What’s more is that this is a pattern for Trump. The Post reports:

President Trump, who has alleged that Hunter Biden got the Chinese to put $1.5 billion into an investment fund, said during private remarks this week that he raised the matter with a U.S. executive who has served as his intermediary on trade talks with Beijing.

He seemed to be soliciting help to get the Chinese to do what Ukraine was being asked to do. (“‘I was with the head of Blackstone . . . Steve Schwarzman,’ Trump said, according to a video of the remarks obtained by The Washington Post. After alleging that Hunter Biden got $1.5 billion from the Chinese, Trump said he asked Schwarzman, ‘Steve, is that possible?’ Trump said Schwarzman asked, ‘Who got that?’ and Trump responded, ‘Biden’s son.’”) Schwarzman reportedly did nothing after Trump’s remarks — but just as in the Ukraine call, Trump seems to intimate that Schwarzman should be looking for helpful information from China about Biden. Schwarzman denies having this conversation.

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Even more startling, The Post reports that Trump condoned Russia’s interference in 2016, implicitly giving Vladimir Putin a pass to do it again in 2020:

President Trump told two senior Russian officials in a 2017 Oval Office meeting that he was unconcerned about Moscow’s interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election because the United States did the same in other countries, an assertion that prompted alarmed White House officials to limit access to the remarks to an unusually small number of people, according to three former officials with knowledge of the matter. The comments, which have not been previously reported, were part of a now-infamous meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, in which Trump revealed highly classified information that exposed a source of intelligence on the Islamic State. He also said during the meeting that firing FBI Director James B. Comey the previous day had relieved “great pressure” on him.

It is gobsmacking that not only does Trump deliver valuable intelligence, he also signals to Russia no harm, no foul about interfering with the election. (One wonders why in the world then-national security adviser H.R. McMaster did not report this outrageous conduct.)

Minority Leader Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) put out a statement Saturday. “If true, the reports that President Trump may have told close associates of Putin that he didn’t mind Russian interference in the US elections are extremely harmful to both our national security and the integrity of our elections,” Schumer declared. “It’s one of the most disturbing things we’ve learned yet.” He demanded the administration “immediately provide the Congressional intelligence committees with all the records of that meeting so we can get to the bottom of it.”

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As a preliminary matter, Trump should be very afraid. The revelation of the Oval Office meeting suggests it is open season on leaking evidence of many problematic conversations, records of which were stashed in a code-word-classified computer system. We can only imagine what else is going to come out and from what sources within Trump’s administration.

The reason for a quick impeachment and trial is that we are in the middle of the very election Trump is attempting to subvert with foreign help. Trump has and will continue to betray our democracy, giving foreign leaders a role in picking our leaders to further his own political power, unless he is stopped. Impeachment is not about punishment but removal from office to protect our Constitution. And there could be no better example of a threat to the Constitution than Trump’s preference for foreign assistance.

The narrative of betrayal is the constant that connects Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation, which identified multiple instances in which the Trump team solicited help from Russia (e.g., Trump’s public invitation to get Hillary Clinton’s emails and the infamous Trump Tower meeting in June 2016) and the Ukraine scandal, in which Trump has gone fishing for help in Ukraine. (That Trump used taxpayer money for leverage is just another outlandish violation of his oath, but not directly relevant to the underlying story of betrayal.)

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I cannot figure out why Democrats, particularly former vice president Joe Biden, have not started to call out “Traitorous Trump” for his habit of sabotaging U.S. elections for his own benefit. Trump betrayed voters, betrayed the Constitution and betrayed democracy. Now he is doing it as president in violation of his oath of office and in the course of another election. The candidates seem more concerned about sticking to their health-care stump speeches than in seizing the moment to project moral leadership.

Republicans for the Rule of Law has already targeted key Republican senators, urging them at the very least to say Trump’s conduct was wrong. Among those targeted is Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine):

Democratic presidential candidates all should be decrying Trump’s Ukraine gambit, and yet Beto O’Rourke is the only one to say flat-out that Trump is assaulting not just Biden but all of the candidates, as well as democracy itself. The former Texas congressman tweeted about Trump’s scurrilous ad attempting to shift attention from his impeachable conduct to Biden and his son, “Trump’s ad about Joe Biden is a disgrace. Every one of us needs to call this exactly what it is: propaganda. Doing anything less is playing right into his hands.” Where are the rest of them? If the plan is to sit back and let Biden twist in the wind, they are making a grave political and moral mistake.

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As for Trump, if left in office, he will continue this behavior, continue to subvert our democracy and invite Americans to question the legitimacy of the election outcome in 2020. This is precisely what the framers had in mind when they devised the impeachment power. Trump’s commission of crimes (extortion, campaign finance violations, obstruction of justice, witness intimidation) is jaw-dropping and deserving of prosecution after he leaves office. But impeachment is designed to prevent threats to our democracy, whether actions are legal or not. We have a repeat offender, a president who habitually assaults the Constitution. How could we possibly leave him in office?