During a call on July 25, President Trump asked President Zelensky of Ukraine to “do us a favor though” and investigate his political opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, and a debunked conspiracy theory that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 U.S. election. The next day, Ambassador Gordon Sondland informed President Trump that President Zelensky “was gonna do the investigation” and “anything” President Trump asked of him.
Overview
During a telephone call on July 25, 2019, President Donald J. Trump asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate his political rival, former Vice President Joseph Biden, and a debunked conspiracy theory that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 U.S. election. President Trump also discussed the removal of Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, said that she was “bad news,” and warned that she would “go through some things.” Two witnesses who listened to the call testified that they immediately reported the details of the call to senior White House lawyers.
When asked by a reporter on October 3, 2019, what he had hoped President Zelensky would do following the call, President Trump responded: “Well, I would think that, if they were honest about it, they’d start a major investigation into the Bidens. It’s a very simple answer.”
Witnesses unanimously testified that President Trump’s claims about former Vice President Biden and alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election have been discredited. The witnesses reaffirmed that in late 2015 and early 2016, when former Vice President Biden advocated for the removal of a corrupt Ukrainian prosecutor, he acted in accordance with a “broad-based consensus” and the official policy of the United States, the European Union, and major international financial institutions. Witnesses also unanimously testified that the removal of that prosecutor made it more likely that Ukraine would investigate corruption, not less likely.
Dr. Fiona Hill, former Deputy Assistant to the President and Senior Director for European and Russian Affairs at the National Security Council, testified that the conspiracy theories about Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election touted by President Trump are a “fictional narrative that is being perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services.” She noted that President Trump’s former Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert and former National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster repeatedly advised the President that the so-called “CrowdStrike” conspiracy theory that President Trump raised in the July 25 call is completely “debunked,” and that allegations Ukraine interfered in the 2016 U.S. election are false.
Nonetheless, on July 26, 2019, U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland met with senior Ukrainian officials in Kyiv and then informed President Trump that President Zelensky “was gonna do the investigation” into former Vice President Biden and
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