Trump Attacks Pelosi's District As 'Dangerous' And 'Disgusting Slum'
President Donald Trump on Friday attacked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s district as a “dangerous & disgusting Slum” minutes before lawmakers resumed impeachment hearings with a new witness in the Ukraine scandal.
In a pair of morning tweets, Trump railed against the probe, arguing that the California Democrat “should be home cleaning up” San Francisco “where even the filth pouring into the Pacific Ocean is rapidly becoming an environmental hazard.”
......filth pouring into the Pacific Ocean is rapidly becoming an environmental hazard, is getting NOTHING DONE. She is a Do Nothing Democrat as Speaker, and will hopefully not be in that position very long. Approve USMCA, which has been sitting on her desk for months!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 15, 2019
Shortly after his tweets were posted, former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch began testifying before the House Intelligence Committee on her May firing. Her ouster occurred just before Trump pressed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to assist with an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, based on unfounded corruption accusations. Trump’s request, documented in a rough transcript of his July 25 call with Zelensky, is at the heart of the impeachment inquiry.
Yovanovitch told legislators she was dismissed following a “smear campaign against me” orchestrated by Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and promulgated by the right-wing media.
That included Giuliani’s unsubstantiated allegation that Yovanovitch gave a “do not prosecute” list to Ukrainian officials in an effort to protect Americans. She has denied the claim, and testified that conversely, it was Ukrainians who viewed her anti-corruption work as a threat and wanted her gone.
Trump’s attempt to fling insults at Pelosi mirror a similar strategy he took in July with the late Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), who chaired the House Oversight Committee ― one of several congressional panels helming the impeachment inquiry.
In a racist Twitter rant against the lawmaker, who was often Trump’s foe, the president called Cummings’ majority-Black Baltimore district a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.”
Pelosi came to Cummings’ defense with a denunciation of Trump’s remarks, praising the congressman as a civil rights champion and a “deeply valued colleague.”
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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
