WASHINGTON — The second week of public hearings into whether President Donald J. Trump tried to trade U.S. military aid to Ukraine for dirt on a political rival began on Nov. 19 with the most dramatic day of testimonies so far.
Four witnesses gave evidence before the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, which is leading the impeachment inquiry, during 10 hours of testimony split into two sessions.
First up were Lieutenant Colonel Alexander S. Vindman, the top Ukraine expert at the National Security Council, and Jennifer Williams, a diplomat advising Vice President Michael R. Pence.
In the afternoon, the State Department’s former special envoy for Ukraine, Kurt Volker, and the former senior director for European and Russian affairs on the National Security Council, Timothy Morrison, gave their testimonies.
Vindman’s testimony generated the most emotional moments in the long day — particularly after some congressmen implied the Ukrainian-born official was disloyal to the United States. Meanwhile, Volker’s testimony laid out a detailed, heartfelt description of Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression and why it is important for America.
However, Volker’s testimony also perplexed many. He insisted that he did not realize for a long time what everyone else seemed to know: that Trump wanted Ukraine to open an investigation into discredited allegations that former Vice President Joe Biden had abused his authority in Ukraine in trying to protect his son Hunter Biden, who was serving a high-paid job on the board of directors of Burisma, a dodgy Ukrainian energy company run by ex-Ecology Minister Mykhail Zlochevsky.
There have been seven depositions since public hearings began last week and five more are scheduled this week. While the testimonies have varied, the positions of those arguing there are grounds for impeaching Trump and those defending him have remained largely consistent.
Below the Kyiv Post’s Washington correspondent Askold Krushelnycky explains the main issues and highlights the key parts of the testimonies of four witnesses who gave evidence on Nov. 19.
Vindman’s testimony
Born in Soviet Ukraine, Vindman was just three years old when his family emigrated to the United States in the 1970s under an agreement between Washington and Moscow to allow Jews, who were targeted for persecution by the Communist regime, to leave the USSR.
Since he testified behind closed doors on Oct. 29, Vindman has received an outsized share of vitriol from Trump and his supporters. Some have even questioned his loyalty to the United States. These attacks continued as he gave evidence on Tuesday.
A decorated war hero who received a Purple Heart medal after being wounded in Iraq, Vindman gave an impassioned response in which he eloquently laid out why America meant everything to him.
Vindman opened his testimony by saying he had dedicated his entire professional life to the United States of America and it had been his honor to serve for more than two decades as an Army infantry officer, including being deployed to Iraq.
He is an expert in Eurasian and European political-military affairs and was based at U.S. embassies in Kyiv and Moscow. He helped draw up American military plans to counter Russian aggression and malign influence globally. His core function is to coordinate policy between various national security departments.
He spoke of “the strategic importance of Ukraine as a bulwark against Russian aggression.”
Broadly speaking, supporting Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and promoting the country’s democratic development has long won bipartisan support in U.S. politics. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s election in April 2019 created an unprecedented opportunity to continue realizing these strategic objectives, Vindman said.
However, in spring 2019, Vindman became aware of two disruptive actors: Ukraine’s then-Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, President Trump’s personal attorney. Both were promoting false narratives that undermined the U.S. government’s Ukraine policy.
Vindman attended Zelensky’s May presidential inauguration and said that, afterwards, the U.S. delegation provided a positive briefing for Trump about Zelenky and his team.
On July 10, Oleksandr Danyliuk, then Ukraine’s national security adviser visited Washington for a meeting with his counterpart John Bolton. Vindman said he, Volker, U.S Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, White House Russia advisor Fiona Hill and Energy Secretary Rick Perry also attended.
Bolton cut short the meeting when Sondland tried to link a White House visit for Zelensky to Kyiv starting investigations about the Bidens.
Sondland had been appointed ambassador by Trump and had been coordinating in Kyiv with Giuliani, who was also trying to persuade the Ukrainian government to launch the investigations Trump desired.
Sondland told Vindman that making any White House meeting for Zelensky contingent upon Kyiv investigating the Bidens and the 2016 elections “had been coordinated with White House Chief of Staff Mr. Mick Mulvaney.”
Vindman said he told Sondland that linking a Trump-Zelensky meeting to the investigations was “improper.” His boss at the time, Fiona Hill, agreed with him. They both reported the incident to the National Security Council’s legal counsel, John Eisenberg.
According to his testimony, on July 25, Vindman listened in on Trump’s phone call to Zelensky and was disturbed by what he called Trump’s “demand” for a foreign government — Ukraine — to investigate a U.S. citizen and a political opponent. He also reported those concerns to Eisenberg.
Vindman said that, if Kyiv pursued such partisan investigations, it would “undoubtedly result in Ukraine losing bipartisan support, undermining U.S. national security and advancing Russia’s strategic objectives in the region.”
He said that he raised concerns “out of a sense of duty” but “I never thought I’d be sitting here testifying to the [Intelligence] Committee and American public about my actions.”
Vindman said it was natural that there should be “spirited debate” but he condemned the personal attacks that had been leveled at some of those who have given testimony.
“The uniform I wear today is that of the United States Army,” he said. “The members of our all-volunteer forces are made up from a patchwork of all ethnicities, religions and socio-economic backgrounds, who come together under a common oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. We do not serve any political party, we serve the nation.
“The army is the only profession I have ever known. As a young man, I decided I wanted to spend my life serving this nation that gave my family refuge from authoritarian oppression. For the last 20 years, it has been an honor to represent and protect this great country. Next month will mark 40 years since my family arrived in the United States as refugees.”
He said his father decided to leave Ukraine so that Vindman, his twin brother and another brother could have better and safer lives. Their father instilled a deep sense of service to the U.S. and “all three of us have served or are currently serving in the military… Our collective military service is a special part of our family history — a story of America.”
He said that, in Russia, the actions he had taken by giving public testimony that might offend the president would likely cost him his life.
He said he was grateful to his father and for “the privilege of being an American citizen and public servant where I can live free of fear for my and my family’s safety.”
He then addressed a message to this father: “Dad, I’m sitting here today in the U.S. Capitol. It’s proof that you made the right decision 40 years ago to leave the Soviet Union and come here to the United States in search of a better life for our family.
“Do not worry. I will be fine for telling the truth.”
He told the Committee that Trump ignored the talking points prepared by Vindman and Morrison for the July 25 phone call and instead asked Zelensky to open investigations into the Bidens and purported Ukrainian election interference.
Vindman explained that, because of the disparity in power between Trump and Zelensky, he was certain the Ukrainian president would see the request for a “favor” as a “demand.”
“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was probably an element of shock — that maybe, in certain regards, my worst fear of how our Ukraine policy could play out was playing out, and how this was likely to have significant implications for U.S. national security,” he said.
Several Republican questioners tried to impugn Vindman’s loyalty to the U.S. or to downplay his importance, noting he had never personally spoken to Trump. Fox News, which enthusiastically supports the president, and other Trump allies have questioned Vindman’s patriotism because he was born in Ukraine.
Republican Representative Jim Jordan, one of Trump’s most vocal supporters, commented that Vindman’s former boss, Fiona Hill, and his more recent supervisor, Morrison, had both had concerns about Vindman’s judgment.
Jordan, has been praised by Trump for the combative and acrimonious way he questions witnesses. He asked Vindman: “Any idea why they have those impressions?”
In response, Vindman showed a laudatory performance evaluation from Hill in which she called him the “top one percent military officer and the best Army officer I have worked with.”
When the Republican counsel to the committee, Steve Castor, asked Vindman about an offer from Danylyuk to become the director of Ukraine’s defense ministry, Vindman confirmed he had been offered the job three times, but “every single time, I dismissed it. I’m an American. I came here when I was a toddler.”
“They’ve accused you of espionage and dual loyalties… that was designed exclusively to give the right-wing media an opening to questionin your loyalties,” Democratic Representative Jim Himes said.
Committee chairman, Democratic Representative Adam Schiff, stopped Republican attempts to make Vindman reveal the identity of the White House whistleblower whom Republicans demand should testify.
Democrats are worried about the whistleblower’s safety after threats by Trump supporters and tweets by the president suggesting that he was a traitor deserving execution.
Trump, who last week tweeted insults against former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch while she was actually testifying, on Tuesday sent out messages denigrating Vindman and Williams.
Despite the nasty jabs at his loyalty and patriotism, Vindman said he remained confident in telling his father not to worry: “This is America. This is the country I’ve served and defended. That all of my brothers have served. And here, right matters.”
That earned him enthusiastic applause from spectators packing the committee room.
Jennifer Williams, an adviser to Vice President Mike Pence for European and Russian affairs, exits Longworth House Office Building after testifying before the House Intelligence Committee during the second week of impeachment hearings of President Donald Trump on Nov. 19, 2019, on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. (Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images/AFP)
Williams’ testimony
Jennifer Williams, a career diplomat advising Vice President Pence about Ukraine and other European issues, also said she was concerned by Trump’s phone conversation with the Ukrainian president and found it “unusual and inappropriate.”
She was disturbed by the seeming request for Zelensky to investigate the Bidens and the allegations of Ukrainian electoral interference in 2016. However, unlike Vindman, she did not report her concerns to her superiors.
Pence met Zelensky in Warsaw on Sept. 1. Williams was also there. By that time the Ukrainian side knew that Trump was withholding the nearly $400 million military aid assistance.
She said Zelensky explained to Trump how important that was and that not providing the aid would help Russia.
She said Pence did not repeat Trump’s requests for investigations when he met Zelensky and she said that the vice president knew that “any signal or sign that U.S. support was wavering would be construed by Russia as potentially an opportunity for them to strengthen their own hand in Ukraine.”
Trump had tweeted about Williams last weekend, prior to her testimony. He wrote: “Tell Jennifer Williams, whoever that is, to read BOTH transcripts of the presidential calls, & see the just-released statement from Ukraine. Then she should meet with the other Never Trumpers, who I don’t know & mostly never even heard of, & work out a better presidential attack!”
Williams said she was not a “Never Trumper” and admitted: “It certainly surprised me. I was not expecting to be called out by name.”
Former Special Envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker exits following his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee during the impeachment hearings of President Donald Trump on Nov. 19, 2019, in Washington, DC. The committee heard testimony during the third day of open hearings in the impeachment inquiry against U.S. President Donald Trump, whom House Democrats say held back U.S. military aid for Ukraine while demanding it investigate his political rivals. (Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images/AFP)
Volker’s testimony
Kurt Volker is a veteran diplomat who had served in many roles, including America’s ambassador to NATO, before leaving the foreign service in 2009.
He was asked in July 2017 to become U.S. special representative for Ukraine negotiations, a job he performed on a voluntary basis without pay. For two years, he did the job to advance the national security interests of the United States, he said.
“In particular,” Volker said, “that meant pushing back on Russian aggression and supporting the development of a strong, resilient, democratic and prosperous Ukraine, one that overcomes a legacy of corruption and becomes integrated into a wider trans-Atlantic community.”
“If Ukraine, the cradle of Slavic civilization, pre-dating Moscow, succeeds as a freedom-loving, prosperous and secure democracy, it gives us enormous hope that Russia may one day change, providing a better life for Russian people and overcoming its current plague of authoritarianism, corruption, aggression toward neighbors and threats to NATO and the United States,” he added.
The stake for the United States in a successful Ukraine “could not be higher,” Volker said.
However, surprisingly, Volker testified that, while he knew Trump wanted an investigation into the Burisma company, he did not make the connection between Burisma and the Bidens and did not understand that others speaking about “Burisma investigations” in fact meant investigations into the discredited narrative about Joe Biden improperly using his power as vice president to bully Ukraine into firing a prosecutor general.
Volker was also unaware, he testified, that other diplomats, politicians and other actors, American and Ukrainian, knew that U.S. military aid was tied to complying with Trump’s request for investigations.
Several of the Democratic members of the committee seemed astonished that Volker said he was out of the loop, despite having such a prominent role in Ukraine and frequent contact with the main actors.
Those included Perry and Sondland. Volker’s interactions with the two, who were seen as close Trump associates pushing for the investigations, were so frequent and well-publicized that others dubbed them the “three amigos.”
Volker said that he saw Giuliani as problematic, but he decided to work with him in order to use him as a channel to influence Trump to take a less negative stance toward Ukraine.
He admitted he advised the Ukrainians to agree to investigate Burisma, but he thought that it was an investigation into corruption by Ukrainians at the energy company whose owner had long been accused of corrupt practices, including by the American embassy and FBI personnel working alongside Ukrainian anti-corruption agencies.
Asked about Trump’s actions by Republican Committee members he replied he had never thought the president’s requests or behavior had been improper or amounted to “bribery” or “extortion.”
He said he had been eager to help Zelensky get the visit to the White House as that would provide a bridge to the new Ukrainian government, which he believed was heading in the right direction.
He was not involved in the July 25 telephone call and initially only had a brief readout of the conversation, which did not inform him about Trump’s request for an investigation into Biden. He said he was also unaware until September that Trump was withholding the military aid package from Ukraine.
Volker said he knew Biden as an honorable man and would have voiced opposition to any attempts to gather political dirt on him.
“In retrospect, I should have seen that connection differently, and had I done so, I would have raised my own objection,” said Volker.
“I did not know of any linkage between the hold on security assistance and Ukraine pursuing investigations. No one had ever said that to me — and I never conveyed such a linkage to the Ukrainians.”
White House Russia expert Timothy Morrison shakes hands with Rep. Jim Jordan, (R-OH), as he exits following his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee during the impeachment hearings of President Donald Trump on November 19, 2019, in Washington, DC. The committee heard testimony during the third day of open hearings in the impeachment inquiry against U.S. President Donald Trump, whom House Democrats say held back U.S. military aid for Ukraine while demanding it investigates his political rivals. (Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images/AFP)
Morrison’s testimony
Timothy Morrison, the National Security Council’s former senior director for Russia and Europe, said he had helped prepare talking points for Trump before his July conversation with Zelensky. However, as he listened in to the call, he realized the president had not used them.
He said he and Vindman were both disappointed with the call. “I think we both agreed we wanted more full-throated support of President Zelensky and his reform agenda, and we didn’t get it.”
Like Vindman, Morrison also headed to the National Security Council’s lawyer after the call, but for different reasons from Vindman. He did not regard Trump’s requests during the call as illegal or improper, but he feared that if the transcript leaked it would be politically damaging.
Morrison said that he wanted to restrict access to the transcript but, after a misunderstanding with the lawyer, it was transferred to an ultra-secret computer system. Some Democrats have expressed the belief that, whether the transcript ended up in that system by accident or design, it would now be much harder to access it for any impeachment investigators.
Morrison also shared some of Vindman’s concerns about Sondland, whom he and some others referred to as “the Gordon problem” and whose actions undermined “the normal National Security Council leadership structure.”
He said he “decided to keep track of what Ambassador Sondland was doing. I didn’t necessarily always act on things Gordon suggested he believed were important.”
Morrison said he wished that Vindman had come to him before going to the lawyer. He said that would have been the correct chain of command procedure and would have saved time dealing with the lawyer.
Morrison, who previously worked for the Republican Party, confirmed that he and other White House officials had expressed concerns about Vindman’s judgment but refused to go into detail. He said that he had taken note of the adverse comments, but had not acted on them as he had not confirmed them for himself.
The impeachment inquiry
The proceedings were triggered by the release of a July 25 telephone conversation between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in which the American leader asks for a “favor” from Kyiv: the launch of an investigation into Joe Biden and his son Hunter.
Trump and his associates had circulated an unsubstantiated narrative that Biden abused his position as vice president to have Ukraine’s then Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin fired in order to quash an investigation he was launching into a notorious Ukrainian energy company Burisma, which had appointed Hunter Biden as a board member and given him a lavish salary for minimal and vague work.
In fact, Shokin had long dropped the investigation and Biden had demanded his sacking because the prosecutor general was regarded by the U.S. and other international supporters of Ukraine as thoroughly corrupt.
If Ukraine launched an investigation against Biden, who Trump viewed as his most formidable potential opponent in the 2020 presidential election, the effect would likely have been to damage Biden’s reputation and election chances.
Trump also asked for Ukraine to investigate another discredited fake story: that Kyiv worked to undermine Trump’s election campaign in 2016.
Trump believed that among the ways Kyiv tried to do that was by revealing secret payments to his campaign chief, Paul Manafort, from former pro-Kremlin Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych. Manafort worked for years for Yanukovych until the latter was overthrown in a 2014 revolution. The consultant concealed millions of dollars paid him from U.S. tax authorities.
Manafort is now serving a 7.5-year prison sentence after being convicted on tax fraud charges.
The Democratic Party contended that, since American military and diplomatic aid was critical for Ukraine to counter Russian aggression, Kyiv would not dare to refuse Trump’s request to launch the damaging investigation into Biden and the fake “2016 Ukrainian election interference” allegations.
Democrats accused Trump of an impeachable offense by demanding what they at first called a “quid pro quo” from Ukraine and later termed a “bribe.” In both cases, Democrats said that at stake were two things Zelensky desperately needed: military aid and a White House meeting with Trump as a signal to Moscow of America’s support for Ukraine.
Trump suspended the military aid package, worth $400 million, for 55 days until bi-partisan Congressional pressure forced him to release it.
The Republican members of the Intelligence Committee argue that there is no proof that Trump was linking his request to the aid package; that in any case the Ukrainian side did not learn until late August, long after the July phone call, that aid had been suspended and therefore could not have been anxious they might lose it if the “favor” was not delivered; that the block on aid was removed without Kyiv launching the Biden or “Ukraine election interference” investigations.
The Democrats have retorted that the Ukrainians knew from other sources much earlier that Trump was conditioning aid and the White House visit on the launch of the investigations; even if that was not the case they would have still felt under pressure to comply with Trump’s requests to improperly investigate a political opponent.
The Democrats also say that Trump released the aid because of a combination of bipartisan pressure and because he became aware that a whistleblower at the White House had registered concerns about the July 25 phone call and he wanted to forestall a Congressional inquiry.
Democrats say that although the impending whistleblower investigation prevented Trump from trading military assistance for political dirt his intention to do so was an impeachable offense. Democratic Representative Joaquin Castro said the attempt to commit a crime is a crime in itself and not lessened by the failure to successfully carry it out.
After the hearings are completed, the Democrat-controlled House will likely vote there are sufficient grounds to impeach Trump.
However, the trial of the president will then be conducted by the Senate, where the Republicans have a majority. Most observers doubt Trump will be convicted.
