Impeachment Hearings: Day 2 – Marie Yovanovitch [UPDATE-2]

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I’m putting up this post and thread dedicated to today’s hearing which was scheduled to begin at 9:00 a.m. ET. Updates to this post will appear at the bottom.

Former ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch is now appearing before the House and opening statements have just finished.

If you’re not within range of television or can’t stream the hearing, you can follow along with these live Twitter threads:

Marcy’s thread

Brandi Buchman for Courthouse News

Law prof and author Jennifer Taub

Some of these feeds also appear in my Trump-Russia Twitter list; open it and refresh periodically.

CNN has a live update page dedicated to today’s hearing.

Washington Post’s live update page here.

Here’s a copy of Yovanovitch’s testimony on October 11 in closed door session, released November 4.

Here’s a copy of Yovanovitch’s written statement submitted today.

If you have other resources you feel are helpful, please share them in comments. Thanks.

UPDATE-1 — 10:28 a.m. ET —

Zelensky was pretty shrewd or innately savvy about the breadcrumbs he left in his interactions with Team Trump.

Trump’s tweet which Daniel Dale embedded as a snapshot:

And of course Trump can’t shut the fuck up; he’s now implied he’s had opposition research done into Yovanovitch’s work history. Why would he need to do that if his actions with regard to Ukraine were totally above board?

Adam Schiff has interrupted questioning to offer Yovanovitch an opportunity to respond to Trump’s tweet denigrating her, amounting to witness intimidation.

UPDATE-2 — 12:35 p.m. ET —

Marcy started a fresh live tweet thread for this afternoon’s testimony by Yovanovitch before the GOP’s counsel and committee members.

Emma Loop with BuzzFeed is now in the hearing room and has also begun a live tweet thread.

Related: If you didn’t hear already, Roger Stone was found guilty on seven counts of obstruction of proceedings, false statements, and witness tampering. Politico’s Darren Samuelson covered the verdict in a thread.

How odd so many of the people close to Trump have been found guilty or pleaded guilty to crimes related to his campaign or work related to Ukraine, Russia, and Turkey.

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131 replies
  1. Rayne says:

    Take note of any tweets by Trump family members today — they will likely be part of an organized disinfo op. Eric Trump’s tweet about Day 1 hearing being ‘boring’ was part of the earliest wave of right-wing tweets using the same description.

    With Donnie Jr. figuring in testimony as part of the smear campaign against Yovanovitch, I’d expect push back from a Trump family member.

  2. Jenny says:

    Thanks Rayne. No doubt the occupant of the WH and his family and followers will attack for Ambassador Yovanovitch. That is what they do – always looking for a fight. Constantly in battle mode, constantly blaming. Ugh!

    Good for Yovanovitch standing up for herself and State Department employees. So much more to be exposed.

      • Rayne says:

        Every time I think Trump has hit bottom, he attempts a new low. Witness tampering (18 USC 1512) in the middle of testimony is just beyond words.

        I don’t know how Yovanovitch keeps such a cool head through this. What a professional.

        • Geoff says:

          Ah, therein lies the rub. For a person like Trump, literally, there is no bottom. He is literally an immoral abyss.

        • TooLoose LeTruck says:

          The man’s a political black hole…

          He tries to pull every last thing he touches into the vast, gaping, insatiable void that is his existence and it looks like he might consume the entirety of the GOP by the time this is over…

    • harpie says:

      https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1195356198347956224
      7:01 AM – 15 Nov 2019

      Everywhere Marie Yovanovitch went turned bad. She started off in Somalia, how did that go? Then fast forward to Ukraine, where the new Ukrainian President spoke unfavorably about her in my second phone call with him. It is a U.S. President’s absolute right to appoint ambassadors.

      ….They call it “serving at the pleasure of the President.” The U.S. now has a very strong and powerful foreign policy, much different than proceeding administrations. It is called, quite simply, America First! With all of that, however, I have done FAR more for Ukraine than O.

      • Vince says:

        I’m paraphrasing, but ABC’s Jonathan Karl said something like it was ‘the worst thing he’s ever seen in his career covering White Houses’.

      • Mooser says:

        And I couldn’t imagine a President who had a foreign policy of ‘squeezing’ countries between the US and Russia.
        And always to the advantage of Russia.

  5. Jenny says:

    Watching testimony, the occupant of the WH is tweeting. Isn’t this witness intimidation? Isn’t this a crime and impeachable? Another day, another crime. I hope this charge will be added to the laundry list of crimes.

  6. P J Evans says:

    Trmp is also demonstrating that he doesn’t know anything about Somalia, and is too incompetent to be president.

      • P J Evans says:

        It doesn’t even require going there, just reading about it and talking to people at State who know the region. (Not that Trmp will ever do either.)

  7. harpie says:

    Goldman asks about joint Putin/Orban statement from 2/2/17. [a little more than a week after Trump inauguration]

    …sounds like Trump cribbed notes from that statement for his 7/25/19 Zelensky call.

  9. Rayne says:

    Welp, add to 18 USC 1512 Witness Tampering a count of 18 USC 1505 Obstruction of Proceedings.

    Nothing like a self-impeaching president.

    EDIT: This is why I can’t finish my series, History’s Rhyme, comparing the Nixon impeachment process to Trump’s impeachable offenses. I can’t keep up with the tangerine hellbeast’s criminal offenses, have had to rethink my latest entry still in progress too many times. Right under our noses he is *still* interfering with legitimate foreign policy for his own personal aims.

    • 200Toros says:

      Well, to be fair, not just for his own personal aims – he’s doing a GREAT job pursuing Putin’s foreign policy priorities!

      A former Navy intelligence analyst friend explained to me why the Syria debacle was such a huge win for Russia – their naval base there is the ONLY one that doesn’t get iced-in during the winter or that can be blockaded. The Syrian base opens to the Mediterranean sea, is navigable by aircraft carrier, doesn’t ice over in winter, and can’t be blockaded. Getting us out of the region was a top Russian priority, that greatly increases their ability to project naval force world-wide. Russia took over Crimea in part to convert their naval base there from lease-to-own.

      What’s the Russian equivalent of the Medal of Honor? trump will probably get that, and it will be well-deserved.That’s my ~smdh~

      • Rayne says:

        There’s no daylight between Trump’s personal interests and Putin’s. As long as Trump is in office he’s immune from prosecution and able to continue to pursue his sucking up to Putin at the expense of America’s sovereignty.

        I hope the inland camps and bases (like Manbij) we abandoned and Russia now occupies were also mentioned. They were a political coup for Russia which they shared on social media. What a waste of time and resources to simply turn them over after fighting ISIS for them. What an insult to turn them over to a country which has no compunction against bombing hospitals and schools.

      • Rugger9 says:

        LANTFLT guys know all about Tarsus (I was PACFLT) and the observation is accurate. It is a Russian policy since the time of the Tsars to have a warm water port in the middle of things since the Baltic freezes over at times, the Northern Fleet Murmansk also freezes, and Vladivostok / Kamchatka is too far away. Crimea wasn’t acquired until the end of the Khanate in 1783, it was a leftover from the Mongol horde states.

        The appropriate medal is Hero of the Soviet Union, I think.

        • 200Toros says:

          Very interesting, thanks for that. It’s something I don’t think the general public thinks about, and something I’ve studied a bit – the supreme importance of a blue-water navy to effect projection of force.

        • Katherine M Williams says:

          The general public would be very interested if they were only *informed* about the dangerous consequences of Trump’s deliberate actions. Instead, we get the press treating Trump’s treasonous crimes as a particularly entertaining reality show, or a horse race, or a circus. They’ve already forgotten Syria and the Kurds. Heck, they’ve forgotten how Saudi Arabia tortured a reporter to death.

        • P J Evans says:

          I was aware that Russia wants ports that don’t get frozen solid in winter – I think they’ve wanted those since Ivan the Terrible started their empire-building.

        • Rugger9 says:

          Ivan IV (the Terrible) was too soon. The Russian Navy started its significance with Peter the Great in the 18th century.

        • John K says:

          For the life of me, I just can’t imagine Putin doing anything except abandoning Trump once he’s no longer president. His usefulness will expire at that point.

        • Molly Pitcher says:

          My brother-in-law was Executive Aide to the Admiral in charge of CincPac, and the few things he could tell us made my hair stand on end.

    • Raven Eye says:

      I read the 18 USC 1512 citation you provided. What surprised me is how many of the buttons Trump has managed to hit. It is well worth reading.

    • Mulder says:

      And I’m delighted to finally see someone (Daniel Dale) point out this… Zelensky to Trump… “It was great that you were the first one, who told me that she was a bad ambassador.”

      Part of me has wondered if Z said this explicitly so it was clear that the characterization was from Trump, not him. And it begs the question of when and under what circumstances did Trump communicate this to Z.

      • Ollie says:

        Yes. My first thought was in reading what Z had stated “It was great that you were the first one, who told me that she was a bad ambassador” was in translation. Having watched Z w/Trump? That was intentional and revealed, w/a clarity of the author of that characterization, for all to know. When you’re a struggling country and totally beholden to an authority to have to chuck&jive w/that power.

        That Trump is being so authoritarian w/his illegal real time attacks on Yov.

    • TooLoose LeTruck says:

      You gotta love it…

      So now I suspect Trump will march off to his own fanfare w/ horns blaring, declaring total victory and proclaiming the ‘witch hunt’ is OVER!

      No matter how badly Republicans may wish it to be so, ‘magical thinking’ is hardly a serious defense…

  12. Doug Fir says:

    Ambassador Yovanovitch’s opening statement is a beautiful example of a powerful message communicated with integrity, sincerity and honor. Especially poignant in light of the ugly, personal attacks by the acting president’s defenders in response to the testimony of Ambassador Taylor and Deputy Assistant Secretary Kent.

    • LeeNLP says:

      Ultimately, this seems to get to the heart of the public hearings- showing, in as side-by-side fashion as possible, the faces of devoted, honest US public servants, folks who take their oaths of office seriously and follow a call to serve higher than self, and the ugly face of corruption that currently occupies the WH and the GOP leadership present in chamber. Yavanovich, Taylor and Kent are the face of what America at its best aspires to be, while Trump’s tweets are as clear a manifestation of how America can fail, how far low it can go, as can be imagined. Will the Americans who still care for the right side outnumber the others and eventually prevail? And if if they do regain power, how will those who never understood the high ideals of the nation ever be brought into the community of citizens of an enlightened democracy? How can the weaponization of lies by the right wing infotainment empire be countered and turned back?

  13. Scorpio Jones, III says:

    Forgetting the politics for a second, I just hope all the United States’ foreign service folks are as serious, intelligent and sincere as Marie Yovanovitch.

    But back to the politics, I suspect the ride quality on Republican buses will be very poor for quite a while.

  15. skua says:

    “Zelensky was pretty shrewd or innately savvy about the breadcrumbs he left in his interactions with Team Trump.”
    Pretty sure I read a report of him being coached by his team on what Trump wanted to hear.

    • Rayne says:

      Still a masterfully crafted breadcrumb — he not only indicates there is at least one earlier communication in which Trump has relayed denigrating remarks about Yovanovitch and that Trump was the responsible party participating in the smear campaign, but Zelensky simultaneously stroked Trump’s narcissism by labeling him the first source, emphasized as great.

      • skua says:

        Yes.
        Audio that let us hear Selensky’s tone of voice might be hilarious, sad and chilling.
        A nation’s leader trying to trying to convey aquiesence, agreement and praise to a conman-bully so that weapons the nation needs will arrive.

  16. 200Toros says:

    Repub Lee Zeldin of NY was on C-SPAN2, blathering the most insane, idiotic garbage you’ve ever heard, attempting to defend Dear Leader, and the reporters were basically laughing at him, and expressing incredulity at his remarks.

    I loved how Schiff showed that the Ukraine election meddling conspiracy theory started with (of course) one Vladimir Putin.

    The GOP is the Party of Putin.

    • Rugger9 says:

      Stefanik (also of NY) runs a close second, she kept trying to ask questions when not recognized. FWIW, I think Schiff should have let her blather on to chew up the minority counsel’s time.

  19. TooLoose LeTruck says:

    Why would he need to do that if his actions with regard to Ukraine were totally above board?
    ______________________

    I’m stunned a sitting POTUS would feel a need to do ‘opposition research’ on one of HIS OWN employees?

    Simply astonishing… if he wanted to replace Yovanovitch, wouldn’t that be w/in his purview? But no, he had to denigrate her… intimidate… smear…

    I recall reading something to the effect she felt physically threatened around the time she left Ukraine…

    Astonishing and infuriating…

    • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

      TPM had a great post yesterday explaining that much of the activity involving Yovanovitch can be explained by Poroshenko’s loss of the Ukrainian election in spring 2019.

      Poroshenko’s loss threatened the grift channels between Guliani and the resources (like LNG) that Poroshenko’s government controlled. Guliani, et al, bet on Poroshenko, but Zelensky’s victory upset their plans.

      Recall, also, that Zelensky represented a glimmer of hope of breaking up the corruption in Ukraine, from which Rudy, et al, were seeking to benefit.

      So Rudy, et al, scrambled to get Yovanovitch out of the way, in order to control access to the looting opportunities in Ukraine, and co-opt the new president as he took power.

      As for Trump’s willingness to smear Yovanovitch, it’s completely in character. We’ve watched his sadistic, insulting behavior for far too long. He can’t simply let something go; he attempts to annihilate whatever enrages him at any given moment. He’s consumed by a desire to revenge, and sometimes it takes the form of libel. It may seem counter-intuitive, but for Trump to be so obsessed with smearing Yonokovitch is probably a very high testament to her character.

  23. harpie says:

    Why would the wh represent that they talked about corruption in congratulatory call when there is no mention of corruption in the read out today?

  25. Michael says:

    “Lee Zeldin of NY was on C-SPAN2, blathering the most insane, idiotic garbage you’ve ever heard”

    Eclipsed by Nunes’ insane, most idiotic garbage uttered on Wednesday, IMHO.

  26. Nehoa says:

    Somewhat OT, but since additional articles of impeachment have come up (witness intimidation), can we also consider jury tampering? Fundraising by Trump for GOP senators who will serve as jury in an impeachment trial? At worst it would have a chilling effect on the GOP senators who might otherwise welcome the fundraising support.

  30. earlofhuntingdon says:

    Trump is a one-trick pony. However little he remembers from the vile Roy Cohn, he treats it as gospel. Never apologize, always attack – early, fast, and often – the lower the better. The more vulnerable the witness and the less deserved the bullying, the stronger the impression it makes on others who might be witnesses or whistleblowers. That’s also straight from the CIA’s insurrection manual.

  31. earlofhuntingdon says:

    As for pizazz, the absolutely riveting questions from Republican counsel today were better than counting sheep. He was obviously not expecting to be the questioner. He was filling time, largely by trying to get Yovanovitch to admit that she suffered no harm as a result of being summarily dismissed by Trump.

    No matter how well she landed, no matter how much her superiors apologized (apart from the abusively silent Pompeo) for being called home and replaced for no logical reason, her summary dismissal is a permanent problem on her resume. And everybody in that room and inside the Beltway knows it.

    • Tom says:

      I was out and about and listening to the hearing on my car radio. Castor was obviously floundering and I thought at one point the radio signal was cutting out because of Castor’s lengthy pauses and inward ruminations.

  32. earlofhuntingdon says:

    The GOP talking point that it’s routine for a president to investigate foreign corruption – but apparently not domestic corruption – is laughable, but the Dems are not rebutting it forcefully enough.

    Only Yovanovitch and news commentators have made the point that there is a process for legitimate investigations of corruption. Indeed, the higher the corruption goes, the more circumspect and process-driven it needs to be, especially when it is being urged on one state by another.

    Trump, however, was attempting to gin up the appearance of bad facts about a domestic political opponent – by demanding it from a foreign state. Trump was not investigating corruption at home or abroad: he was practicing it.

      • Mitch Neher says:

        Excerpted from the article linked above:

        White House spokesman Hogan Gidley said in a statement that the readout in this case was “prepared by the NSC’s Ukraine expert” at the time, Alexander Vindman.

        Vindman, who testified earlier this month in the ongoing impeachment inquiry, helped prepare the talking points for the April call that suggested Trump bring up the corruption issue, the source said.

        Vindman also prepared talking points for Trump before the July 25 call, according to a transcript of Vindman’s closed-door deposition released last week.

        “I drafted read-ahead materials, the talking points,” Vindman said, referring to preparations made for the April 21 call. “All the materials, it goes through a staffing process, and then it gets forwarded from Ambassador Bolton to the President and Executive Secretary.”

        Asked whether he put “anything in your talking points about investigations into the 2016 election on the Bidens or Burisma,” Vindman replied, “Absolutely not.”

  33. Eureka says:

    huh. At 229p, ABC cut away from coverage to their regular schedule, a talk show. Then checked rest of over-the-air channels and they, too, are all airing regular schedules now– not sure when they switched.

    (now 235p Schiff calls 5 min. recess– but Yovanovich was still testifying when the broadcast channels cut away)

  34. 200Toros says:

    When Repubs bring up Hunter Biden’s $50K/month compensation from Burisma, why aren’t the Dems bringing up Doral G7 proposal, Air Force bunking at trump Turnberry, Pence staying at trump Doonbeg, taxpayer money spent for trump’s golfing at his own properties, Javanka in the WH, failure to divest, etc? That’s a slam-dunk – “Why thank you for bringing that up, and while we’re on the topic of profiteering….”

    • Katherine M Williams says:

      Not the best of times to get into a mud-slinging match. On the other hand, our glorious Free Press could easily point out the illegalities and greed of Trump & his family.

  35. Molly Pitcher says:

    Is there a reason that the execrable Gym Jordan is incapable of wearing his suit coat in the hearings ? I bet he wars a wrestling singlet under his shirt and pants.

    • Eureka says:

      I bet he wars a wrestling singlet under his shirt and pants.

      I further bet it Retains Odor. In fact I can vividly smell the stale gym mat now…

    • BobCon says:

      GOP consultants often push that kind of thing as a way of supposedly sending an image of being a man of action, not bound by convention, etc.

      When Michael Brown’s emails were released in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, it was revealed that while he was not getting prepared for the disaster, he was spending time talking with his press secretary about how far he should be rolling up his shirt sleeves to project an image of concern.

      • Tom says:

        Like the ads for financial institutions that depict their top executives as decisive, jut-jawed, steely-eyed men with rolled up sleeves and arms crossed on their chests ready to duke it out with their business rivals.

    • Rugger9 says:

      It’s his Schtick, like Devin and midnight runs and getting mocked by cows on the internet.

      Pretensions of being a working class man of the people.

  36. Molly Pitcher says:

    It is depressing that there are only 68,093 are watching the live stream on CNN.I wonder what the viewership is for all of the ways to access these hearings ?

    • readerOfTeaLeaves says:

      CNN is one outlet.
      Add in podcasts, Facebook (yipes), the Daily Show, Colbert, John Oliver, Bill Maher, plus news lineups on Friday and over the weekend, and it’s a whole lotta information going out on phones, tablets, tvs, and print media.

      IMVHO, the switch to professional attorneys for longer periods of questioning is a genuine public service. Yovanovitch was compelling.

      Also, from the Twitter bits that I followed for about an hour, both Ken Starr (!) and some Fox political director were shocked that Trump intimidated the witness during testimony. When you’ve lost Ken Starr and Fox executives…. ;^)))))

      • Bri2k says:

        There were 81k people watching C=SPAN’s YouTube feed at the beginning. I had C-SPAN “radio” (audio only) from their website but since there was no commentary, I found out on day one it was a good idea to have video instead so I could see the name tags.

        I’ve got to admit, I turned off Nunes’ response. The only sane way to follow this is to tune out all the GOP gas-lighting. I still haven’t figured out how to watch this sober though.

  37. Tom says:

    I noticed that Nunes use the words “topple” and “overthrow” with respect to what he said the Democrats were trying to accomplish with this impeachment hearing, speaking as if the President is some semi-regal figure and implying that the process under way is illegitimate. Nikki Haley was similarly over-the-top the other day when she said that impeachment is the equivalent of “the death penalty for public officials.” There’s life after impeachment and the Republicans are portraying the Trump Presidency as some sort of quasi-monarchy complete with crown princes and princesses, rather than the elected chief executive office that the Founders envisaged. But I suppose this trend goes back to the casting of the JFK Presidency as Camelot.

    • OldTulsaDude says:

      In my view, Nunes lost the last shred of his dignity when he called these impeachment hearings “show trials”, comparing a proper constitutional inquiry as equivalent to Stalin’s purges.

  38. Tom says:

    There’s no-one around that has firsthand knowledge of the American Revolution or the Civil War, so I guess those events didn’t happen either.

    • P J Evans says:

      Second-hand knowledge, though – that’s possible. (I’ve read civil-war era letters and journals. Next thing to being there.)

        • Tom says:

          One of my most vivid childhood memories is of sitting in a doctor’s office looking through a Reader’s Digest and coming across an article about the recent death of one of the last Civil War veterans. I was thrilled that I was alive at the same time as soldiers who had fought in the Civil War.

        • bmaz says:

          I used to actually like going to the doctor’s office because they had Readers Digest and Highlights magazines.

        • r helder says:

          one of the reasons i loved visiting my grandparents was that they had kept EVERY copy of readers’ digest since the early forties (when the “humor in uniform” section began)

        • P J Evans says:

          I went to a couple of dentists, in different states, who had Architectural Digest. It’s interesting, even if the intended audience isn’t people like me.

        • bmaz says:

          It is so weird what one can remember from back then. Some of it so vividly, some not at all. Long time gone. I am thankful for reasons to think back to there again though.

        • P J Evans says:

          It’s possible – I knew a woman in Texas whose father was about 80 when she was born, and had been in the Civil War. (One of my great-grandfathers turned 21 about two days after Appomatox. He joined the autumn after he turned 18. Died in 1921.)

  39. John Paul Jones says:

    I don’t think the Orange Beast was doing oppo research. The Somalia point was one of the first resumé items that came up in Schiff’s introduction, so probably all it means is that TOB was glued to his set. And for him it’s a negative because it is a s***hole country, rather than the positive (hardship posting, dangerous) it really is.

  42. holdingsteady says:

    CNN has the opening statement, 10 single spaced pages, of David Holmes who is the one who overheard trump on the phone with Sondland in Kyiv.
    Lots there!

    • harpie says:

      YES!
      THREAD: https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1195479264444833797
      3:10 PM – 15 Nov 2019

      I obtained a copy of David Holmes’ opening statement, saying that he heard Trump telling Gordon Sondland: “So, he’s gonna do the investigation?” Sondland tells Trump: “He’s gonna do it” and that Zelensky will do “anything you ask for. [VIDEO] [!!!]

      I haven’t watched the video yet, but read it’s good…

      Links to article and Testimony at the end of the thread.

      • Vicks says:

        This will be a whole lot more valuable if Sondland corroborates.
        If the shoe was on the other foot I’d be saying this sudden revelation was a bit suspect.

        • holdingsteady says:

          I am assuming the two staffers who also heard the call will corroborate.
          Sondland will testify next Wednesday and I can’t imagine he would get away with a denial.
          I read all ten pages, it is very convincing, detailed and believable imo. David Holmes looks to be another solid, ethical witness.

        • BobCon says:

          What are the odds Sondland goes 5th Amendment? I could see him so tangled up in lies that his lawyer insists that he shut up and only communicates in writing or a tightly controlled setting, not in a hearing.

        • earlofhuntingdon says:

          He has that legal right. In federal service, however, when asked about performing one’s official duties, pleading the Fifth ordinarily and justifiably leads to immediate loss of employment.

          Sondland should be fired anyway. It’s not as if he’s gonna miss his rent or have to choose between paying it and buying his monthly prescriptions.

          But the remarkably cowardly Mike Pompeo is waiting for his emperor to turn thumb’s up or down. So much for graduating first in his class at West Point.

        • harpie says:

          Chuck Rosenberg, succinct about Pompeo [excerpted by Rozen]:

          https://twitter.com/lrozen/status/1195543618725044225
          7:26 PM – 15 Nov 2019

          Chuck Rosenberg on Pompeo:
          “His silence is deafening. It is an act of abject cowardice. ..astonished..does not have the spine to stand up for the people in his organization who are being denigrated by this president. That silence is…deafening and it is disgusting.”

        • Thebuzzardman says:

          My son was in line to go to West Point. He did the overnight stay; I got to stay in the Thayer Hotel for free etc. I’m prior service, had friends who attended, so I’m all proud and drinking every bit of the cool-aid about the awesome ethical leaders it produces – and mostly, it does. But I decide to wander the halls of the Thayer, where notable graduates photos line the halls. And most of them are paragons of our society. But I come across a few and I say to myself “Well, it’s not EVERY last guy”.

          And I thought that again the moment I saw Pompeo in the Trump administration and especially the last few months.

          Ultimately my son didn’t go, even with a Letter Of Assurance etc.

          Chose William & Mary with a full tuition scholarship and a 4 year ROTC scholarship instead.
          We just attended the contracting ceremony for him and other cadets who were up for one this weekend. Which I didn’t know they did, but apparently all do, in some way.

        • LeeNLP says:

          Sondland: “Oh, you mean *that* loud, unsecured cell phone conversation with the president in a Kiev restaurant. Yes, that does start to ring a bell…”

          Funny how memory works…

        • holdinsteady says:

          Haha, he will write it up like his previous correction: ‘oh yeah, my memory was jogged when Holmes told Taylor who told Congress who heard testimony from Holmes… oops’

          What a rats nest of nastiness Sondland has exhibited (E.g. he told trump on the call ‘he [Zelenskyy] loves your ass.. he’ll do anything you want )’.

          I’m soooo embarrassed by this undermining of diplomacy under trump. But there is hope with Schiff and the democrats counsel Goldman doing a great job with awesome witnesses. It is fascinating to learn more about how the interagency efforts work together and how passionate they are in their work.

          I’ll take care to never stay at his hotels!

          Let’s hope the democrats can get Holmes deposition transcript shared to the public before Sondland testifies, I bet they’ll try. I’m not sure how that review process works before releasing the testimony.

  43. e.a.f. says:

    nothing in dtrump’s tweet today surprises me in the least. There will most likely be more like that which will be a lot worse. Who would ever have expected a world leader, from a democratic country, would “say” something along the lines, “bad things were going to happen to an Ambassador” for their country. You might expect it from some idiot running a “shit hole country”, but even that leader would be smart enough to ensure it didn’t become public knowledge.

    Not only is dtrump a nasty bit of business, he’s just plain stupid.

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