November 20, 2019
(Bloomberg) — The House Intelligence Committee is hearing from Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, on the fourth day of public testimony in the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump.
Sondland is testifying Wednesday morning. In the afternoon, Laura Cooper, the Defense Department’s top official on Russia and Ukraine, and David Hale, the under secretary of State for political affairs, will appear before the committee.
Here are the latest developments:
Envoy Says He Told Pence Aid Tied to Probe (9:41 a.m.)
Sondland will say he expressed his concerns about the delay in U.S. aid to Vice President Mike Pence before they met with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Warsaw on Sept. 1.
“I mentioned to Vice President Pence before the meetings with the Ukrainians that I had concerns that the delay in aid had become tied to the issue of investigations,” Sondland will say, according to his opening statement. “I recall mentioning that before the Zelenskiy meeting.“
During the meeting, Zelenskiy raised the issue of security aid with Pence, and the vice president said he would speak to Trump about it, Sondland will say.
Sondland will also say that he pulled Zelenskiy aide Andriy Yermak aside and told him that Sondland believed U.S. aid wouldn’t resume until Ukraine took action on the public statement sought by the U.S.
Sondland also will say, “I really regret that the Ukrainians were placed in that predicament, but I do not regret doing what I could to try to break the logjam and to solve the problem.”
Sondland Confirms Account of Trump Call (9:27 a.m.)
Sondland confirms an account from other witnesses that he called Trump from a restaurant in Kyiv on July 26 but he said he didn’t remember key details. He said he didn’t recall later discussing Joe Biden and his son with David Holmes, the embassy staffer who described the incident.
“I have no reason to doubt their accounts,” Sondland will say in his opening statement. “I would have been more surprised if President Trump had not mentioned investigations, particularly given what we were hearing from Mr. Giuliani about the president’s concerns. However, I have no recollection of discussing Vice President Biden or his son on that call or after the call ended.”
Holmes testified that Sondland called Trump to assure him that the Ukrainian president would commit to “the investigations” that Rudy Giuliani was pushing.
Sondland Says ‘Everyone Was in the Loop’ (9:18 a.m.)
Sondland will say that “everyone was in the loop” on the demand for investigations of Burisma and the 2016 election in exchange for a White House call and a meeting for Ukraine’s president. “It was no secret.”
Sondland will say that among those who got his July 19 email about the demand were Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, the chief of staff for Vice President Mike Pence, and acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney.
“We all understood that these pre-requisites for the White House call and White House meeting reflected President Trump’s desires and requirements,” Sondland will say.
Sondland Says Pompeo Knew of Demands for Aid (9:10 a.m.)
Sondland also provides an email exchange putting Secretary of State Michael Pompeo within the loop of getting Ukraine’s president to appease Trump’s concerns and “break the logjam” on providing the security funds. That would include setting up a meeting in Warsaw “for a short pull-aside” for Trump to meet President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
“I would ask Zelenskiy to look him in the eye and tell him that once Ukraine’s new justice folks are in place (mid-Sept), that Ze should be able to move forward publicly and with confidence on those issues of importance to Potus and to the US,” Sondland told Pompeo on Aug. 22. “Hopefully, that will break the logjam.”
Pompeo replied “Yes,” according to Sondland’s opening statement.
Sondland Confirms ‘Quid Pro Quo’ for Probe (9:01 a.m.)
Sondland will say, “as I testified previously, Mr. Giuliani’s requests were a quid pro quo for arranging a White House visit for President Zelenskiy.”
“Mr. Giuliani demanded that Ukraine make a public statement announcing investigations of the 2016 election/DNC server and Burisma,” Sondland will say. “Mr. Giuliani was expressing the desires of the president of the United States, and we knew that these investigations were important to the president.”
He will say that he learned in July and August that U.S. security aid to Ukraine was being suspended. Sondland plans to say he was “adamantly opposed” to the suspension and never received a “clear answer” of why it was delayed.
“I later came to believe that the resumption of security aid would not occur until there was a public statement from Ukraine committing to the investigations of the 2016 election and Burisma, as Mr. Giuliani had demanded,” Sondland’s opening statement says. He will say he shared his concerns with the Ukrainians and with Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin.
Sondland Worked With Giuliani on Trump Order (8:53 a.m.)
Sondland will tell the committee that he, Energy Secretary Rick Perry and U.S. envoy Kurt Volker worked with Rudy Giuliani on Ukraine matters at Trump’s “express direction.”
“We played the hand we were dealt,” Sondland will say, according to his prepared opening statement obtained by Bloomberg.“We all understood that if we refused to work with Mr. Giuliani, we would lose an important opportunity to cement relations between the United States and Ukraine. So we followed the president’s orders,” he will say.
Bondi Says Trump Probably Won’t Testify (8:47 a.m.)
President Trump would relish the opportunity to testify in the impeachment probe before Congress under oath but probably won’t because the proceedings are tantamount to a “sham court,” White House aide Pam Bondi said.
“I know why he wants to testify, because he did nothing wrong,” Bondi said on CBS in one of her first interviews after being hired by the White House to manage communications and strategy on impeachment.
Separately, Bondi distanced Trump from Gordon Sondland, U.S. Ambassador to the EU, who is at the center of the impeachment inquiry and is scheduled to testify before the House Intelligence Cmte on Tuesday. Trump knows Sondlland, but “does not know him well,” Bondi said.
Sondland to Say Pompeo Looped In on Ukraine (8:01 a.m.)
Sondland looped in Secretary of State Michael Pompeo on efforts to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy into making public commitments to appease Trump so he would grant an Oval Office meeting, the New York Times reported Wednesday.
Sondland advised Pompeo in August about drafting a statement with Ukrainian officials that they hoped would satisfy Trump, the newspaper said, according two anonymous people briefed on the matter. Sondland also discussed pressure on Zelenskiy to take steps Trump sought prior to a scheduled meeting between the two leaders in Poland that was later canceled.
It’s unclear how detailed Sondland was in his communications with Pompeo, who is said to have approved of the plan, according to the report. The previously undisclosed details link Pompeo more directly to the Trump administration’s campaign to push Ukraine to make commitments that House Democrats say would benefit Trump politically and possibly damage U.S. national security. — Elizabeth Wasserman
Sondland to Be Questioned on Call With Trump (7 a.m.)
Sondland has put Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani at the center of the effort to extract a promise from Ukrainian officials to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden.
Sondland, a Trump donor, is likely to come under intense questioning after new information emerged about a telephone call he had with Trump on July 26, the day after Trump’s phone conversation with Zelenskiy.
David Holmes, a member of the embassy staff in Kyiv, told House investigators last Friday that he overhead Trump asking Sondland about “the investigations.” Holmes said that Sondland told him after he hung up that the president “didn’t give a s— about Ukraine” and that Trump only cares about the “big stuff” that benefits him “like the Biden investigation.” — Billy House
Catch Up on Impeachment Coverage
Key Events
Kurt Volker, the former special envoy to Ukraine, said Tuesday he wasn’t initially aware of attempts to prod that country into investigating Biden but later realized the anti-corruption efforts sought by the administration meant probes of the former vice president.The Sondland transcript is here and here; Volker’s transcript is here and here. Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch’s transcript is here and here; the transcript of Michael McKinley, former senior adviser to the secretary of State, is here. The transcript of Holmes, a Foreign Service officer in Kyiv, is here. The transcript of Hale is here. The transcript of William Taylor, the top U.S. envoy to Ukraine, is here and here. State Department official George Kent’s testimony is here and here. Testimony by Alexander Vindman can be found here, and the Fiona Hill transcript is here. Laura Cooper’s transcript is here; Christopher Anderson’s is here and Catherine Croft’s is here. Jennifer Williams’ transcript is here and Timothy Morrison’s is here.Taylor’s opening statement is here; Kent’s statement is here. Yovanovitch’s opening statement is here. Kurt Volker’s opening statement is here; Tim Morrison’s statement is here. Alexander Vindman’s statement is here. Jennifer Williams’s opening statement is here.
–With assistance from Caitlin Webber.
Source: MSN
