TheEconomistNovember 23rd 2019 271A
n oddity ofPresident Donald Trump’s
defence against the allegation that he
hijacked American policy towards Ukraine
in search of a political advantage is that he
admitted much of what he was accused of
from the start. Even as his defenders de-
nied he had offered President Volodymyr
Zelensky a quid pro quo—military aid in re-
turn for a corruption investigation into a
son of Joe Biden—Mr Trump released an
edited transcript of a call between the two
leaders that suggested this was precisely
what he had done. The testimony given to
the House impeachment inquiry on No-
vember 20th by Gordon Sondland, Mr
Trump’s ambassador to the European Un-
ion, suggests this was a savvy tactic.
Facing a possible charge of lying to Con-
gress—on account of his previous testimo-
ny—Mr Sondland went all in. Good-rela-
tions-for-investigations is exactly what Mr
Zelensky was offered, said the Trump polit-
ical appointee and hotel magnate. To get an
Oval Office meeting with Mr Trump, Mr Ze-
lensky needed to announce the opening of
two investigations: one into Hunter Bi-
den—who once sat on the board of a Ukrai-
nian energy firm, Burisma—and another
into a debunked conspiracy theory that Uk-
raine, not Russia, was responsible for
cyber-meddling in America’s 2016 election.
Mr Sondland said he had heard this
from Rudy Giuliani, the president’s lawyer
and fixer: “Mr Giuliani’s requests were a
quid prod quo.” He said he was not express-
ly told, but had assumed, that Mr Trump
also held up $391m of military aid to Uk-
raine shortly before his call with Mr Zelen-
sky as part of the same attempted bargain.
Previous witnesses to the impeachment
probe being conducted by the House Intel-
ligence Committee had characterised the
disruption in American policy towards Uk-
raine in similar terms. Yet, in the absence
of higher-level testimony, some Republi-
cans had tried to characterise this as arogue play by middle-rankers. Not so, said
Mr Sondland. He had discussed Mr Trump’s
proposal to Mr Zelensky with Vice-Presi-
dent Mike Pence; Mike Pompeo, the secre-
tary of state; and Mick Mulvaney, the White
House chief of staff. “We followed the pres-
ident’s orders,” he said. “Everyone was in
the loop. It was no secret.”
The response of Adam Schiff, the Demo-
cratic chairman of the committee, was also
significant. He asked Mr Sondland to con-
firm, as the ambassador then seemed to,
that Mr Trump was asking Mr Zelensky to
do him a valuable favour. The Democrats
seem to believe this will support an im-
peachment charge of attempted bribery. Mr
Schiff also hinted at another charge, con-
tempt of Congress (the third count against
Richard Nixon), when he lamented that the
administration had refused to release Mr
Sondland’s documents as evidence.
Mr Schiff’s Republican counterpart De-
vin Nunes appeared not to know what had
hit him. His earlier remarks to Mr Son-
dland, in which he commiserated with him
on being drawn into the Democrats’ “sham
impeachment”, suggested he did not ex-
pect him to cause trouble. Instead Mr Son-
dland, looking relaxed and good-hu-
moured, had blown up many of the
defences Republicans have tried to sur-
round Mr Trump with. Had the president
himself denied the allegations againstPre-impeachment
They were all in on it
WASHINGTON, DC
Donald Trump’s hand-picked ambassador to the European Union weakens
Republican defences against impeachment
United States
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32 Lexington: ImpoochmentAlso in this section