Trump Posts Rambling, Angry Letter To Pelosi Protesting Impeachment

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

This Wednesday, December 18, the two articles of impeachment that the House Judiciary Committee approved against President Donald Trump — one for abuse of power, the other for obstruction of Congress — are expected to come up for a full vote in the U.S. House of Representatives. If the Democrat-controlled House votes to indict Trump on those articles (which is likely), they would go to the U.S. Senate for consideration. Trump, the day before the expected House vote, sent a long-winded, rambling letter to House Speaker Pelosi and railed against House Democrats for pursuing impeachment.

Here are some of the most absurd things Trump said to Pelosi in his December 17 letter.

1. Trump claimed his July 25 conversation with Zelensky was ‘totally innocent’

Pelosi and other House Democrats have been stressing that Trump crossed the line when he tried to bully Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky into investigating former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden. But Trump, in his letter, told Pelosi, “I had a totally innocent conversation with the president of Ukraine…. I said to President Zelensky, ‘I would like you to do us a favor, though’…. I said do us a favor, not me, and our country, not a campaign.”

2. Trump claimed he was putting America’s interests first with Zelensky:

“Every time I talk with a foreign leader,” Trump told Pelosi, “I put America’s interests first, just as I did with President Zelensky.”

3. Trump argued that impeachment is Democratic revenge for 2016 election, and he exaggerated his election results:

For months, Pelosi resisted impeachment — even after special counsel Robert Mueller’s report was made public. But Trump claims in his letter to Pelosi that she is seeking revenge on him for Hillary Clinton’s lost in the 2016 presidential race.

“Everyone, you included, knows what is really happening,” Trump told Pelosi. “Your chosen candidate lost the election in 2016, in an Electoral College landslide, 306-227, and you and your party have never recovered from this defeat. You have developed a full-fledged case of what many in the media call Trump Derangement Syndrome, and sadly, you will never get over it.”

But Trump overstated the election results: it was 304-227.

4. Trump claimed his treatment is worse than those accused during the Salem Witch Trials:

In the letter, Trump compared impeachment to the Salem witch trials, writing, “more due process was afforded to those accused in the Salem Witch Trials.”

As HuffPost’s Jennifer Bendery wrote, 20 people were killed in the Salem witch trials, a fate that the president will surely escape.

An ancestor of two women killed during the Salem witch trials even reached out to Bendery, insisting the president knows “nothing of patriotism.”

5. Trump accuses Pelosi of lying about praying:

Pelosi said at a recent press conference that she prays for Trump. But Trump, in his letter, asserted that she is lying about praying for him, and said she is “offending Americans of faith” by doing so.