Embassy Official Confirms Trump Asked About Ukraine Investigations
The official, David Holmes, also said that he was told President Trump cared more about the investigations than about Ukraine.
By Nicholas Fandos
Nov. 15, 2019
Updated 6:28 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON — An official from the United States Embassy in Kiev confirmed to House impeachment investigators on Friday that he overheard a call between President Trump and a top American diplomat in July in which the president inquired about investigations he wanted from Ukraine, according to three people familiar with the testimony.
The official, David Holmes, testified privately that he was at a restaurant in Ukraine’s capital when he heard Mr. Trump during a cellphone call loudly asking Gordon D. Sondland, the American ambassador to the European Union, if Ukraine’s president had agreed to conduct investigations into his political rivals. Mr. Sondland, who was in Kiev for meetings with top Ukrainian officials at the time, replied in the affirmative.
Mr. Sondland told Mr. Trump that President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine “loves your ass,” and would conduct the investigations and “anything you ask him to,” according to two of the people, who described his testimony on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss it.
After the call ended, Mr. Holmes asked it if was true that the president did not care about Ukraine, the people said. The ambassador replied that Mr. Trump cared only about the “big stuff,” like investigations that his personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani was pushing for, because they affected him personally.
The call took place on July 26, one day after Mr. Trump personally pressed Mr. Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his son Hunter, as well as unproven allegations that Ukraine conspired with Democrats to interfere in the 2016 election.
more:
http://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/15/us/politics/trump-ambassador-sondland-ukraine-call.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
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