Ambassador to the EU Gordon Sondland, slated to publicly testify in the impeachment inquiry on Wednesday, kept acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and Energy Secretary Rick Perry apprised of the Ukraine pressure campaign, according to emails obtained by the Wall Street Journal.
In one exchange, he assured the two that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky was willing to talk about sham investigations into the Bidens and the 2016 election, just before a scheduled call with President Donald Trump.
“I talked to Zelensky just now. He is prepared to receive Potus’ call,” Sondland wrote. “Will assure him that he intends to run a fully transparent investigation and will ‘turn over every stone.'”
The emails come on the heels of an episode first revealed by top Ukraine diplomat Bill Taylor, who told the House Intel Committee that his aide overheard Trump urging Sondland to focus on the investigations. Taken together, new evidence paints a picture of Trump administration officials lashed ever closer to coercion — or as Democrats call it, bribery — of a foreign government for a domestic political advantage.
Sondland’s upcoming hearing is one of the most highly anticipated testimonies of the inquiry so far. Mulvaney and Perry have both resisted House subpoenas, with Mulvaney in particular asking a judge to decide whether or not he has to comply.
Poor Ol’ Gordy
In way over his head , reporting to these guys like a faithful lap dog and then lying to Congress about it .
If you take the 5th, yer screwed
If you come clean, yer screwed
E.B.B.T.G.T.J.
Everybody but Trump Goes to Jail
Sad
One aspect of this I think receives too little attention is the ongoing grift related to the natural gas production and distribution network in Ukraine. Specifically the potential U.S. citizens, some in our government, were involved in a scheme to pocket huge sums of money through intermediaries. I have zero doubt Perry and Giuliani were arranging deals to enrich themselves. Yet the House barely touches on it, I suppose not wanting to clutter their focus, or possibly not to muck up ongoing criminal investigations. Various person’s maneuvers to remake the board of Burisma screams manipulation for money. I posit when the dust settles on this a lot of people are in for a great deal of difficulty on this angle. Unless of course Barr and Trump just shut down law enforcement efforts to get to the bottom of it. Which seems all the more reason to get in front of it and make it too public to close down.
Oh, I so want to see these two do the perp walk. I doubt that Trump or Pence will pardon them so it is at least a possibility. If the Dems do get control in 2020, we need to keep their feet in the fire to go after all the criminals from this administration.
Are you implying here that it might not be bribery? Why the suck up to the GOP point of view?
It is bribery, and a quid pro quo. There can be no question based on the information presented publicly so far.
BUT HIS EMAILS!
ed: let me comment, discobot