THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 14 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A
HOUSE IMPEACHMENT HEARINGS
about the investigations,”
Sondland replied, according to
Taylor’s testimony Wednesday.
Republicans tried at times to
knock the diplomats off their
position or at least to demean
their testimony as third-hand
whispers about what the
president might have thought.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), newly
installed to the panel for his
bulldog style, lived up to that
reputation with rapid-fire
questions that few people in
attendance could follow, let alone
the witnesses.
In one exchange Jordan sent a
copy of Sondland’s testimony to
Taylor and started rattling off
questions before Taylor finally
interjected: “Mr. Jordan, should I
read this?”
Jordan explained that he
would read it and then ask
questions. “Oh, very good, very
good,” Taylor responded.
When he slowed down, Jordan
made the GOP’s strongest point
of the day by focusing on the facts
that Zelensky never publicly
stated that he would investigate
Burisma, the energy company
that placed former vice president
Joe Biden’s son on its board in
2014, and that by Sept. 11 the
security aid was released to Kyiv.
“Your clear understanding was
obviously wrong because it didn’t
happen. President Zelensky
didn’t announce he was going to
investigate Burisma or the
Bidens,” Jordan said.
When Democrats pushed too
far, Taylor and Kent pushed back,
diplomatically.
Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-
Ill.) raised concerns that the
“irregular channels” of Ukraine
diplomacy that the diplomats
derided in their testimony might
be happening in other corners of
the State Department.
“I’ve not heard of any other
separate channel that has this
kind of influence,” Taylor said.
“I have no basis to make a
determination,” Kent replied.
That might not have been
dramatic, but most Democrats
came away pleased with their
overall demeanor.
“I appreciate how you
endeavor to stay out of the fray, to
relate what you heard, what you
saw without additional
commentary,” Schiff said. “That is
as it should be.”
[email protected]President Reagan to President
Trump,” he said in opening his
testimony.
Taylor brought with him one
piece of new information,
revealing that one of his aides in
Kyiv just told him about a phone
conversation July 26 between
Trump and the ambassador to
the European Union, Gordon
Sondland.
That came the day after
Trump’s now-famous call with
Ukraine President Volodymyr
Zelensky in which, according to a
partial transcript released by the
White House, the president asked
Zelensky to “do us a favor” to
conduct investigations into his
political rivals.
On that call, Taylor’s aide could
hear the president’s voice, and
afterward the aide inquired
about Trump’s views of Ukraine.
“President Trump cares moreduring World War II, including
one who survived the Bataan
Death March only to end up
spending three years in Japanese
prisoner of war camps.
“Indeed, there has been a
George Kent sworn to defend the
Constitution continuously for
nearly 60 years, ever since my
father reported to Annapolis for
his plebe summer,” Kent said.
Taylor outlined more than 50
years of service, starting as a
cadet at the U.S. Military
Academy and then as an infantry
officer with the 101st Airborne
Division in Vietnam. He worked
at the Energy Department, on the
Senate staff and at NATO, before
joining the State Department for
stints that included a previous
tenure as ambassador to Ukraine.
“I am nonpartisan and have
been appointed to my positions
by every president fromcondition of anonymity to
discuss a private meeting.
“You exemplify so many
courageous men and women who
serve in the diplomatic corps,
who’ve served in our military,
who represent the United States
so well around the world,” Rep.
Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.),
chairman of the House
Intelligence Committee, said as
the hearing wrapped up.
From their opening
statements, the diplomats tried
to set the tone by each outlining
their long tenures in public
service and their families’ history
in the military, giving them an
extra amount of heft before a 22-
member committee in which
only three lawmakers served in
the military and another in the
CIA before coming to Congress.
Five of Kent’s great-uncles
served in the Navy and Armytestimony in what will be a few
weeks of open hearings, as laying
the foundation to impeach
Trump over his intervention into
Ukrainian affairs. Taylor and
Kent testified that Trump
pressuring Ukrainian officials to
launch investigations into
Democratic rivals violated their
understanding of diplomatic
norms and that his personal
intervention in delaying nearly
$400 million in security aid
violated several decades of
bipartisan foreign policy.
That their testimony came
across a bit dry at times
reinforced what House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) called “a
prayerful day for all of us” in a
closed-door Democratic caucus
meeting before Wednesday’s
hearing started, according to the
notes of a Democrat in the room.
The person spoke on theThey looked the
part.
If President
Trump were to
cast the characters for career U.S.
diplomats specializing in Eastern
Europe, William B. Taylor Jr. and
George Kent would have made
the cut.
Taylor, the acting ambassador
to Ukraine, and Kent, a deputy
assistant secretary at the State
Department, delivered the sort of
analytical and sedate testimony
that comes with decades
stationed abroad in locations
that only make it onto the
domestic news if something has
gone horribly wrong.
During more than 5^1 / 2 hours of
testimony before the House
Intelligence Committee,
Democrats found two witnesses
who came across as experts in
their field, looking and sounding
as if they knew far more about
the subject matter than any
member of the committee on
either side of the dais.
Kent sported a bow tie, with a
three-piece suit, while Taylor
wore a traditional dark power
suit that was amplified with a
booming voice that some TV
viewers likened to America’s
most famous 20th-century
newsman, Walter Cronkite.
They aren’t household names
and lacked the blockbuster
revelations — there was no
disclosure of secret White House
tapes, like there was in the
Watergate hearings in 1973 — but
Taylor and Kent brought to life
the story that Democrats have
been telling only in bits and
pieces.
Even Trump’s staunchest allies
vouched for their character when
the testimony concluded.
“They’re credible public
servants,” Rep. Mark Meadows
(R-N.C.), who watched the
hearing in a seat behind the
media, told reporters afterward.
He quickly suggested they
lacked credibility because they
never spoke directly to Trump or
to other senior White House
officials, dismissing their story as
hearsay evidence as most GOP
members of the committee had
done. Meadows even belittled
their testimony as a bit boring.
“More people were yawning
than applauding,” Meadows said.
But Democrats saw these
witnesses, the first public
In opening testimony, Democrats find an air of authority in diplomats’ accounts
@PKCapitol
PAUL KANE
MATT MCCLAIN/THE WASHINGTON POST
George Kent, a deputy assistant secretary of state, leaves after he and William B. Taylor Jr., the acting ambassador to Ukraine, testified
Wednesday before the House Intelligence Committee. Both outlined their long tenures in public service and families’ military history.lution setting up the Senate pro-
cess.
“Given articles of impeach-
ment haven’t even been drafted,
it’s impossible to know what ei-
ther side would want a trial to
look like,” said a person familiar
with Schumer’s thinking, who
spoke on the condition of ano-
nymity to discuss strategy.
Schumer declined Wednesday to
discuss his next steps but warned
that a trial should not be “trun-
cated.”
McConnell’s general template
remains the Senate impeachment
trial of Clinton in early 1999,
which lasted five weeks and had a
bipartisan consensus at its start
about how it would proceed, ac-
cording to McConnell’s aides and
allies.
Discussions on Senate rules in
1999 broke down repeatedly be-
fore the chamber finally agreed
on a compromise by a margin of
100-to-0.
An initial proposal by Sens.
Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.)
and Slade Gorton (R-Wash.) to
make a full trial contingent on a
two-thirds supermajority finding
Clinton’s alleged offenses im-
peachable faced fierce objection
from Republicans.
“When I presented it to the
Republican conference, they did
everything but stone me and
throw me out in the hall,” said
former senator Trent Lott (Miss.),
who was then the Republican
leader.
A compromise was reached
later in a closed-door meeting for
all senators in the Old Senate
Chamber, when Sens. Phil
Gramm (R-Tex.) and Edward M.
Kennedy (D-Mass.) agreed they
should start the trial before de-
ciding whether witnesses would
be called before the full body.
Lott said McConnell and
Schumer might have a more chal-
lenging time striking a deal.
“This is a different situation,”
he said. “You do have a divided
Congress. You do have a presi-
dent who has agitated a lot of
people.”
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]Sean Sullivan and Rachael Bade
contributed to this report.could side with Democrats to
force a process that Democrats
accept as fair, according to a
person familiar with Republican
discussions.
A separate group of centrist
Senate Republicans facing tough
reelection fights next year have
been telling McConnell and col-
leagues that they do not want the
process to be rushed, worrying
that any move to quickly dispense
with a trial risks giving their
Democratic opponents an open-
ing to say they did not take their
duties seriously.
That view has been bolstered
by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who
has privately told conservative
colleagues they must give breath-
ing room to Republicans running
in 2020 and let the trial play out
for at least a few weeks, according
to two Republican aides briefed
on the talks, who spoke on the
condition of anonymity to dis-
cuss the internal deliberations.
“This is going to require a great
deal of work, and I don’t think it
should be rushed through,” said
Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine),
who is up for reelection in 2020.
Collins said any attempt to dis-
miss impeachment at the outset
of a trial would be met with vocal
opposition by a “lot of senators,
who’d have misgivings and reser-
vations about treating articles of
impeachment that way.”
On the other hand, several
Trump allies are planning to pre-
pare a motion to dismiss that
they could propose early on dur-
ing a trial.
“The sooner we’re done with
this, the better,” said Sen. Rand
Paul (R-Ky.). “Why just have peo-
ple sitting around for this parti-
san sham? As soon as we possibly
can dismiss this or vote along
party lines, especially if the Dem-
ocrats in the House limit the
witnesses, I’ll move to do that.”
Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) also
dismissed the prospect of a
lengthy trial, saying a “week is
more than enough.”
Senate Minority Leader
Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) has
been talking with Democratic
senators, including those run-
ning for president, to decide the
best way to approach any negoti-
ation with McConnell about
whether Democrats join in a reso-Judiciary Committee, about the
outlook in the chamber. Newly
hired White House aides who are
working on impeachment issues
have also been meeting with Sen-
ate GOP staffers this month.
McConnell has not publicly
committed to a timeline for a
trial. “I think it’s impossible to
predict how long we’ll be on it or
predict which motions would
pass,” the GOP leader said
Wednesday.
But McConnell will not be able
to set the schedule in isolation.
The rules for an impeachment
trial, including a process for call-
ing witnesses, must be passed by
51 or more senators, since Pence
is not able to cast a deciding vote
on the question. That gives McCo-
nnell, who oversees a 53-seat
Republican majority, relatively
little room to maneuver.
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah)
has been a sharp critic of Trump’s
behavior on Ukraine, and more
independent-minded senators,
like Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska),ly the responsibility we have,”
said Sen. John Thune (S.D.), the
second-ranking Senate Republi-
can. “How long that takes is an
open question... but I suspect
that, you know, it’d go on for a
while.”
Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.),
who has speculated publicly that
a Senate trial could run as long as
eight weeks, argued during the
lunch that former president Bill
Clinton’s impeachment proceed-
ings in the Senate took five weeks
but that Trump’s case was likely
to take more time because he has
not admitted to any wrongdoing.
Clinton “admitted that he had
lied to the FBI,” Burr said before
the lunch. “I figured it’s going to
take longer for them to make a
case, because they don’t have
that.”
One White House official said
the president is not yet concen-
trating on a trial but has spoken
with McConnell, Vice President
Pence and Sen. Lindsey O. Gra-
ham (R-S.C.), the chairman of thewhen Republicans speculated
about whether the House would
hand over the process to them
either before or after Christmas,
according to multiple people in
attendance.
Inside the lunch, McConnell
had little guidance for his ranks,
outside of saying the trial will go
on as long as the Senate wants it
to run, said the people, who spoke
on the condition of anonymity to
share details from the private
meeting.
But McConnell’s deputies, as
well as most of his ranks, believe
a longer trial is the likelier out-
come — which they say would
give Trump and his defense team
sufficient time to make his case.
Cornyn said Wednesday that it
would be difficult to find a major-
ity in the Senate to dismiss the
trial early on, even if the presi-
dent’s attorneys request it, “be-
fore the evidence is presented.”
“I think the consensus in our
conference is at least that we
need to proceed and take serious-dential candidates who have no
official role in the process.
“Pete Buttigieg and Joe Biden
might like that,” Cornyn said of
the mayor of South Bend, Ind.,
and the former vice president,
who now poll in the top four in
Iowa with Sens. Elizabeth War-
ren (D-Mass.) and Bernie Sanders
(I-Vt.).
There is an emerging divide
among Republicans, however,
over timing. While some Republi-
cans favor a lengthy trial as a
means of defending President
Trump and creating problems for
Democrats, others are calling for
swift dismissal or final vote.
The Democratic senators who
remain in the presidential race
have all said publicly that the
impeachment proceedings are
more important than political
concerns. But advisers to multi-
ple candidates have been inquir-
ing about the potential timing
behind the scenes, and Sanders
has spoken about the potential
challenges of an extended trial if
the Democratic-controlled House
votes to impeach Trump and
sends the case to the Senate.
“We will do our best to get back
to Iowa, to get to New Hamp-
shire, to get to all the states that
we have to,” Sanders said Sunday
at an event in Charles City, Iowa,
when asked about a potential
trial in January. “But there’s no
question it will make our life a
little bit more difficult.”
Warren said Wednesday that
she has “constitutional responsi-
bilities” and “if the House goes
forward and sends impeachment
over to the Senate, then I will be
there for the trial.”
One top adviser to a senator
running for president, who spoke
on the condition of anonymity to
discuss strategy, said the cam-
paign was already rearranging
fundraising and campaign sched-
ules to prepare for a trial.
“We’ve been all but told that
January is when we should ex-
pect not to have them,” the person
said. “And that in December is
when we should expect to have
them.”
The issue of trial length came
up during a closed-door lunch of
all GOP senators Wednesday,
TRIAL FROM A
Lengthy trial could hinder senators running for president
MELINA MARA/THE WASHINGTON POST
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has not committed publicly to a timeline for an
impeachment trial, saying Wednesday that “it’s impossible to predict how long we’ll be on it.”