Marie Yovanovitch, the third witness in public impeachment hearings, testified while president tweeted against her
An American ambassador recalled by Donald Trump from Ukraine has told impeachment investigators she felt “shocked and devastated” by Trump’s personal attacks on her, and that she was “amazed” corrupt elements in Ukraine had found willing American partners to take her down.
Related: Democrats to consider Trump Twitter smear in articles of impeachment – live
Continue reading...Exclusive: president’s personal lawyer has emerged as a key figure in the impeachment inquiry, with speculation Republicans will seek to paint him as a rogue actor
Rudy Giuliani, Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, has said he is confident the president will remain loyal to him as an impeachment inquiry unfolds in which the former New York mayor has become a central figure.
But Giuliani joked that he had good “insurance” in case Trump did turn on him, amid speculation Republicans will seek to frame him as a rogue actor.
Continue reading...Democrats say Bill Taylor and George Kent’s testimonies tied Trump to efforts to pressure Ukraine while Republicans say they proved nothing
Trump promised after the August mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton that his administration would propose policies to curb gun violence.
However, the president has yet to release any gun-control proposals, and he has reportedly abandoned the plan in recent weeks.
Trump has been counseled by political advisers, including campaign manager Brad Parscale and acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, that gun legislation could splinter his political coalition, which he needs to stick together for his reelection bid, particularly amid an impeachment battle.
The president no longer asks about the issue, and aides from the Domestic Policy Council, once working on a plan with eight to 12 tenets, have moved on to other topics, according to aides who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private deliberations.
A nearby hospital said it had received two patients in critical condition from the shooting at a high school near Los Angeles, with three more victims en route.
#SaugusHighShooting: We have received 2 patients in critical condition, 3 en route. We will provide updates as they become available.
Santa Clarita is in California’s 25th congressional district, which currently does not have a member in Congress following Katie Hill’s resignation. https://t.co/LpJiHG84Z6
Continue reading...Ukrainian film-maker Oleg Sentsov gives stark assessment of leader’s dictatorial rule
The children of Russian oligarchs learn about freedom in the UK only to return to Moscow to reinforce Vladimir Putin’s dictatorial rule, Oleg Sentsov, a Ukrainian dissident jailed for five years by Russia, has warned in a stark assessment of Putin’s stranglehold on power.
Sentsov, Russia’s most famous political prisoner, was released with 35 other Ukrainians in a high-profile prisoner swap in September, in which an equal number of Russians were released.
Continue reading...Beyond the tussle between Democrat Adam Schiff and Republican Devin Nunes is the big question – will party interest reign supreme?
The battle for American hearts and minds in the unfolding impeachment drama is, at its core, a battle between two very different Californian congressmen.
In the red corner is Devin Nunes, a Republican former dairy farmer from the state’s agricultural Central Valley, who long ago threw his lot in with Fox News talking-point orthodoxy and has never hesitated to defend Donald Trump, no matter how much the rest of the political establishment – and the factual record – was arrayed against him.
Continue reading...Donald Trump cared more about investigating his political rival Joe Biden than the fate of Ukraine, according to dramatic testimony from a key witness in the first impeachment inquiry hearing before the American public. As Adam Schiff, the Democratic chair, gaveled the House intelligence committee into session, cameras from every major network carried the proceedings to millions of Americans, some of whom were encountering the allegations against Trump for the first time
Continue reading...Only three times in the history of the American republic has Congress initiated public testimony that could result in the removal of the president by impeachment. The tally will rise to four on Wednesday.
Related: Lights, camera, impeachment: TV phase of inquiry carries pluses and pitfalls
Continue reading...Accusations levelled by Valeria Gontareva against Ihor Kolomoiskiy provide test for Ukraine’s new president
It is possible that when a car drove into Valeria Gontareva at a pedestrian crossing in Knightsbridge, central London, in late August it was merely an accident.
But soon after, while Gontareva was recovering in hospital, her son’s car was set on fire back home in Kyiv. A few days after that, her family home in the Ukrainian capital was also burned down. For Gontareva there is no doubt that the attacks are part of a disturbing pattern.
Continue reading...Trump’s request that Ukraine help find dirt on Joe Biden has led to an impeachment inquiry – and drawn in multiple people
Democrats announced an official impeachment inquiry into Trump on 24 September following a whistleblower’s complaint about Trump’s interactions with the president of Ukraine. A White House summary of a 25 July call shows Trump pressed Volodymyr Zelenskiy to work with the US attorney general and Rudy Giuliani, to investigate his political rival Joe Biden in the run-up the 2020 US election. Trump told Zelenskiy to look into unfounded and debunked allegations that Biden helped remove a Ukrainian prosecutor who investigated a company tied to his son Hunter.
Continue reading...Congress hears Mulvaney approved Trump-Zelenskiy meeting on condition Ukraine announced investigations tied to Joe Biden
Donald Trump’s acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney approved a White House meeting with the president for the Ukrainian president on condition Ukraine announced investigations tied to Trump’s political rival Joe Biden, according to testimony released on Friday.
Related: Trump impeachment inquiry: Mick Mulvaney implicated in released transcripts – live
Continue reading...Various legal protections exist but the president’s aggressive response risks eroding a crucial check on official wrongdoing
Donald Trump and his allies have publicly attacked a whistleblower who filed a complaint about the president’s dealings with his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and triggered a chain of events that led to an impeachment inquiry of the president.
Related: Ukraine crisis put on ice by Trump staff busy working out how to buy Greenland
Continue reading...Senior state department official George Kent says the president had a very specific demand for his Ukrainian counterpart
Donald Trump wanted to hear three words out of the Ukrainian president’s mouth, according to newly released testimony in the US impeachment inquiry: “investigations”, “Biden” and “Clinton”.
Related: Michael Bloomberg reportedly preparing for presidential run – live
Continue reading...State and defence departments wanted military aid restored, but the Greenland issue ‘took up a lot of energy’, new testimony reveals
After the White House cut off military aid to Ukraine, Donald Trump’s top officials scrambled to get it restored but were unable to organise a meeting with the president, in part because his staff were too busy pursuing his interest in buying Greenland, according to newly released congressional testimony.
The acting US ambassador to Ukraine, Bill Taylor, told Congress that Trump’s order in mid-July to cut off security assistance triggered a series of high-level meetings with cabinet members on how to get it resumed, given the urgency of the Russian military intervention in eastern Ukraine.
Continue reading...US officials said Trump would not ‘sign a check’ for military aid without investigation into Joe Biden, Bill Taylor tells inquiry
For a second time in two days, newly released testimony in the impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump has produced a firsthand account of US officials negotiating a quid pro quo in Ukraine in which military aid would be used to pay for a political hit against Joe Biden, the president’s potential 2020 adversary.
Related: Trump-Ukraine scandal: Taylor transcript details direct quid pro quo via irregular channels – live
Continue reading...EU envoy acknowledges in updated testimony he told Ukraine it would likely not receive aid unless it announced investigations into Trump’s rivals
Republican Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell appears to have bulldozed directly through protocol by forecasting, before the articles of impeachment have even been drafted in the House and Trump put on trial in the Senate, that the president will be acquitted.
“If it were today, I don’t think there’s any question — it would not lead to a removal,” @SenateMajLdr McConnell says of a potential impeachment trial in the Senate.
/2 McConnell: “I’m pretty sure I know how it’s going to end.” Says Trump will be acquitted by Senate like Clinton & Andrew Johnson
Sondland was asked, with respect to the “demands” made by Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani to investigate the 2016 election and Burisma, if “those conditions would have to be complied with prior to getting a meeting.”
Continue reading...Testimony of veteran diplomat Marie Yovanovitch exposes Trump’s paralysing hold on the administration
What shines through the testimony of Marie Yovanovitch is her disorientation. She is a veteran diplomat at the peak of her career, and in one of the most challenging but important posts in US foreign policy. But she had no clue what was happening inside her own government.
On 24 April this year, she received a call from Carol Perez, the director general of the foreign service, speaking to her in cryptic tones as if Yovanovitch’s life was in danger if she remained at her ambassadorial post in Kyiv. She spoke as if there was a threat too awful to describe clearly on a phone line.
Continue reading...Two senior American diplomats warned congressional investigators a White House plot to manufacture political dirt on Joe Biden in Ukraine had undermined US national security interests and shredded faith among foreign service personnel, according to transcripts released on Monday by committees pursuing an impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump.
Related: Trump rejects whistleblower offer to answer Republican questions
Continue reading...The former Texas congressman has had low polling numbers and his campaign has been under financial strain
Beto O’Rourke was once a front runner in the Democratic primaries, who raised huge amounts of money from small donors across the country.
Related: Beto O'Rourke withdraws from Democratic race to face Trump
Following in the footsteps of Joan Didion, and Meghan Daum and Luc Sante – Donald Trump has penned his own version of the “Goodbye New York” essay after announcing yesterday that he had changed his primary residence from Manhattan to Mar-a-lago.
“I love New York, but New York can never be great again,” he begins. Like so many bigly figures in the literary world, Trump has written about that bittersweet feeling of leaving the iconic city.
I love New York, but New York can never be great again under the current leadership of Governor Andrew Cuomo (the brother of Fredo), or Mayor Bill DeBlasio. Cuomo has weaponized the prosecutors to do his dirty work (and to keep him out of jams), a reason some don’t want to be...
Continue reading...Tim Morrison is at closed-door testimony following last night’s reports that the official is stepping down from his post at the White House
Nancy Pelosi rather unusually presided over the House herself this morning as members began to debate the impeachment resolution.
.@SpeakerPelosi taking the unusual step of presiding over the House herself as they begin debate on the procedures for the impeachment inquiry going forward
Tim Morrison, the national security council official currently testifying behind closed doors in the impeachment inquiry, reportedly intends to confirm Bill Taylor’s account that the White House held up Ukraine’s military assistance to push for public announcements of investigations into Joe Biden and the 2016 election.
The Washington Post reports:
Morrison is expected to tell impeachment investigators on Thursday that the account offered by Ambassador William B. Taylor Jr., is accurate, particularly that Morrison alerted him to the president’s and his deputies’ push to withhold security aid and a meeting with the Ukrainian president until Ukraine announced an investigation of the Bidens and 2016 election interference, the person said on the condition of anonymity to describe sensitive discussions.
Morrison will also say that he did not necessarily view the president’s demands as improper or illegal, but rather problematic for U.S. policy in supporting an ally in the region, the person said.
House committees leading the impeachment inquiry reportedly intend to call Donald Trump’s former national security adviser
The interior department is grounding its entire fleet of drones due to security concerns, the Wall Street Journal reported.
With more than 800 aerial drones, the department has one of the largest fleets in the federal government.
US officials worry that the country’s reliance on Chinese drones may be putting critical US infrastructure at risk. They are concerned the drones may be sending information back to the Chinese government or hackers elsewhere to use for cyberattacks or other offenses.
Hello, Kari Paul here in San Francisco, taking over the blog for the next few hours. More news to come shortly.
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