November 13th marks the first day of public impeachment hearings. Too many of us aren’t taking this seriously for the somber and momentous time this is. It’s never a good day when a president is being impeached, and it’s never a good day when the president has given so many reasons to put impeachment on the table (wittingly or unwittingly). If, like press secretary Stephanie Grisham, you find the hearings boring, you’ve got to just dig in and learn what you can about what led to this. You can make up your own mind, but not if you don’t have the facts.

Here’s what happened on the impeachment front for the week ending November 17…

General Happenings:

1. On the opening day, Representative Adam Schiff, who is leading the proceedings, says they’re looking primarily into presidential abuse of power. He says he sees several impeachable offenses, including bribery.
2. Here’s Schiff’s opening statement, so you can get an idea of the tone he’s trying to set.
3. And here’s Representative Devin Nunes’ opening statement. Nunes is the Republican ranking member.
4. Following Rick Perry’s efforts in Ukraine to influence their energy policy, two of his political supporters got a potentially lucrative gas and oil exploration deal with Ukraine’s government.

• • Perry gave Ukrainian officials a list of potential energy advisers, which I’m guessing is not unusual since Perry obviously knows several fossil fuel executives as part of his work.
  • However, Perry was also one of the “three amigos” who were working to make a meeting between Trump and President Zelensky happen, so his influence there was strong.

5. With friends like these who needs enemies? Rudy Giuliani writes an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal arguing that nothing on the July 25^th call is an impeachable offense. Giuliani says that the call was mostly about corruption in general, and Trump only spent about “six lines on Joe Biden.”
6. Republicans are trying to distance Trump from Giuliani, who, as we all know by now, is a hand grenade. According to their 18-page memo, they plan to focus on four reasons the call was OK:

• • The call shows no conditionality. (Except for maybe the “Do us a favor though…” part.)
  • Both Trump and Zelensky say there was no pressure.
  • The Ukrainian government was unaware that aid was being held up at the time of the call. (One deposition puts this assertion into question).
  • Trump met with Zelensky and the aid was released, all without Zelensky opening the investigations. (A White House meeting was conditioned on the investigations, and that never happened. Zelensky was scheduled to announce the investigations two days after the aid was released, so by then it was moot).

7. Trump considered firing Michael Atkinson, the intelligence community’s inspector general who reported the whistleblower complaint to Congress. Trump thinks Atkinson is disloyal.
8. Representative Mark Meadows (R-NC), when questioned about the hearings, says, “when we start to look at the facts, everybody has their impression of what the truth is.” So facts aren’t facts.
9. The White House releases a transcript of a previous phone call between Trump and Zelensky. This call is congratulatory in nature—Zelensky had just won the election.

• • They don’t talk about the Bidens or the 2016 elections.

• • The White House readout of the call in April doesn’t match with the released transcript. The readout stated that during the call, Trump said we’re committed to work with Ukraine “to implement reforms that strengthen democracy, increase prosperity, and root out corruption.” There’s no mention of that in the actual transcript they released.

• • The first call was marked “Unclassified” but the second one is marked “Secret.”

10. By at least September 7, the State Department determined that the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) didn’t have a legal standing to withhold military aid to Ukraine. On September 9, they told Congress there was no hold on the aid. On September 13, Trump said he was releasing the aid, but Bolton had already approved some of it.
11. Mick Mulvaney wants to join the lawsuit with other White House officials who are waiting to find out from a judge whether they can testify even though Trump invoked executive privilege.

• • So then John Bolton files a motion to prevent Mulvaney from joining. He argues that Mulvaney is a key player in the events leading up to impeachment (he was cooking up some kind of drug deal, according to Bolton).
  • And then Mulvaney withdraws his request.

12. Most witnesses so far agree that the actions taken by Trump, Giuliani, Parnas, Fruman, and others were interfering with U.S. policy in Ukraine and setting back our progress in rooting out corruption in Ukraine. They also agree it was to Russia’s advantage.
13. Lev Parnas, Igor Fruman, and Giuliani met privately with Trump at last year’s White House Hanukkah party. Afterward, Parnas told two people that Trump gave him a secret mission to pressure Ukraine officials to open investigations into Joe and Hunter Biden. At that time, Poroshenko was the president of Ukraine and Yuriy Lutsenko was the prosecutor. Lutsenko was the origin of the smears against Yovanovitch.

• • Parnas and Fruman met with Poroshenko in February to make an offer: if Poroshenko publicly opened the investigations, he’d get an invite to the White House. So this whole not-a-quid-pro-quo thing goes back to the previous administration.
  • When Poroshenko was not re-elected that spring, they had to scrap that plan and scramble to come up with a new one.

14. Speaker Nancy Pelosi invites Trump to testify in the impeachment inquiry.
15. Trump accuses Adam Schiff of doctoring the deposition transcripts before releasing them. There’s no evidence of this.

Bill Taylor and George Kent Testimony:

1. William Taylor and George Kent provide testimony together to the House impeachment panel. Their testimony was pretty well covered in previous weeks, so I’ll try not to rehash that here.
2. Schiff gives both witnesses time to make long statements summarizing their previous testimony. This will be standard going forward, I think. After the opening statements, it’ll go like this:

• • The lawyers for both sides have 45 minutes to question the witness, which is so much better than the typical grandstanding from Representatives. If you listen to nothing else, listen to the lawyers’ questioning.
  • Then members from each party get 5 minutes to question witnesses.

3. The Republican’s lawyer, Steve Castor, advances the argument that the alternative channel led by Giuliani could’ve been more outlandish. It’s often hard to follow Castor’s line of questioning.
4. Taylor reveals that one of his aides overheard a conversation between Trump and Ambassador Sondland. Sondland called Trump on his cell phone from a restaurant, and the aide could hear Trump’s voice clearly coming out of the phone’s speaker. Trump asked about the status of the investigations. The aide asked Sondland how Trump felt about Ukraine; Sondland said Trump cares more about the investigations into Biden.
5. Kent testifies that Giuliani ran a smear campaign against Marie Yovanovitch by leading efforts to “gin up politically motivated investigations.” Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman were helping him out with these efforts. The three of them were “peddling false information.”
6. Both witnesses acknowledge that there are national security reasons that Zelensky would say he didn’t feel pressured by Trump. Trump could impose serious consequences on Zelensky.
7. Kent defends Biden and says there’s no way Joe Biden interfered with government policies to help out Burisma.
8. The State Department is still withholding Taylor’s and Kent’s notes and records, so they are missing some of their documentary evidence.
9. Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) questions Taylor’s understanding of quid pro quo and mocks him for being the Democrats “star witness.”
10. Republicans critique the process, call witness testimony hearsay since they weren’t on the calls and didn’t talk to Trump, and liken Democrats to a cult. They bring up the debunked conspiracy theories about Joe Biden and Ukraine’s involvement in the 2016 elections. They also level a bizarre accusation that Democrats sought nude photos of Trump from the Russians. I don’t know anyone who wants to see that.

• • Note: I’m working on a post addressing all the various Ukraine conspiracy theories being thrown around. So far, they’re super sketchy at best, but I’ll post the information once I have a more complete picture.

Marie Yovanovitch Testimony:

1. Marie Yovanovitch testifies in an open hearing to the House impeachment panel.
2. Against the rules laid out for the proceedings, ranking member Devin Nunes cedes his time to Representative Elise Stefanik (R-NY) with the apparent intention of creating the optics of Schiff shutting down a female questioner. Though Stefanik later takes nine minutes to read statements made by Schiff about the whistleblower testifying, she later complains to the press that Schiff shut her down.

• • After her testimony, her democratic opponent for the 2020 elections raises over $1 million in two days.

3. Republicans obviously don’t think their base can understand the rules of procedure as laid out in the House resolution on impeachment.
4. Yovanovitch’s testimony is very similar to what we’ve already heard from the deposition.
5. She expresses confusion about why, if she serves at the pleasure of the president, didn’t he simply remove her from her post. Why did he feel the need to smear her before bringing her home?
6. Yovanovitch accuses Trump of “kneecapping” her ability to further U.S. interests in Ukraine.
7. When she got the call to come back, she was finishing up hosting a dinner party honoring a Ukrainian anti-corruption activist who had been attacked with acid and killed.

• • The director general of the Foreign Service, Carol Perez, was the one who called her. She stressed that there was concern for her safety and she needed to return immediately.

8. Republicans try to make it sound like it’s OK she was recalled because she still has a job, right? And she likes what she’s doing, right? That’s unbelievably patronizing and excuses bad behavior by employers.
9. Devin Nunes dismisses Yovanovitch’s employment concerns as an “HR” issue.
10. She’s never heard of an ambassador being recalled based on false information (the prosecutor who made up some of the lies used against Yovanovitch has since retracted them).
11. Yovanovitch says she felt threatened by Trump’s words—she’s going to “go through some things”—during his call to Zelensky. And then, in the middle of her testimony, Trump tweets this:

• • “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.”
  • Yovanovitch is a steely ambassador who accepted five hardship posts. It’s comical to think that any of the situations in these countries are her fault. Also, Zelensky merely agreed with Trump after he criticized Yovanovitch.
  • Yovanovitch says this tweet is intimidating.

12. She was incredulous that the Trump administration bought into the misinformation that Giuliani was peddling.
13. Yovanovitch testifies that the publication of the black ledger that led to Manafort leaving Trump’s campaign in 2016 was not an action targeted at Manafort or Trump. It was targeted at removing corrupt politicians from Ukraine’s government.

• • This disputes (but does not disprove) the theory that Ukrainians were trying to force Manafort out of Trump’s campaign.

Transcripts Released:

The House releases additional transcripts from closed-door depositions. Same caveat as last week: I haven’t read every word of every page because there is just too much. I do verify what I’m reading about the transcripts, and have at least skimmed most of them.

Jennifer Williams:

1. The House releases the transcript of Jennifer Williams’ deposition. She’s a top national security aide to Mike Pence, advising him on Russia and Europe.
2. Williams took notes while listening in on the call with Trump and Zelensky.
3. She said she found the references in the call between Trump and Zelensky to be more specific to Trump and his personal political agenda, and not so much to U.S. policy objectives in Ukraine.
4. She also said that the call “shed some light on possible other motivations” for the freeze in military aid.
5. A month after asking Pence to attend Zelensky’s inauguration, Trump told him not to go. Williams got no explanation for that.
6. In Williams’ notes, she said Zelensky specifically mentioned Burisma during the call, but that information is missing from the official transcript (corroborating Vindman’s statements about missing words).
7. Williams vouched for Yovanovitch’s stellar reputation in the Foreign Service.
8. She had never heard of Crowdstrike before that call.
9. After Williams’ testimony, Trump calls her a “never Trumper.” Even though she works for Vice President Pence.

Tim Morrison:

1. The House releases National Security Advisor Tim Morrison’s deposition transcript.
2. Morrison said he went to National Security Council lawyers with concerns about the transcript of the call. He advised those lawyers to restrict access to the transcript because of the potential political fallout if it were leaked. He was right about that!
3. He didn’t think anything illegal transpired on the call. He did think that Trump’s behavior exhibited bad foreign policy, which could squander a “once-in-a-generation opportunity” to crack down on corruption in Ukraine with the new president Zelensky.

4. A top diplomat who works closely with Trump (referencing Gordon Sondland) told him that the military aid was conditioned on the investigations that Trump wanted.
5. In the same conversation where Trump told Sondland that there was no quid pro quo—that he didn’t want anything from Ukraine—Trump also insisted that Zelensky publicly announce investigations into Joe and Hunter Biden.
6. Fiona Hill had warned him about the “Burisma bucket of issues” when he was transitioning into his job. The bucket includes Burisma, Hunter Biden, the DNC server, and CrowdStrike.
7. Morrison said he googled “Burisma” and found out in seconds that Hunter Biden was on the board. This makes Volker, Sondland, and others who’ve testified they had no idea that Burisma was related to the Bidens look like fools. Or liars.
8. Morrison said he didn’t know about the military aid being conditioned on the investigations until a September 1 conversation with Sondland. Morrison said, “Even then I hoped that Ambassador Sondland’s strategy was exclusively his own and would not be considered by the leaders of the administration and Congress, who understood the strategic importance of Ukraine to our national security.” So obviously he thought it improper.
9. According to Morrison, Sondland had around a half dozen conversations with Trump over the summer, Sondland was acting at Trump’s behest, and Sondland spoke to Ukraine officials about exchanging military aid for political investigations.

Catherine Croft:

1. The House releases Catherine Croft’s deposition transcript. Croft is an adviser to Kurt Volker. Here are some highlights.
2. Trump’s view of Ukraine was out of step with White House and State Department officials.
3. So many people knew about the hold on aid that it was impossible to keep it secret, even from Ukraine officials.
4. Ukraine officials knew about the holdup in aid long before it was reported.
5. Ukraine wanted to keep it quiet because it could appear that U.S. support for Ukraine was dwindling. As long as they thought they’d get the aid in the end, they had no reason to want this to get out.
6. OMB put a separate hold on a transfer of lethal aid in the form of javelin missiles over concerns that “Russia would react negatively.” OMB was the only agency objecting, with the State Department, National Security Council, and other policy agencies supporting the transfer.
7. Before Taylor accepted his post, they talked about whether the policy toward Ukraine would change. Croft said her frank opinion was that the White House wouldn’t change their policy on Ukraine unless Trump “viewed it— the—that Biden was going to be a credible rival for him in the upcoming election, and that he—that furthering the narrative that Russia was for the Republicans and Ukraine was for the Democrats would be in his interest, and that might push him to change the policy on Ukraine.”
8. Her thinking was that “in an attempt to counter the narrative about Russian support for the Trump administration in the 2016 election or Russian interference in the 2016 election that—that it would be useful to shift that narrative by shifting it to Ukraine as being in support of the Clintons.”

Christopher Anderson:

1. The House releases Christopher Anderson, Volker’s assistant.
2. He says that John Bolton wanted increased senior White House engagement with Ukraine but that he was worried about Giuliani’s influence there.
3. Anderson’s efforts as a Foreign Service officer to show support for Ukraine were quashed by the White House.
4. It was Anderson who relayed the story about Trump calling Bolton at home to complain about a Naval operation that he thought was hostile to Russia. The White House had the operation canceled.
5. Anderson though that Lutsenko was feeding false information to Giuliani to make himself appear useful to the U.S. government so he could keep his job. He was replaced as Ukraine general prosecutor in late summer.
6. Volker had been in touch with Giuliani, and was concerned about his actions in Ukraine. So it’s not clear to me how Volker didn’t know about the investigation into the Bidens.
7. Bill Taylor was concerned that Giuliani was going to continue making their job difficult, despite assurances from Mike Pompeo that U.S. policy toward Ukraine wouldn’t change.
8. Taylor wanted to make sure not to discuss any “individual investigations” in their conversations about Ukraine. It was U.S. policy to push anti-corruption activities; it was not U.S. policy to push individual investigations.
9. This narrative that the Ukraine government was an enemy of Trump jeopardized our efforts to resolve the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

Laura Cooper:

1. The House releases Laura Cooper’s deposition transcript. Cooper works in the Pentagon as a deputy assistant secretary of Defense for Russia and Ukraine.
2. Cooper’s testimony was cut short when Republican representatives stormed the SCIF.
3. The Pentagon got no heads up about the freeze on military aid to Ukraine. When they found out that Mick Mulvaney froze the aid, they scrambled to get the money released.
4. There were questions over whether the hold was legal, being that it came from the Office of Management and Budget.
5. Before the press broke the news about the freeze, questions arose from the defense industry, which was waiting for the funds. She even got a call from the Chamber of Commerce.
6. Conversations with Volker and alarm bells from Taylor led her to believe Ukraine was aware of the freeze far earlier than previously believed.
7. Volker indicated to her that military aid would not be released without a public statement from Ukraine committing to the investigations Trump wanted. This was in a discussion where it was clear that the path Volker was taking to lift the aid was to get Ukraine to make the public announcement of the investigations. She says, “the only reason they would do that is because there was, you know, something valuable.”
8. Volker mentioned to her “an effort that he was engaged in to see if there was a statement that the government of Ukraine would make that would somehow disavow any interference in U.S. elections and would commit to the prosecution of any individuals involved in election interference.”
9. Cooper says that even though she was told by Michael Duffey in OMB that the holdup in aid was over corruption, the anti-corruption review had already been completed, and Pentagon officials had “affirmed that we believed sufficient progress has been made.” Duffey refuses to testify.
10. Also, the Department of Defense certified that Ukraine met the deadline for anti-corruption benchmarks in May.

• • After the freeze in aid, the Department of Defense did no further work on reviewing anti-corruption measures.

11. Cooper attended a meeting with senior administration officials where they concluded that there are only two ways for Trump to withhold aid.

• • The president notifies Congress and declares a “rescission” of the funds
  • The Pentagon reprograms the funds (this also needs a congressional notification)

12. The impending end of the fiscal year was putting the entire funding for aid in jeopardy.
13. Securing Ukraine will help us push back against Russian aggression in the rest of the world.

David Holmes:

1. Holmes testified at the end of the week, and his transcript was released by Monday. So I’m including all the info in this week’s recap.
2. The impeachment panel interviews David Holmes, an aide to Bill Taylor. Holmes is the aide referenced in the above testimony from Taylor about the phone call he overheard between Sondland and Trump.
3. Holmes says there’s a risk that Russia was monitoring that phone call between an ambassador and the president on a cell phone in a public restaurant in Kyiv. They “generally assume mobile communications in Ukraine are being monitored.”
4. Trump’s voice was very loud and discernible (so we can assume others in the restaurant heard it as well), and the two discussed the investigations they wanted from Ukraine.
5. Trump’s voice was so loud, Sondland had to hold his phone away from his ear.
6. At one point, Trump said, “So he’s going to do the investigation.” Sondland replied, “Oh yeah, he’s going to do it.”
7. Holmes says that:

• • Sondland told Trump that Zelensky “loves your ass.”
  • Sondland told Trump that Zelensky would do “anything you ask him to.”
  • The day after Trump asked Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden, Sondland told Trump that Ukraine would open the requested investigations.
  • Sondland confirmed that Trump doesn’t give a shit about Ukraine. He cares more about the investigation into Biden.
  • Sondland and Trump also discussed freeing rapper A$AP Rocky.

8. Holmes reported the call to his supervisor. He also says two other officials (whose names are redacted) were at the lunch.
9. Holmes reported the conversation to the NSC legal advisor John Eisenberg, the same guy Vindman reported his concerns to and the same guy who decided to place the record of the call on a super secret server. Eisenberg did nothing.
10. At a foreign policy meeting, Sondland once said, “Damnit, Rudy. Every time Rudy gets involved he goes and f—s everything up.”
11. Fiona Hill also testified she was concerned about Sondland’s use of his personal cell phone as well as the one issued to him by the government. She felt his communications weren’t secure. He also gave out her own personal cell phone number.