Trump says whistleblower complaint relates to ‘totally appropriate conversation’

Donald Trump has dismissed whistleblower allegations that he asked Ukraine’s new president to investigate Joe Biden and his son in return for more US military support as a “ridiculous story”.

Speaking alongside his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison in the Oval Office, Mr Trump told reporters his conversations with foreign leaders were always “totally appropriate”.

He added: “It was actually a beautiful conversation.”

In a notably hostile exchange with reporters, the president maintained that he would be vindicated, saying he was “22 and 0” with regard to stories about his corruption.

“It’s a ridiculous story. It’s a partisan whistleblower. He shouldn’t even have information. I’ve had conversations with many leaders. They’re always appropriate,” he said.

“We don’t know the identity of the whistleblower, we just know that it was a partisan person, meaning they come from a different party,” Mr Trump said, after telling reporters that he “fights so hard for this country”.

When asked again if he knew anything about the whistleblower, the president, visibly annoyed, fired back: “You’re supposed to be the media, figure it out.”

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“It doesn’t matter what I discussed, someone ought to look into Joe Biden’s billions of dollars and you wouldn’t look into that because he’s a Democrat,” Mr Trump added, referring to the former vice president’s comments on Ukraine.

He did not deny that he spoke to the official about the Mr Biden.

The president’s response comes after his political rival Hillary Clinton accused him of seeking help from a foreign government to increase his election chances – a potential rerun of the Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

According to the Washington Post, the complaint involved communications with a foreign leader and a ‘promise’ that Trump made, which was so alarming that a US intelligence official who had worked at the White House went to the inspector general of the intelligence community.

Mr Trump spoke with the Ukrainian president a little over two weeks before the complaint was filed. That conversation, via phone, was already under investigation by House Democrats, who are determining whether Mr Trump and Rudy Guiliani, the president’s lawyer, were attempting to manipulate the Ukrainian government into assisting in the president’s re-election campaign.

Before the whistleblower’s complaint to the inspector general was revealed, Democrats had asked for a full transcript of this phone call, as well as a list of its participants.

On Thursday, the inspector general testified about the whistleblower’s complaint to members of the House Intelligence Committee behind closed doors.

Representative Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, threatened Thursday to sue the administration if intelligence officials did not share the complaint, filed with the intelligence community’s inspector general. He called acting director of national intelligence Joseph Maguire’s refusal to share the briefing with Congress “unprecedented.”

“We cannot get an answer to the question about whether the White House is also involved in preventing this information from coming to Congress,” Mr Schiff said. “We’re determined to do everything we can to determine what this urgent concern is to make sure that the national security is protected.

Mr Schiff continued, saying that some “is trying to manipulate the system to keep information about an urgent matter from the Congress. ... There certainly are a lot of indications that it was someone at a higher pay grade than the director of national intelligence.”

Representative Jim Himes, who serves on the House Intelligence Committee, told CNN on Friday that he wasn’t surprised if Mr Trump was indeed having “inappropriate” conversation with a foreign leader, but was concerned by the news that the complaint involved a promise. “What would make it corrupt or illegal,” he said, is that promise.

On Thursday, senate majority leader Mitch McConnell agreed to add $250m to a budget for election security. The move was a surprise, as the Republican senator had previously appeared to refuse any further allocations towards security in the upcoming elections.

It’s unclear if the week’s activity had anything to do with the senator’s decision. In a statement, he framed the budget. In a statement regarding the new budget, he framed the Trump administration as heroes of election security, saying they’ve “made enormous strides to help states secure their elections without giving Washington new power to push the states around.”

Critics and activists say the $250m is not enough to adequately prepare for the incoming threats.

In his second press conference on Friday, the president was joined by Australian prime minister Scott Morrison, and did not mention or take questions regarding the whistleblower.

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