Tag: Gordon Sondland

Sondland testimony looms over impeachment hearings this week

The Hill logoDramatic testimony from U.S. diplomats working in Ukraine have significantly raised the stakes for this week’s impeachment inquiry appearance from Gordon Sondland, the mega-donor to President Trump who is now the U.S. ambassador to the European Union.

Sondland is expected to come under tough questioning from Democrats and Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday after shifting his initial statement in the inquiry to acknowledge it was his belief that Trump linked Ukrainian security assistance to that country announcing investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

Testimony last week from William Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, has also put a new spotlight on Sondland. Taylor testified that one of his staffers overheard Sondland speaking with Trump about the desired investigations into Biden and 2016 election interference.

View the complete November 18 article by Cristina Marcos on The Hill website here.

How rich people like Gordon Sondland buy their way to being US ambassadors – 4 questions answered

In every other developed democratic country, the role of ambassador, with only very rare exceptions, is given to career diplomats who have spent decades learning the art of international relations.

In the U.S., however, many ambassadors are untrained in diplomacy, and have simply bought their way into a prestigious post.

The involvement of the American ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, in the Ukraine scandal has prompted interest in the media and Congress in the role of non-career ambassadors like him.

View the complete November 18 article by Dennis Jett, Professor of International Affairs at Pennsylvania State University on the Conversation website here.

Lawmakers spar over upcoming Sondland testimony

The Hill logoPresident Trump’s allies and critics on Sunday took differing views of the implications of U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland‘s testimony in the House’s impeachment inquiry, with Democrats saying Sondland’s upcoming appearance will show that Trump solicited a bribe and Republicans disputing his statements about a quid pro quo.

Sondland is scheduled to testify in front of the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday.

Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.) told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that Sondland’s public testimony will demonstrate that Trump solicited a bribe.

View the complete November 17 article by Zack Budryk on The Hill website here.

Top NSC aide puts Sondland at front lines of Ukraine campaign, speaking for Trump

The Hill logoA senior White House official told House impeachment investigators last month that President Trump‘s hand-picked ambassador to Europe had pushed — on behalf of Trump himself — for Ukraine’s president to launch two investigations that could help Trump politically.

Tim Morrison, a top aide at the National Security Council (NSC) who was expected to depart the White House after his testimony, said Gordon Sondland, U.S. ambassador to the E.U., had huddled with a top Ukrainian representative on Sept. 1, when he relayed the message that the release of U.S. military aid to the besieged country hinged on Kyiv opening the investigations Trump sought. 

“What he communicated was that he believed … what could help them move the aid was if the prosecutor general would go to the mic and announce that he was opening the Burisma investigation,” Morrison testified privately on Oct. 31, according to the transcript released Saturday by Democrats leading the impeachment investigation.

View the complete November 16 article by Olivia Beavers, Mike Lillis and Morgan Chalfant on The Hill website here.

Senior national security official ties key official more closely to Trump on Ukraine in impeachment inquiry

Washington Post logoA former White House national security official told House investigators that Gordon Sondland, ambassador to the European Union, was acting at President Trump’s behest and spoke to a top Ukrainian official about exchanging military aid for political investigations — two elements at the heart of the impeachment inquiry.

Tim Morrison, the top Russia and Europe adviser on the National Security Council, testified that between July 16 and Sept. 11, he understood that Sondland had spoken to Trump about half a dozen times, according to a transcript of his sworn Oct. 31 deposition released by House committees Saturday. Trump has said he does not know Sondland well and has tried to distance himself from the E.U. ambassador, whom Trump put in charge of Ukraine policy along with two others, even though Ukraine is not part of the European Union.

“His mandate from the president was to go make deals,” Morrison said of Sondland.

View the complete November 16 article by Colby Itkowitz, Karoun Demirjian, Michael Kranish and Shane Harris on The Washington Post website here.

Impeachment witness provides firsthand account of hearing Trump demand ‘investigation’ of Bidens by Ukraine

Washington Post logoPresident Trump specifically inquired about political investigations he wanted carried out by Ukraine during a July phone call with a top U.S. diplomat who then told colleagues that the president was most interested in a probe into former vice president Joe Biden and his son, a State Department aide said Friday in closed-door testimony that could significantly advance House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry.

David Holmes, an embassy staffer in Kyiv, testified that he overheard a July 26 phone call in which Trump pressed U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland about whether Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would “do the investigation,” according to three people who have read his opening statement and spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe its contents.

“Ambassador Sondland replied that ‘he’s gonna do it,’ adding that President Zelensky will do ‘anything you ask him to,’ ” Holmes said, according to these people.

View the complete November 15 article by Karoun Demirjian, Rachael Bade, John Hudson and Toluse Olorunnipa on The Washington Post website here.

Trump is throwing Sondland under the bus. But the new spin has a fatal defect.

Washington Post logoThe plight of Gordon Sondland is an object lesson in the perils awaiting those who get sucked under by the gravitational pull of Trump’s bottomless corruption and narcissism but fall just short of displaying absolute loyalty and subservience to the Trump cause.

Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, is now getting accused by at least one Trump loyalist of fabricating his latest round of testimony in league with Democrats — even though Sondland is a top Trump donor. And another leading Trump sycophant is questioning Sondland’s credibility, something Trump himself tried to do at a rally on Thursday night.

But the new story that Trump and his loyalists are telling about Sondland is deeply flawed: It elides a mountain of evidence that’s already out there on the public record, as will be explained below.

View the complete November 15 commentary by Greg Sargent on The Washington Post website here.

A second State Department official overheard Trump’s call with E.U. envoy discussing Ukraine and ‘investigations’

Washington Post logoHouse Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday that testimony presented by two career diplomats during Wednesday’s open impeachment hearing “corroborated evidence of bribery” by President Trump in his relations with Ukraine.

Her comments come as Democrats seek to build a case that Trump sought to withhold military assistance and an Oval Office meeting until Ukraine announced investigations into former vice president Joe Biden and his son, as well as an unfounded theory that Ukrainians interfered in the 2016 presidential election to hurt Trump.

Meanwhile, it was learned Thursday that a second official from the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv was present when U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland spoke on a July 26 phone call from Ukraine with Trump that more directly ties the president to his administration’s effort to pressure Ukraine’s new leadership.

View the complete November 14 article by John Wagner, Felicia Sonmez and Colby Itkowitz on The Washington Post website here.

Diplomat ties Trump closer to Ukraine furor

The Hill logoThe top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine on Wednesday offered a long and intricate account of President Trump’s “highly irregular” foreign policy in Kyiv, providing new details of the episode — ones that appeared to boost Democrats’ case — in the first public hearing of their impeachment inquiry.

House Democrats left the open hearing buzzing about the new developments provided by William Taylor, U.S. chargé d’affaires for Ukraine, during his nearly five-hour appearance on Capitol Hill.

In measured and detailed testimony, Taylor more strongly tied Trump to the push for investigations meant to benefit the president, revealing that a member of his staff overheard a conversation between Trump and U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland the day after the president’s July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

View the complete November 13 article by Olivia Beavers, Morgan Chalfant and Mike Lillis on The Hill website here.

Taylor testifies Trump cared more about ‘investigations’ than Ukraine

The Hill logoWilliam Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, on Wednesday said that U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland told a member of his staff in July that President Trump cared more about an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden than he did about Ukraine.

Taylor described the conversation relayed to him last week by a member of his staff during his opening remarks at the first hearing in the House impeachment inquiry on Wednesday.

According to Taylor, the conversation took place on July 26, the day after a phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in which Trump raised investigations into the 2016 election interference and the Biden family. Taylor said his staffer, who he did not name, overheard a phone call between Sondland and Trump during which the president asked the EU ambassador about the investigations.

View the complete November 13 article by Morgan Chalfant on The Hill website here.