JOHN BOLTON, YOU’RE UP

| 4:43 pm EDT October 30, 2019
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When John Bolton’s longtime sidekick Charles Kupperman asked the courts to rule on whether he should comply with a House subpoena to testify in the impeachment inquiry, or comply with a Trump White House order not to appear, Palmer Report explained that it appeared Bolton was pulling the strings. The Kupperman ruling will effectively “force” Bolton to testify as well, meaning Bolton can maintain credibility with the far-right by saying that he had no choice but to testify against Trump and take him down.

In any case, we’re about to find out if that’s what John Bolton is really up to, because House Democrats just asked him to come in and testify next week. Conveniently enough, this allows just enough time for the Kupperman court ruling to play out before Bolton is supposed to show up. Oh, and did we mention that Bolton is using the same attorney who’s handling Kupperman’s court case?

So where does this get us? If John Bolton’s master plan really is to get the courts to order him to testify in the House impeachment inquiry, and he does show up and fully cooperate, he should end up being – by far – the most useful witness to date. Not only can he corroborate what his former underlings like Fiona Hill and Colonel Vindman have said, Bolton has also spent plenty of time in close quarters with Trump, and can provide far deeper insight into whatever Trump has said about his Ukraine scandal motives.

In addition, everyone knows that John Bolton is a far-right warmonger who hates the Democrats as much as the Democrats hate him. There’s no way Donald Trump and his allies can paint Bolton as being part of some kind of partisan liberal conspiracy against Trump. You can expect Bolton to try to use his testimony to set up huge sales for his upcoming tell-all book, but that’s neither here nor there. All that matters is if Bolton is willing to give the kind of testimony that’ll take Trump down.