Former national security adviser John Bolton could be the firsthand witness the Democrats need, according to the New York Times. This qualifier makes Bolton’s testimony relevant to the Senate’s impeachment trial. But in terms of impact, this changes very little.
The New York Times alleges that in Bolton’s new memoir, he says Trump directly tied the Ukrainian military aid freeze to an impending investigation into the Bidens. If this is true, Bolton could be the missing link between the two established facts in the case against Trump. The first fact is that more than $391 million in security assistance to Ukraine was withheld and later released. The White House has denied that the freeze had anything to do with the second fact — that Trump wanted and expected Ukraine to investigate 2016 election meddling and Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.
If the aid freeze and the investigation were indeed connected, Democrats would have the quid pro quo they need. But this isn’t a bombshell. The House already built its case on the assumption that Trump did deliberately engage in a quid pro quo. Bolton’s affirmation will not persuade the GOP to abandon its line of defense and admit presidential wrongdoing on a level deserving of removal from office.
What’s more: If Democrats suspected Bolton could strengthen their case, they should have subpoenaed him during the House’s impeachment investigation and persisted in their efforts to compel his testimony. It’s worth noting that Bolton’s position has changed — when the House launched its investigation, Bolton said he would testify only if the courts found it necessary. Now, Bolton says he will testify with or without a court order.
Still, the Democrats should have fulfilled their legal responsibility to investigate every single component of this case. Instead, they presented the Senate with two half-baked articles of impeachment, claiming the nature of the allegations against Trump was too urgent to do the thing right. If time was such a concern, then why did House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wait to deliver the articles of impeachment to the Senate for nearly two months?
Bolton’s missing link makes it all the more clear that the Democratic Party severely fumbled this case by rushing it through the House. Even if Bolton is permitted to testify during the impeachment trial, it’s unlikely his testimony will change the ultimate results. At this point, Senate Republicans are too dug in to reconsider, and the American public is too zoned out to notice.
The most Bolton’s testimony could do is slightly change the vote count. Centrist Sens. Susan Collins and Mitt Romney have already suggested they’ll vote to call Bolton to the Senate, and given their past criticism of Trump’s dealings with Ukraine, it’s likely they could be convinced to vote to convict.
But Democrats need more than two Republican votes to remove Trump from office. The Constitution requires a two-thirds supermajority, which means the Democrats need 66 votes to succeed. Right now, they’re having a tough time securing 51 votes in favor of additional witness testimony.
Bolton’s testimony is important to those who still care about nuance. Unfortunately, both political parties abandoned that long ago. Republicans will almost certainly vote to acquit, Democrats will cry foul play, and Bolton will sell a lot of books. And soon enough, it will be November.
