Trump amps up attacks on whistleblower as some Republicans call for more strategic response to impea

Trump amps up attacks on whistleblower as some Republicans call for more strategic response to impeachment

Trump: 'We're trying to find out about a whistleblower'

President Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Sept. 30 that his call with the president of Ukraine was "perfect." (The Washington Post)

By Toluse Olorunnipa and Ashley Parker

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-amps-up-attacks-on-whistleblower-as-some-republicans-call-for-more-strategic-response-to-impeachment/2019/09/30/4ef4b5b8-e38e-11e9-b403-f738899982d2_story.html

"SNIP......

President Trump continued to escalate his scorched-earth campaign against a whistleblower who accused him of pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political rivals, even as new evidence emerged Monday that he and his administration are urging other governments to provide assistance to a related Justice Department inquiry that has been pushed by the president.

Trump said he was trying to “find out about” the whistleblower Monday, the latest move in an increasingly frenetic counterassault targeting the anonymous intelligence officer and top Democrats leading the impeachment inquiry. The comments came as his allies struggled to coalesce around a clear strategy to respond to a fast-moving and quickly mounting threat to his presidency.

The ad hoc counter-impeachment effort developing around Trump underscores the risk the president faces as Democratic leaders plan to launch a probe aimed at proving that Trump abused his presidential powers in asking Ukraine’s president to investigate former vice president Joe Biden, a leading 2020 Democratic presidential contender, and his family, as well as an unsubstantiated theory that Ukrainians worked with Democrats to interfere in the 2016 election.

The White House has not yet set up anything resembling a “war room” to coordinate its response, and officials spent Monday in meetings trying to determine a path forward. The president’s outside legal team played down the threat of impeachment and dismissed the need for the kind of coordinated war-room-based effort that President Bill Clinton relied on 20 years ago.

......SNIP"