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The White House has released a memo of Donald Trump’s phone call with the president of Ukraine. It sparked an official impeachment inquiry after he vowed yesterday to release a fully declassified and unredacted transcript of the controversial call. The 5-page document was made on the day of the 25 July phone call by note-takers in the White House situation room as the president spoke to Volodymyr Zelensky. It begins with Trump congratulating the new Ukrainian president on his election victory. Trump then reminded Zelensky the U.S spends a lot of effort and a lot of time aiding his country. It was reported that Trump ordered his staff to withhold 400 million U.S dollars in aid to Ukraine just days before the phone call, prior to the memorandum’s release.

Trump spoke with Zelensky the day after former special counsel Robert Mueller spoke in public testimony regarding his report on Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump said, “I will say that we do a lot for Ukraine. We spend a lot of effort and a lot of time. Much more than the European countries are doing and they should be helping you more than they are. Germany does almost nothing for you. All they do is talk and I think it’s something that should really ask them about”. He added, “A lot of the European countries are the same way so I think it’s something you want to look at but the United States has been very very good to Ukraine”.

He also said, “I wouldn’t say that it’s reciprocal necessarily because things are happening that are not good but the United States has been very very good to Ukraine”. He begins by immediately asking for an investigation surrounding the origins of the Russia investigation that clouded the first years of his presidency. Trump said, “Whatever you can do, it’s very important that you do it if that’s possible”. He then urged the president of Ukraine to look into an alleged issue involving his 2020 rival Joe Biden. Trump added, “The other thing, there’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that. So whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. It sounds horrible to me”.