Watch the Trump Impeachment Inquiries and Ukraine's Roles in 2020

There's more to the story than what's being told in the media these days regarding President Donald Trump and Ukraine. The fact is that with its new president, Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine has been in need of assistance in terms of its ongoing conflict with Russia and has been turning to the Trump Administration for that aid. President Trump's threat of withholding aid to force the Ukrainians to open an inquiry against former Vice President Joe Biden and his family is a severe abuse of power that warrants the opening of impeachment proceedings against him and some of his administration.

Now the Trump Administration (and the Republican Party at-large) is going to spin the Democratic House's actions as a treasonous coup. Do yourselves a favor, don't buy into it. Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats know what they're doing, as Speaker Pelosi made clear that impeachment proceedings would only start when the situation warranted doing so and there was sufficient indisputable evidence to back it up such action. That situation has just come, and now we're seeing House Democrats taking action.

Even though President Trump is relishing an impeachment fight as a campaign booster, he doesn't seem to understand how severely he overstepped his authority. And while he might show no fear and/or panic as an outward façade, it's guaranteed that both House and Senate Republicans are panicking while scrambling to do damage control for him. If you listen closely to congressional Republicans' rhetoric, you'll hear how their lies are fooling no one.

More evidence will start to trickle out into the limelight, and already there is movement on the part of Attorney General William Barr to obstruct the Congressional inquiry by not turning over subpoenaed documents. Take this a non-surprise/non-shock as the Trump Administration has been the most opaque presidency since Richard Nixon. Additionally, keep an eye on what the Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, does with regards to subpoenas. President Trump will likely order him to ignore the subpoenas by threatening the security of his job.

Another head to watch is Vice President Mike Pence. Vice President Pence might also be subpoenaed for any knowledge that he might have regarding President Trump's conversation with President Zelensky in their phone call. If he also starts withholding his personal knowledge that may be grounds for impeachment of the Vice President, too.

For me personally, what I find the most infuriating about this is the fact that President Trump's actions are really not a first by any stretch. Trump's actions follow a pattern by Republican presidential candidates and incumbent Republican presidents going back to Richard Nixon in 1968. So in a sense it's not surprising/shocking for me to see President Trump enticing Ukraine to do his opposition research for him.

As for Ukraine's role, the fact is that they're trying to find a way to get into both Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin's good graces. However, by potentially agreeing to do Trump's political research for him has also undermined American sovereignty in the process. Ukraine has its problems, especially a severe corruption problem in the post-Soviet era. Boosting Trump's election prospects is another example of such corruption. This is a problem that I don't think President Zelensky seems to realize he's likely exacerbating.

As I said before, this isn't the first time a Republican presidential candidate was seen seeking another nation's help getting into, or being re-elected into, office. This scenario has happpened with just about every Republican presidential campaigns since 1968 with three exceptions: Gerald Ford, George H.W. Bush, and Bob Dole. It's not like the Democrats are squeaky clean in this regard, too, as they're clearly not. However, they've only done this twice: Bill Clinton in 1996 and his wife Hillary in 2016. But that doesn't take away from the point that it's a common campaign tactic by the Republicans; only that this time they got irrefutably caught. Democrats have had a hard time trying to prove that this was the case, and now they have the undeniable evidence to show that their assertions about the Trump campaign colluding with an outside power in the 2020 presidential race were, in fact, true.