Acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney's comments about President Donald Trump's dealings with Ukraine could not have been clearer, The Washington Post said in an editorial.
"President Trump may be formally refusing to cooperate with a congressional impeachment inquiry, but on Thursday his acting chief of staff revealed all that House investigators need to know in order to determine whether Mr. Trump abused his oath of office," the Post said.
"Yes, Mick Mulvaney said, Mr. Trump withheld military aid from Ukraine, money that had been appropriated by Congress and was desperately needed to resist Russian aggression, in order to induce the government of Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate a conspiracy theory about the hacking of the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 election.
"In other words, the president was using U.S. aid as leverage to advance his personal political agenda."
The Post noted that hours later Mulvaney tried to walk back his remarks and said "there was absolutely no quid pro quo."
"But his earlier statement could not have been clearer," the newspaper said.
The Post maintained it was "quid pro quo."
"It was corrupt," the newspaper maintained. "And his chief of staff confessed it, in the cynical expectation that Republicans would not hold Mr. Trump accountable."