President Donald Trump and some of the loyalists in his administration — including White House Counsel Pat Cipollone — have been encouraging associates to defy subpoenas and not cooperate with House Democrats in their impeachment inquiry. But some Trump associates have testified nonetheless, including Marie Yovanovitch (former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine) and Fiona Hill (formerly Trump’s top adviser on Russia-related matters). And journalist Andrew Feinberg, a Washington, D.C. correspondent for The Independent, discussed these testimonies with former Watergate special prosecutor Nick Akerman.
During the Watergate scandal of the 1970s, Akerman was a major thorn in the side of President Richard Nixon. And Feinberg asked Akerman to weigh in on the fact that Yovanovitch, Hill and others have been willing to testify despite people in the Trump Administration asking them not to.
“The fact is, these people aren’t beholden to Donald Trump,” Akerman told Feinberg. “They’ve been subpoenaed, and that overrides Trump’s counsel’s statement. They have to obey the subpoena.”
View the complete October 16 article by Alex Anderson on the AlterNet website here.