Eisenberg is expected to testify Monday.
White House lawyer moved transcript of Trump call to classified server after Ukraine adviser raised alarms
By Carol D. Leonnig, Tom Hamburger and Greg Miller
Oct. 30, 2019 at 10:50 p.m. EDT
Moments after President Trump ended his phone call with Ukraine’s president on July 25, an unsettled national security aide rushed to the office of White House lawyer John Eisenberg.
Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the top Ukraine adviser at the White House, had been listening to the call and was disturbed by the pressure Trump had applied to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate his political rivals, according to people familiar with Vindman’s testimony to lawmakers this week.
Vindman told Eisenberg, the White House’s legal adviser on national security issues, that what the president did was wrong, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation.
Scribbling notes on a yellow legal pad, Eisenberg proposed a step that other officials have said is at odds with long-standing White House protocol: moving a transcript of the call to a highly classified server and restricting access to it, according to two people familiar with Vindman’s account.
The details of how the White House clamped down on information about the controversial call comes as the House impeachment inquiry turns its focus to the role of Eisenberg, who has served as deputy White House counsel since the start of Trump’s administration. House impeachment investigators on Wednesday evening announced they have asked Eisenberg and a fellow White House lawyer, Mike Ellis, to testify Monday.
On Thursday, the House is scheduled to vote on rules governing the next phase of the inquiry and hear from Tim Morrison, a former deputy to national security adviser John Bolton. Bolton has also been asked to testify next week.
Vindman’s account marks the first known instance in which a witness before the impeachment inquiry has provided a firsthand account linking Eisenberg to the decision to move the problematic transcript to a highly classified server.
more:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-house-lawyer-moved-transcript-of-trump-call-to-classified-server-after-ukraine-adviser-raised-alarms/2019/10/30/ba0fbdb6-fb4e-11e9-8190-6be4deb56e01_story.html
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