Republican Challenger Joe Walsh Calls Donald Trump A ‘Traitor’ For Asking China, Ukraine To Investigate Bidens

Donald Trump’s primary challenger slammed the president as a “traitor” for publicly calling on Ukraine and China to investigate Joe Biden.

Joe Walsh, the former Republican congressman who has announced a primary challenge to Trump for the party’s 2020 nomination, spoke out this week after Trump publicly asked for the countries to launch investigations into Joe Biden and his son, Hunter. Trump is facing an impeachment inquiry after a whistleblower complaint outlined actions that Trump took to pressure Ukraine into investigating his political opponent, and this week made public calls for other countries to look into what are reported to be unfounded allegations of wrongdoing by the Bidens.

Speaking to Jake Tapper on CNN’s State of the Union, Walsh called out Trump’s actions.

“There’s enough we know now to vote to impeach this President. He stood on the White House lawn this week, Jake, and told two additional foreign governments to interfere in our election,” Walsh said. “That alone is impeachable. This is a strong term I’m going to use. But I’m going to say it on purpose: Donald Trump is a traitor.”

While Trump’s actions have led to an impeachment inquiry launched by Democrats in Congress, a growing number of Republicans are also speaking out against the president. Utah Senator Mitt Romney, who has been a frequent critic of Trump in the past, said that Trump’s apparent calls for foreign meddling in the 2020 presidential election are “brazen and unprecedented.”

Romney was one of the first Republicans to express concern when the initial whistleblower complaint was released, outlining Trump’s reported plot to withhold military aid in an attempt to pressure Ukraine into investigating his political opponent.

Romney also pushed back against Trump’s claims that he is simply trying to root out corruption, saying that Trump has only seemed to target his potential opponent in the 2020 presidential election.

“When the only American citizen President Trump singles out for China’s investigation is his political opponent in the midst of the Democratic nomination process, it strains credulity to suggest that it is anything other than politically motivated,” Romney tweeted.

Former Arizona Senator Jeff Flake, another Republican who has frequently criticized Trump, said he believes that there are many Republicans who could turn on Trump as well. Responding to a report that as many as 30 Senate Republicans could vote to remove Trump from office if the vote were to be held in secret, Flake said in an appearance on Fox News that he believed the number is actually closer to 35.