS how Trump reacts to people who cross him. NOW, people might argue, “Well, hold on. What if Zelensky admitted that Trump pressured him? Wouldn’t Trump be gone, leaving Zelensky to deal with someone else?” And the answer is NO! First off, even if Trump was gone, who would be next? Trump’s boy Pence? Bust most importantly, it would NOT necessarily mean Trump would be gone (or at least any time soon). We know how this works and so does Zelensky — it would take forever, and then the Republicans would likely protect Trump. And in the meantime, Trump would do everything he could to screw him.

  8. The aid was available in February. It wasn’t released until September…two days after they were caught…

    1. @newmove Right, which is why I’d like to treat both equally and nullify their politicization of our non-partisan intelligence nad military communities. If you don’t start going after red flags, that’s how the fraud sneaks in.

      It’s like how Trump likes to whine about being “spied on” by the Obama administration. The part he always manages to leave out, is how he was throwing up red flags by actively seeking a land deal with the Kremlin in Moscow during the election. Of course you’re going to be watched, for national security reasons. He’d complain if it was anybody else doing the exact same thing…

      If the Senate doesn’t flip 20 republicans to remove him, hopefully the Impeachment moniker the House provides will sway low information voters to go blue, and this whole “Politicize and Attack Everything!” fiasco will be behind us. Personally, I don’t like to call Trump supporters names, because many of them are just stuck in their bubble of misinformation that Facebook and YouTube provides for them. There’s plenty of liberals that are the same way (although they’re a bit less crude). I’ve lived in large liberal cities and very red rural areas, and can say that neither side is more or less intelligent or mean than the other (for the most part).

    2. @JOE Are you implying that Trump is a saint? I’ve yet to see a single shred of evidence that Shokin was investigating Burisma that doesn’t come from an anonymous source on a far right publication. I’ve already said I’m fine with Biden being investigated, and wish he would drop from the race. No one wants a career politician that profers status quo policy. Obama and Trump were elected because people wanted change. Yang or Sanders are the only ones who will offer that (albeit by different means).

      I’ve known Trump was a crooked businessman long before he became president. He should have been in jail for multiple cases of tax evasion, fraud, illegally constructing on someone else’s property, and money laundering since the 80’s. His “charity” and “school” were both found to be fraudulent and shut down. You’ll never win an argument in trying to give Trump a moral high ground.

  9. The President’s 2016 campaign chairman is in prison. His former lawyer is in prison. His longest political aide’s federal trial started today. His current lawyer is under multiple federal investigations.

    1. @Shirley Brown
      The Trump Trade policy goes like this
      1. On Monday announce that you intent to burn your house down on Saturday
      2. On Thursday, announce you have decided not to burn your house down
      3. On Friday, release a press statement Congratulating yourself for saving the house

  10. God Bless the whistleblower for stopping that.

    Trump’s bullying has gone on far enough.
    Time to suspend this schoolyard-menace once and for all.

    1. It’s more than his bullying, it’s his ability to attract and encourage his brand of corruption.
      Zelensky was definitely smelling what Trump was cooking, and looking to be besties. Ukraine’s new president was way too comfortable with the game to be good for his country.

    2. @4c1dr3fl3x Not buying that Zelinski is corrupt, but the part about Trump spreading a brand of corruption is pretty obvious to the whole world. You wrote it here in very good and clear terms.

  11. I’m an independent who has voted all over the map in the past, but one thing is absolutely certain for me going forward, and that is that I’ll never vote for any Republican for ANY office as long as there is ANY taint of the Trump cult in the Republican Party. In fact, I probably won’t ever vote Republican again for anyone, anywhere, any time. Period. These turkeys gave us Trump and I’m not going to forget that any time soon.

    1. @Wado Waleli How about one? Then you would have to vote for someone you actually knew something about. Not just walk into the booth and flip the D lever.

    2. @Box truck driver Hey, I’m not saying I WANT to do that, but I consider it very foul play when the Republicans totally corrupt their party, abandon all long-time legitimate principles, then play party politics, expecting their “base” to bail them out when, in reality, they sold their base out. I’m an independent and I won’t accept that B.S. and you shouldn’t, either, just because you’re a registered Republican. That’s the whole problem with “party politics” and that’s exactly why I’m an an independent. Republicans won’t get ANY votes from me for probably a long, long time.

    3. @Box truck driver Well, that’s a point for you, BTD! Hopefully, you won’t vote like one, either, as long as there’s any hint of the Trump cult in D.C. Take care.

    4. @Box truck driver Please do vote, BTD. I respect the fact that you want to honor what our founding fathers did. I do, too, but the best way to do that is to exercise the muscle of the democratic process, and the first thing we all have to do to do that is to vote. I know sometimes (okay, most times, LOL) it’s between the lesser of two evils, but it’s still essential in order for us to keep our democracy, which is part of our basic freedoms, vital and safe from the tyranny our forefathers were most concerned about. It’s true we go through some pretty lousy cycles, but our basic freedoms are still better than suffering endlessly from the effects of one tyranny replacing another. Take care, and be assured that in the future we will see more representative government if we persist in our demand for it, and I think a lesson from these times is that we clean up the mess we have unwittingly created.

    1. andreas pedersen The GOP, once upon a time, a very long time ago, served America. Fact check In History.

    2. Yes they are and under trump no less. We can not let that happen. I have nightmares about the implications of a trump for life presidency.

    3. The repubs are truly desperate and know they are history. Like any cornered animal they are fighting back without the restraints or morals, ethics or future building, they’re just trying to survive. Its over for them.

    4. @newmove Hopefully the Democrats will fight better than they ever have before. They need to continue to hire lawyers to do the questioning of witnesses.

      Hopefully the American people that watch and listen will contact their Republicans Senators and give them what for. Letting them know that their political futures are at stake.

    5. @Rebeccah Mclaughlin I certainly agree about dems hiring lawyers. I’ve long given up the idea of hope and turned that into action and will remain active till this is all over. I say that as a recent ex member of the repubs.

  12. Will the GOP have the profiles in courage to do the right thing and impeach tainted President Trump AKA individual number one in the House and convict him in the Senate for his crimes. If they fail to do so then they will be establishing precedent that any President is above the law and can commit any crime while in office no matter what. Now that will be one heck of a legacy to have. Bribery, fraud, extortion, witness intimidation, perjury, destruction of evidence. That does not include an administration that stands with white supremacy, bigotry, racism, promotes anti-semitism, misogyny, homophobia, fear and hatred. Truly something our children and grand children can look up,to. (Sarcasm included)

    1. Wouldn’t it be something if you had enough of those senators in your pocket (blackmail) that the vote goes exactly that way.
      Then, if the king was being blacked mailed, you would be running things. This is what I see happening. It is the only thing that makes sense.

  13. So the whistle blower rolled out just before the time ran out for the Ukraine to give Dementia 45 what he wanted? Nice.

  14. The internet is a great tool unless it’s used by tools.
    Right wing religious conspiracy nuts will latch on to anything that they think makes them look as though they are enlightened and spout it like it’s the gospel. Most of these people are not enlightened enough to discern the truth from their blue pill existence.

  15. Nix the Quid pro quo speak. Call it what we know and understand best, bribery and extortion. We know these to be nefarious and ill-begotten. Some mafioso business!

  16. This 2020 vote every repukes out, vote trumpty to spend the rest of his life in Siberia!!! He loves Russia so much!!! 🎃🐔💩🤪😠

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.