In a radio interview this morning, U.S. Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO) said he’ll offer an amendment striking impeachment language that uses the term debunked or discredited to describe the theory that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 U.S. election.
Buck said he’s going to do this because, “It’s not just a group of right wing nuts that are saying, ‘Oh, the Ukraine interfered!’ There are a lot of people who believe that the Ukraine took steps.”
As a factual matter, it is only a group of right-wingers who still adhere to the debunked theory that Ukraine meddled in the U.S. election.
U.S. intelligence agencies do not support Buck’s view.
Buck acknowledged that when Trump asked to investigate the Bidens, Trump got “off track.” But Buck didn’t say what consquences, if any, Trump should face for his request to investigate a political rival.
Here’s Buck’s exchange on KOA 85-AM’s Colorado’s Morning News today:
CO-HOST MARTY LENZ: Congressman, respectfully, is it appropriate to carry conspiracy theories? I mean, you’re countering what FBI director Chris Wray and his department has said when it comes to Ukraine and election meddling. I think you’ve been very fair and reasonable in many of these things. But but that’s a bridge too far, because you know that’s not the case but you, Ted Cruz, other officials keep conflating and muddying the waters with Ukraine and Russia when it comes to election meddling.
KEN BUCK: And I got to tell you, I absolutely disagree with you. There is a Politico article dated January 11th, 2017–.
LENZ: It’s an op-ed. It’s an op-ed, though. It’s an op-ed in a paper. It’s like saying, “I drive, so I’m a driver in NASCAR or Indy 500.” That’s the kind of the level you’re meddling there.
BUCK: No! The Politico article — and other articles, frankly — have outlined statements by the foreign minister of the Ukraine and other issues. No one is suggesting that Russia didn’t interfere. They absolutely interfered. But the Ukraine also took a very strong position in favor of Hillary Clinton and opposed to Donald Trump. Many of their senior officials — and all the president was asking — well, one of the things the president was asking for in his conversation, was for the president of the Ukraine to do an investigation as to the 2016 election. That’s a legitimate request. When they start talking about the Bidens, it gets off track. But that request is not a conspiracy theory. And I just disagree with my Democrat friends on this. And I will have a chance tomorrow to offer an amendment and we will have that discussion.
ZESBAUGH: Oh! Tell us about your memo. What is it going to say?
BUCK: My amendment is going to strike some language in the articles — or move to strike some language in the articles of impeachment– that refer to the Ukraine interference in the election as discredited, debunked, whatever the term is that they use in the articles of impeachment. I’m going to move to strike that. I think it’s a sentence out of that because it just isn’t. It’s not just a group of right wing nuts that are saying, “Oh, the Ukraine interfered!” There are a lot of people who believe that the Ukraine took steps.
LENZ: Well, believing is one thing. But when your own intel — when the FBI — says otherwise, that’s problematic, because then you are politicizing in many ways what what our intel does for the country. We may not see eye to eye on this, but the facts being are what they are, it’s just — it’s concerning for me that to some degree in the reasonable of this that we can’t agree on on a similar set of facts, even when our own intelligence agency says Ukraine did not meddle.
BUCK:And I again, I disagree with you on that. And I — you know what? You have prompted me; I am going to write an op-ed on this, frankly, because –.
LENZ: Ha! [facetiously] You’re meddling, Congressman, but–.
BUCK:I am not meddling. I am–.
ZESBAUGH: He’s joking.
BUCK: I think it is important to point out that the president’s request to the Ukrainian — that President Trump’s request to the Ukrainian president at the beginning of that phone conversation was a legitimate request.
