Taylor says Trump felt 'wronged' by Ukraine

Taylor said Trump felt "wronged" by Ukraine over the 2016 election and "this was something he felt they owed him to fix," meaning opening the investigations.

However, when Fiona Hill, the deputy assistant to the president who served on the National Security Council, testified during her closed-door hearing last month, she said top advisers had briefed Trump that the evidence did not support the theory that Ukraine meddled in the election.

Hill said that Tom Bossert, then Homeland Security adviser, and others had briefed the president during his first year in office on the interference in the 2016 election and debunked the conspiracy theory that Ukraine had interfered in the election.

Kent: 'No factual basis' behind CrowdStrike conspiracy theory

Kent, responding to questions from Goldman, said he "had not heard of CrowdStrike until l read the transcript" of the July 25 phone call between Trump and Zelenskiy.

Goldman then asked if the theory behind CrowdStrike — the name of the cybersecurity company that’s been at the center of a far-right conspiracy theory that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election — had “any factual basis.”

“To my knowledge, there is no factual basis,” Kent said. Trump mentioned “CrowdStrike” in the July 25 call, according to the transcript of it.

Goldman then asked Kent who he did believe interfered in the 2016 election.

"It’s amply clear that Russian interference was at the heart of the interference in the 2016 election cycle," Kent said.

Asked in the same exchange by Goldman if there was any basis to the accusation that Joe Biden did anything wrong in Ukraine, Kent replied, "None whatsoever."

State Dept. official testifying Friday is staffer who overheard Trump-Sondland call

A source familiar with the matter tells NBC News that David Holmes, the State Department official just added to the calendar to testify in closed session next week, is the staffer for Bill Taylor who overheard E.U. Ambassador Gordon Sondland’s phone call in which President Trump asked about "the investigations."

Holmes is a new character in the Ukraine saga. He is the counselor for political affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine. As today’s hearing was getting underway, two officials working on the impeachment inquiry told NBC News that Holmes is expected to testify in closed session next Friday, Nov. 15.

At the same time, Taylor was revealing that one of his own staffers had informed him just last Friday about a phone call on July 26, in which the staffer was with Sondland and overheard a call between Sondland and Trump.

The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

babaearly1:

We will never become like this until a revolution takes place

Revolution is cute and all that But I think personal consciousness will revolutionize our nation
we are like a country living at d river bank yet washing our hands with saliva

Trump: I'm 'too busy' to watch impeachment hearings


Trump responds to first public impeachment hearings: 'There's nothing there'

President Donald Trump said Wednesday afternoon he hadn't had time to watch the first public impeachment hearings.

"I'm too busy to watch it," he told reporters in the Oval Office during a meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, less than three hours after the session began on Capitol Hill. "It's a witch hunt, it's a hoax. I'm too busy to watch it, so I'm sure I'll get a report."

Despite his claim that he hadn't been able to watch the proceedings, the president did take a jab at the Democratic staffer questioning witnesses.

"I see that they are using lawyers that are television lawyers ...they took some guys off television," said Trump. "You know, I'm not surprised to see it, because Schiff can't do his own questions."

Trump allies on impeachment hearing: Boring!

Trump’s allies think Wednesday’s initial impeachment hearing is a snoozer.

"This is horribly boring... #Snoozefest," Trump’s son Eric tweeted, adding in another tweet, "For as much time as the Democrats have spent trying to orchestrate ‘political theater’ they have done a terrible job. This clown show is horribly boring."

White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham tweeted, “This sham hearing is not only boring, it is a colossal waste of taxpayer time & money.”

And Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., a close ally of the president, told reporters, “I don’t know about you but it’s hard for me to stay awake and listen to all of this.”

White House official responds to Taylor testimony on Trump-Sondland call

Taylor testified earlier Wednesday that one of his staffers had informed him about overhearing a July 26 call between Sondland and Trump in which Trump asked Sondland about “the investigations,”

A White House official responded to Taylor's testimony, saying, “This alleged new phone call makes no mention whatsoever of any alleged quid pro quo. Even if this hearsay account is accurate, no one was very concerned about it since they have just now reported it. Not only was Taylor not on the call with the alleged call between President and Sondland, but the person who relayed the account to Taylor wasn’t even on the call either. House Democrats are relying on a game of telephone.”

Two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News that the staffer who overheard the call is David Holmes, a State Department official just added to the calendar to testify in closed session Friday.

Early reviews on GOP counsel are in

Rachel Maddow MSNBC
✔
@maddow
Legitimately surprising to me that the GOP counsel appears to be asking a bunch of freeform basic factual questions to which he doesn’t know the answer. #ImpeachmentHearings

Ari Fleischer
✔
@AriFleischer
Whatever the GOP counsel is doing, it's not working. I don't undertand where he's going.

Schiff, GOP argue over arguing

Schiff and Republican members of the Intelligence Committee argued at the onset of Republican questioning about, well, their ability to argue.

Schiff had interrupted a question from the Republican side pertaining to "facts not in evidence," telling Taylor he did not have to answer it, but that the chairman was not objecting to the question.

That led to an argument over whether rules of a courtroom are in play, and Republicans countered that they would have objected to many Democratic questions under the standard Schiff had expressed to Taylor.

GOP counsel asks if Hunter Biden speaks Ukrainian

GOP counsel Steve Castor, as part of an apparent attempt to cast Hunter Biden’s joining of the Burisma board as suspect, peppered Kent and Taylor with questions about the son of the former vice president.

Castor asked Kent whether he knew if Biden was an "expert" in "corporate governance."

"I have heard nothing about prior experience," Kent said.

"Do you know if he speaks Ukrainian?" Castor asked a moment later.

"I do not," Kent said.

"Do you know if he possesses any other elements other than that he is the son of a sitting vice president?" Castor asked.

"I do not," Kent replied.

Castor presses Taylor on "irregular" Ukraine channel

Castor, after a series of confusing questions that even longtime Republicans took issue with, eventually arrived on a line of questioning that seemed to strike a chord.

Pointing out Taylor’s criticism in his opening statement and prior testimony of the "irregular" diplomatic channel between the U.S. and Ukraine, Castor asked Taylor "did you try to wrest control of the irregular channel?"

"I did not try to," Taylor replied.

Responding to questions about why, Taylor said it was because "both channels were interested in having a meeting between President Zelenskiy and President Trump."

"There’s no reason to kind of wrest control if we were going in the same direction," he added.

Castor then asked again, why, if Taylor held growing concerns about that channel, he didn’t make that attempt but later expressed his worries so sharply.

"I was concerned when the irregular channel was going against the overall direction and purpose of the regular channel," Taylor said.

Members begin questions

The staff questioning round has now ended.

The committee has moved to the five-minute member round for the 22 members alternating between Democrats and Republicans.

As a reminder, in this round members can give their five minutes time to another member.

The member questions should last roughly two hours barring any breaks or procedural delays. At this point, we don’t know if/when another break will occur.

Schiff tried to get at the heart of Trump’s demand

Schiff’s exchange with Kent and Taylor is important because he’s trying to pull out of them a confirmation that Trump’s interest in corruption was a cover to manufacture an investigation into the Bidens. Schiff noted that Trump didn't mention corruption during the July 25 call. He didn't mention corrupt oligarchs, but mentioned the Bidens and CrowdStrike.

“He was interested in the Bidens?” Schiff said.

“Yes, sir,” Kent replied.

Schiff argued that Trump wanted to put Zelenskiy in a box. Kent testified that Zelenskiy, however, expressed trepidation about getting involved in foreign elections.

What was Joe Biden's role in Ukraine?

Moments ago, the Republican counsel questioned Kent and Taylor about former Vice President Joe Biden's role in Ukraine.

Here's a quick primer: Beginning in 2014, Biden led diplomatic efforts in Ukraine to bolster the country’s fledgling democracy and root out corruption after mass protests ousted a Russian-backed president. He specifically called for the removal of Viktor Shokin, the Ukraine prosecutor general who was widely believed to be corrupt.

“I said: ‘You’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in’ — I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money,’ ” Biden said at a 2018 event, recounting his actions. “Well, son of a b---- , he got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.”

The removal of the prosecutor was U.S. government policy at the time, and widely agreed to among the international community as the right move. In his closed-door testimony, Kent testified last month that the International Monetary Fund, the European Union countries and the U.S. agreed that Shokin should be removed as prosecutor general.

Kent knocks down the equivalence between Biden and Trump

Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., pressed Kent on the difference between Biden acting on Obama administration orders and getting rid of a corrupt prosecutor in Ukraine and Trump pressing the country to open an investigation into the Bidens.

Kent testified that the former Ukrainian prosecutor undermined a U.S.-backed assistance program and it was a part of American foreign policy to lobby for his removal. He also said that he did not see in the transcript of the July 25 call a genuine interest from Trump to end corruption in Ukraine.

"I don’t think he was trying to end corruption in Ukraine, I think he was trying to aim corruption in Ukraine — at Joe Biden," Himes said.

Texas GOP Rep. shouts at Taylor

Rep. John Ratcliffe, R-Texas, spent much of his five minutes of questioning yelling at Taylor.

During a particularly fraught exchange during his questioning, Ratcliffe repeatedly asked Taylor whether he had any evidence that Zelenskiy was "lying" when he told reporters that he was not aware of a military aid hold or of any conditions being placed on the military aid to his country when he had held the July 25 call with Trump.

"Yes or no," Ratcliffe demanded to know.

"If I can respond," Taylor said, before being interrupted by Ratcliffe, who yelled, "My time is short, yes or no?"

"I have no reason to doubt what the president said,” Taylor said.

Ratcliffe, with sweat on his brow, then replied, “where is the impeachable offense in that call?”

"Shout it out! Anyone?" he continued. Ratcliffe then attempted to withdraw his question and have the clock suspended for his five-minute allotment.

"I have one minute left," he said. "I withdraw the question," he said.

Jordan argues that because the investigations didn’t happen, Trump did nothing wrong

In another line of questioning, Jordan highlighted what is becoming a more prominent Republican defense of Trump’s conduct: Because Ukraine didn’t end up investigating the Bidens and Democrats and the roughly $400 million in military aid was released, Trump did nothing wrong.

“What you heard didn’t happen,” Jordan said to Taylor in trying to discredit his understanding of the administration’s efforts toward pressuring Ukraine to probe the Bidens and Democrats.

As The New York Times reported, Ukrainian President Zelenskiy was set to deliver a statement on CNN on Sept. 13 announcing the investigations in order to secure a White House meeting and the military aid. But earlier that week, Congress was alerted to the whistleblower complaint. Then, on Sept. 11, the Trump administration released the hold on aid.

As Schiff said earlier in the hearing, the Trump administration released the aid after facing significant pressure from lawmakers to do so, not to mention the effect of the timing of the whistleblower account being reported to Congress.

Kent says smear campaign against Yovanovitch was led by Guiliani, corrupt Ukrainians

Rep. Andre Carson, D-Ind., asked Kent about the smear campaign against former Ambassador the Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. Kent said that the smears against her were led by corrupt people in Ukraine and also promoted by Guiliani. He stopped short of saying that the smear campaign was directly linked to Trump’s decision to remove her.

"You can't promote principled anti-corruption action without pissing off corrupt people,” Kent said. "Rudy Giuliani's smear campaign was ubiquitous in the spring of 2019 on Fox News and on the internet and Twittersphere."

Kent, Taylor say they aren’t 'Never Trumpers': 'No, sir'

Kent and Taylor, under questioning from Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., said they are not "Never Trumpers."

Trump has accused administration officials who have testified before the committee of being "Never Trumpers." On Wednesday morning, Trump tweeted, "NEVER TRUMPERS!"

When Swalwell asked Kent if he was a "Never Trumper," meaning a conservative who refuses to support the president, Kent said he was just a career foreign service official who has served for nearly three decades under Republican and Democratic presidents.

Taylor was more succinct in his answer.

"No, sir," he told Swalwell.

The diplomat who overheard Trump call once won award for dissenting

The U.S. diplomat who is said to have overheard a phone call between President Donald Trump and E.U. Ambassador Gordon Sondland in which Trump asked about "investigations" once won an award for voicing dissent within the government when he saw something amiss.

David Holmes, now the political counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine, is the latest character to be drawn into the impeachment saga when he was unexpectedly added to the hearing calendar for a closed-door deposition Friday. He’s expected to be questioned by House investigators about events during and around Sondland’s visit to Kyiv in July, including what he overheard Sondland on his cellphone discussing with Trump. During public testimony Wednesday, Bill Taylor revealed that a staffer recently told him about the conversation. Two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News that Holmes is the staffer in question.

Holmes has a history of speaking up when he disagrees, according to an NBC News review of archived materials from the American Foreign Service Association, the union that represents U.S. diplomats. In 2014, he won AFSA’s William R. Rivkin Award for Constructive Dissent, which honors a mid-career foreign service officer for intellectual courage in speaking up.

At the time of the award, Holmes was senior energy officer as U.S. Embassy in Moscow. He was recognized for his work on Afghanistan and South Asia during which he filed a formal dissent channel message in February 2013. He argued that the division of authority for Afghanistan-Pakistan policy among different parts of the State Department “hindered our diplomatic effectiveness.”

“My efforts over this period, and then my formal dissent, were intended to give a voice to an important perspective that I felt lacked an advocate,” Holmes was quoted as saying in an article in the September 2014 edition of The Foreign Service Journal, the union’s monthly magazine.

A dissent cable is a unique State Department mechanism that lets diplomats voice disagreement about U.S. policies, with protections against retribution. They’ve been used previously during the Vietnam War and in 2017 when diplomats objected to Trump’s travel ban on people from several Muslim-majority nations.

Hurd's questioning highlights Dems' point on timing of Trump's interest in Ukraine corruption

Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas, sought to make the point in his line of questioning that the Trump administration provided substantial military aid to Ukraine in fiscal year 2017 and 2018, trying to highlight that the administration was very supportive of Ukraine.

But that point also highlights something else important: that Trump did not become enamored with Urkainian “corruption” until earlier this year, which happens to also be when Biden began running for president. It’s a point Democrats have sought to make in the impeachment process.

Of course, the two “corruption” investigations Trump sought were probes of the Bidens and a debunked conspiracy theory involving the Democrats and the 2016 election.

Ratcliffe seeks to find out about Democrats’ interactions with the whistleblower

Rep. John Ratcliffe, R-Texas, sought to engage in a "colloquy" with Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., during his round of questioning to find out details about what Schiff knows about the whistleblower and any interactions with the person.

Schiff then said that Ratcliffe should direct his questions to the witnesses.

"I’m not trying to find out the identity," Ratcliffe said. "I’m just trying to find out the date that this happened."

Republicans have been focused on the whistleblower approaching a member of the majority staff before filing their official complaint about what they knew about the Trump-Zelensky phone call. Republicans claimed both before and throughout the hearing that Schiff knows the identity of the whistleblower, but Schiff made clear Wednesday that he doesn’t know who the person is. Democrats have said that during the closed-door depositions that Republicans have sought to out the whistleblower.

Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., chimed in and read from the rules of the public hearings that what Ratcliffe was seeking to do regarding the whistleblower was not in accordance with the resolution passed by the House that outlined procedures for the hearings.

Ratcliffe pushed further asking Schiff, "Are we ever going to find out the details?"

"Mr. Ratcliffe, your time is dwindling. I suggest you use it," Schiff responded.

Hearing room bursts out laughing after Democrat snaps back at Jordan

Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., got a round of laughs in the hearing room for a joke he made in response to a lengthy rant from Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, about how impeachment investigators need to have “the person who started” the impeachment probe, meaning the first whistleblower, come testify.

Welch retorted, "I'd like to see the person who started it come testify. President Trump is welcome to take a seat right there."

Laughs followed.

Taylor notes that Pompeo cable was a career first

During an exchange with Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, D-N.Y., Taylor said that the first time he sent a first-person cable to the secretary of state in his 30-year career in the foreign service was in August to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Taylor emphasized that sending a cable to America’s top diplomat was a rare move.

Asked whether Taylor heard back from Pompeo, Taylor said, "Not directly."

Kent said that he was on vacation when the cable came in, "but my understanding is that it made it to his intended recipient."

Kent, however, said he’s unsure if anything was done, saying, "I can’t honestly say what happened with the cable at the highest level."

In August, then-White House national security adviser John Bolton recommended that Taylor send a first-person cable to Pompeo directly relaying his concerns about the U.S. security assistance to Ukraine that was held up by the Office of Management and Budget more than a month earlier, on July 18.

"I wrote and transmitted such a cable on Aug. 29, describing the 'folly' I saw in withholding military aid to Ukraine at a time when hostilities were still active in the east and when Russia was watching closely to gauge the level of American support for the Ukrainian government,” Taylor said about the cable in his opening statement Wednesday.

Kent says plainly that Giuliani was looking for ‘political dirt’

Rep. Val Demings, D-Fla., pressed both Kent and Taylor on Giuliani’s shadow foreign policy efforts, and they both agreed it was not in the interest of U.S. national security.

“Was Mr. Giuliani promoting official U.S. interests?” she asked.

Kent: "I believe he was looking to dig up political dirt."

Taylor: "I agree"

Fun fact: Demings also questioned former special counsel Robert Mueller in July and got him to say that Trump was not entirely truthful in his written answers in the Russia probe.

Republicans argue witnesses don't have 'firsthand' knowledge of events. Is that right?

Republicans repeatedly argued — on Twitter and in the hearing room — that Wednesday's witnesses lacked firsthand knowledge of a pressure campaign on Ukrainian officials, and placed emphasis on the fact that Kent and Taylor never spoke directly to Trump.

This argument is in part misleading. Kent and Taylor had direct knowledge of the Trump administration's diplomatic mission in Ukraine, and testified to those facts. Republicans are correct in noting that these two particular officials do not have firsthand knowledge of Trump's conversations, or those of his acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney.

In their sworn depositions and in the open hearing, Taylor, the current acting ambassador to Ukraine, and Kent, a top State Department official, referred to conversations, emails and meetings they participated in or were told about involving high-level diplomats, senior Ukrainian officials and the Ukrainian president. They refer to contemporaneous notes and official documents.

Taylor, answering questions from Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, confirmed that he was not on Trump's July call with Ukraine's president that triggered a whistleblower complaint, nor had he spoken directly with Mulvaney, who Taylor said was part of a secondary, "irregular" diplomatic channel that worked to pressure Ukraine to conduct investigations, and that he had never met the president.

"This is what I can’t believe, and you're their star witness," Jordan said.

Impeachment investigators have interviewed 15 witnesses in closed-door questioning and subpoenaed more. At least one, Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, was on the call at the heart of the impeachment inquiry and is scheduled to testify publicly next Tuesday. Meanwhile, E.U. Ambassador Gordon Sondland, who multiple witnesses testified spoke directly with Trump and claimed to act accordingly, is scheduled to testify publicly next Wednesday.

Notably, more than a dozen White House staffers and Cabinet officials with firsthand knowledge have not complied with congressional subpoenas, including Mulvaney, former national security adviser John Bolton, Secretary of Energy Rick Perry, and a slew of other government staffers. The White House has sought to limit what witnesses can say. Kent and Taylor testified that they had been directed by the State Department not to testify when invited by congressional investigators, only doing so once they were subpoenaed.

Democratic Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Ill., pointed this out Wednesday afternoon during the hearing on Wednesday.

"You'd have a lot more direct testimony and direct evidence if you weren't blocking that ability," he said.

Schumer says senators should 'keep their ears and minds open' on impeachment

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Wednesday's impeachment hearing shows why the investigation must "continue unimpeded."

"The new revelations show exactly why the investigation must continue unimpeded so all the facts come out and why every senator should not prejudge until all the facts are out," he said. "We heard some new facts today, and that's all the more reason senators should keep their ears and minds open."

Schiff lays out thrust of inquiry case, denies knowing the whistleblower

Schiff, in his closing remarks, reiterated the allegation that Trump abused his office and leveraged a high-profile meeting and military aid to pressure Ukraine to investigate the Bidens and, in effect, invite foreign interference in U.S. elections to help his reelection.

“You described a situation in which those in the service of the president made it clear to the Ukrainians they need to publicly announce these investigations or they weren't going to get that meeting and they weren't going to get that military assistance,” Schiff said, referring to the testimony of Taylor and Kent.

Schiff noted that this hearing is just one of several scheduled for the coming days and weeks to continue to bolster the Democrats’ case.

Before wrapping up, Schiff again denied knowing the identity of the whistleblower before the complaint was filed.

netpro:


Trump withheld foreign aid approved by Congress for Ukraine who desperately needed it. And was pressuring the newly elected president to start an investigation that is solely for his personal gains.

It is a criminal offence. You are free to like Trump because he is Powerful and Rich. But don't hide your head in the sand.

GEORGE KENT: Conditions Have ‘Always’ Been Placed on Aid to Ukraine, Including Anti-Corruption Reforms. Zero evidence supporting your claim.

Good thread op!

How far,has he been impeached?

CTPlayer:
Just the opposite. Nobody paid Trump. Now on the other hand the Ukrainian energy company paid/bribed the Bidens
for special treatment and to end an investigation into that company.

I believe the word quid quo pro means..... Giving/getting something, in return for something ( usually negative), which in our local parlance means..... Scratch my back, I scratch your back... Don't this conote bribery/corruption?.