Mr. Morrison testified that he attempted to gather the “the right group of principals” to meet with the President but was unable to do so because of scheduling issues.443 According to Mr. Morrison, the next possible opportunity was during a trip to Warsaw, Poland at the beginning of September, but President Trump did not end up making that trip.444
Ms. Cooper recalled receiving an email at the end of August from Secretary of Defense Esper referencing a meeting or discussion with the President, and that there was “no decision on Ukraine.”445
Ukrainian Officials Learned About the Hold in July 2019
Witnesses testified that officials in the Ukraine government knew of President Trump’s hold on security assistance before it was publicly reported in the press on August 28, 2019. Ms. Croft testified that after July 18—when the hold was announced by OMB at the interagency meeting—it was “inevitable that it was eventually going to come out.”446
Two individuals from the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, D.C., approached Ms. Croft approximately a week apart “quietly and in confidence to ask me about an OMB hold on Ukraine security assistance.”447 Ms. Croft could not precisely recall the dates of these conversations, but testified that she was “very surprised at the effectiveness of my Ukrainian counterparts’ diplomatic tradecraft, as in to say they found out very early on or much earlier than I expected them to.”448
Ms. Croft explained that the Ukrainian officials came to her quietly because they would not want the hold to become public:
- I think that if this were public in Ukraine it would be seen as a reversal of our policy and would, just to say sort of candidly and colloquially, this would be a really big deal, it would be a really big deal in Ukraine, and an expression of declining U.S. support for Ukraine.449
DOD also received questions from the Ukraine Embassy about the status of the military assistance. Ms. Cooper testified that those occurred on July 25, 2019—the same day as President Trump’s call with President Zelensky:
- On July 25th, a member of my staff got a question from a Ukraine Embassy contact asking what was going on with Ukraine security assistance, because at that time, we did not know what the guidance was on USAI [DOD-administered funds]. The OMB notice of apportionment arrived that day, but this staff member did not find out about it until later. I was informed that the staff member told the Ukrainian official that we were moving forward on USAI, but recommended that the Ukraine Embassy check in with State regarding the FMF [State Department-administered funds].450
On July 25, Ms. Cooper’s staff received two emails from the State Department revealing that the Ukrainian Embassy was “asking about security assistance” and that “the Hill knows about the FMF situation to an extent, and so does the Ukrainian Embassy.”451
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