An hour ahead of testimony, the State Department orders Ambassador Sondland not to show up to testify and he complies. Subpoenas, fines, more articles of impeachment and jail are the only answers here.
Minor footnote in the Gordon Sondland saga. His lawyer is none other than Robert Luskin! “Gold Bars” Luskin, as longtime TPM Readers will remember him. We first met him as Karl Rove’s lawyer back in the 2005 era. But really endeared himself to us because of the time he accepted payment in gold bars from his clients who were convicted of laundering hundreds of millions of dollars from Colombian drug kingpins, as one does. In his favor, Luskin has a sense of humor. When Legal Times asked him in 1999 why he was shuttering his boutique law firm he replied: “To paraphrase Hobbes: The life of a boutique is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” Good one!
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New episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast is ready for your listening pleasure.
We’re expecting Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman to make their first appearance in court early this afternoon.
Tierney Sneed is at the federal courthouse in Alexandria, Virginia — the same courthouse in which Paul Manafort’s trial took place. She’s not allowed a phone inside but will have updates as soon as possible.
TPM’s Josh Kovensky was on the story of the money that lead to today’s indictments a month ago. A month ago. See his write up here. This is the kind of dogged, looking-around-the-corner reporting your memberships make possible. Our membership drive is critical. If you’ve been thinking about joining, please make today the day. You membership makes all the difference. Just click here.
Late Update: Our team won’t cut it out with the great pieces. Be sure to see Tierney’s report from the court house, a first look at former Rep. Pete Sessions’s (R-TX) role in the scandal, how today’s news shifts the picture of the larger Ukraine extortion story, while we’re at it who are Rudy’s business partners, and what was the pot racket they had going on the side.
Before we get to the news this morning I want to thank everyone who made our TPM event in New York last night possible. First I want to thank our special guests Aditi Juneja, Waleed Shahid, Leah Greenberg and Lara Putnam. My only regret is that we didn’t videotape Aditi’s presentation and our panel on the Next Democratic Party so we could share it with members around the country who couldn’t attend in person. I felt more like an attendee than a moderator and host since I was so interested in what each had to say.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is grilled by the Nashville NBC affiliate about whether he met with Rudy Giuliani when they were both in Warsaw in February. Pompeo wilts, but refuses to answer: