Hannity Defends Trump Ukraine Call: ‘Do Us a Favor’ Is Just One of His ‘Go-To Phrases’

Sean Hannity came to President Donald Trump‘s defense tonight on Ukraine, insisting there was no quid pro quo and dismissing the portion of the call transcript wherein Trump said “do us a favor.”

Hannity has started referring to the impeachment inquiry as a “Soviet-style attempted impeachment coup,” and he brought up the transcript to ask “Where is the crime here?”

In the transcript released by the White House, President Trump says “I would like you to do us a favor though” before bringing up Crowdstrike and “the server.”

Hannity said there’s nothing wrong with Trump “getting to the bottom of the DNC colluding with interference in the eighth 2016 elections to help Hillary.”

But in addition to arguing there was nothing wrong with “do us a favor” because there was no quid pro quo, Hannity also argued the remark is fine because Trump says it all the time, like a verbal tic:

“And let’s be clear, the term ‘do us a favor.’ Well, we all have go-to phrases. ‘You know,’ I say, ‘you know,’ a lot. The president uses them all the time. A verbal aside.”

He proceeded to show clips of Trump saying “she just did me a beautiful favor,” “I said, fellows, do me a favor,” “you’re doing us a favor,” “we did them a favor but they’re doing us a favor,” and “I said would you do me a favor.”

“Like big league for the president,” Hannity continued. “The term ‘do me a favor,’ that’s a phrase the president uses we’ve identified hundreds of times.”

You can watch above, via Fox News.