Democrats predicted Trump would make aid to states contingent upon political demands. Experts say he’s proving them right

During President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, Democrats warned that he could tie aid to individual states in the U.S. to political demands — not unlike tying military aid to Ukraine to an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden. And a tweet posted by Trump on Twitter on Wednesday is being cited by reporters as proof .

On Wednesday, Trump tweeted that he would be meeting with Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the White House — and he demanded that New York State cease all investigations of him. The president posted, “I’m seeing Governor Cuomo today at The White House. He must understand that National Security far exceeds politics. New York must stop all of its unnecessary lawsuits & harassment, start cleaning itself up, and lowering taxes.”

Kyle Cheney, after seeing that tweet, wrote, “Trump suggests his treatment of New York is related to their lawsuits aimed at his businesses/personal conduct.” And in a separate tweet, Cheney posted, “This is actually the precise scenario that House Democrats warned of during the impeachment trial: What if Trump conditioned federal aid to a state on a personal political demand?”

Sam Stein also found Trump’s tweet to be troubling, writing, “A bit wild to see it out in the open here. But Trump is conditioning aid to a state based on whether it is pursuing lawsuits against him. It’s all been sanctioned now by the acquittal I suppose. But this is the thing House Dems drew analogies to in their senate presentation.”

Attorney John Wilson weighed in as well, tweeting from his @SD49ersPadres account, “This is exactly the hypothetical” that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff  “offered about conditioning aid to, say, Texas after a flood. Republicans rejected it and have now empowered the very definition of abusive lawlessness.”

Another attorney, Peter Seregienko, @petersergienko, tweeted, “Hasn’t this effectively been Republican policy for years? Trump just makes it overt and transparent, which is actually helpful because it forces non-Republicans to confront it.” And Twitter user Renee Wilmeth, @feedmedrinkme, warned, “There’s nothing to stop him from going after states like California or cities he deems ‘sanctuary’ cities.”