Thread by @DawsonSField

Hahaha!
While the Dems try to demand the Ukraine docs for the Senate, the White House OMB releases redacted versions of them in the middle of the night as FOIA.

Chumming the waters to lure the sharks into a trap.
#ButNothingsHappening

https://twitter.com/weareoversight/status/1219852782133444609

We know how bad Schiff is at quoting a script. The Dems are far worse at "fill in the blank" games. They fill in their assumptions & presumptions! Then have no way of seeing what is coming at them!

Like this little tidbit, the 2019 Defense Appropriations Act authorizes the US (the Executive Branch) to take any military equipment mend for Ukraine that has not been provided to them yet to be given to DOD upon notification to the Congressional defense committees. #checkmate?

Yep, so blind they missed the relevance of the small bit of information that they did get! Too busy imagining what is under the black highlighter to understand what was printed in plain language from the legislation written by Congress!

Looked up the 2019 appropriations act to see what was outside the quote above.
Congress did not appropriate $200M to Ukrainian military aid. They appropriated an amount not to exceed $200M, so how much below $200M is 'obstructing' the will of Congress? Opinions may vary...

I'm not a defense appropriations expert, but I would think that legally, appropriating to Ukraine an amount up to $200M authorizes the executive branch to spend between $0 & $200M at it's discretion. So what can the DOD spend that money on if it chooses to not give it to Ukraine?

So what does Congress authorize the Executive Branch to do with those defense stocks?
Well the Sec. Def. has to tell Congress how undelivered Ukrainian aid was spent as "designated by the Congress" on the Global War on Terror.

So the argument that Congress appropriated the money to Ukraine & that it was an abuse of power for the President to withhold it is completely false. Congress appropriated up to $200M for Ukraine with authorization to use it for the Global War on Terrorism instead.
#Checkmate

Did anyone in Congress bother to read the Defense Appropriations bill before they signed it?
Unlike OMB did they bother to check the law before they claimed it was broken?
How does the Congressional Budget Office claim this was illegal look now?
#ImpeachmentTrial

Here is a link to the source documents. Mostly redacted under FOIA, but more than enough bait to lure in the Democrats. With a few flashing red warning signs that would make an honest Democrat realize that this is a trap!
americanoversight.org/omb-releases-u…

"ment" not "mend"

I shouldn't thread before coffee! Too many typos!

Stealing @Avery1776's cat's meme today!

This leaves me wondering, I imagine this type of language is in every defense appropriations bill.

Did the Obama Admin spend every dollar appropriated to Ukrainian defense?

Or did some of those dollars get diverted to Overseas Contingency Operations?

Maybe to pay for Syria?

What happens if the defense of @realDonaldTrump requires revealing that Obama diverted funds from Ukraine or another ally to pay jihadists to conduct regime change in Syria or Libya or one of the other #RegimeChangeDeluxe locations?

@realDonaldTrump The Congressional Research Service conveniently published research on this topic on 9/6/19, 5 days before the funds were released to Ukraine.
So before the explosion of coverage. Let's see what it says!
fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec…

Since 1997, DOD has operated with an Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) piggy bank to move money around to meet operational needs.
DOD is allowed to reprogram this money within OCO programs by SECDEF notifying the leadership of the defense committees.

The SECDEF can also take money out of OCO accounts with the sign off of the 4 leaders of the defense committees. There are caps, the SECDEF (working for the POTUS) can reprogram $4B out of OCO to normal budget & $2B between OCO programs for the years. State Dept can also do this.

Now, if you have been told that funds assigned to these programs must be spent by a certain date or the law is violated, then that is incorrect. The contingency funds have no date by which they are required to be spent. Designed that way as contingencies are unpredictable.

They do have a form of expiration date, funds unspent by a certain date must be re-appropriated by Congress to be spent after a date specified by Congress. So essentially it is a slush fund to spend on contingencies, not a normal appropriation.

It also means that the law did not require the administration to spend the money by 9/30/19. The law prohibited the President from spending it AFTER 9/30/19 without Congressional approval.

It is why there is a rush at the end of every federal fiscal year: 'use it or lose it'

So lets look at some of the contingencies covered by this OCO slush fund:

The SECDEF can transfer $2B a year between these programs w notification to Congress. He can also move another $4B with approval of the committee chairs.

So if the DOD has $2B sitting around unspent in their MRAP Fund that could serve a higher priority, it can be moved to one of the other slush funds.
The limits (or lack of limits) have changed over time & are not detailed. But this OCO Trust Fund has existed since 1997= Big $$$

It looks like from 1997-2015, some money was just put into the OCOTF & the SECDEF decided what program to put it into as the contingencies arose. Starting in FY2016, all of the money went into specific funds but could be reprogrammed as needed.

There are additional programs within the realm of OCOTF. But these raise my alert bells!
So it would be perfectly legal for SECDEF on orders of the President & OMB to transfer up $2B into or out of these kinds of programs to pay for the highest priority contingencies.

I suspect these 4 slush funds are going to feature prominently in investigations on how US foreign aid dollars were being used to fund terrorists, crooks, oligarchs & NGOs that were using our tax dollars against us...
Even to interfere in the election. #ButNothingsHappening

Just a hypothetical here, but what if US security assistance to Ukraine included giving them a cyberwarfare capability to fight back against the Russians?
Only to see them use those cyberwarfare tools to interfere in the 2016 election?
c4isrnet.com/home/2017/03/3…