Reuters/Erin Scott
George Kent, the deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs listens to William Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, testify during a House Intelligence Committee public hearing in the impeachment inquiry against U.S. President Donald Trump on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., November 13, 2019.
- Two career foreign service officers laid out a devastating portrait on Wednesday of President Donald Trump's efforts to strong-arm an ally into delivering political dirt on a rival.
- Bill Taylor, the US's chief envoy in Ukraine, said that in his decades-long career of public service, he'd never seen anything like this before.
- George Kent, a top State Department official overseeing Ukraine policy, blew a hole through all of Trump's main defenses.
- Democrats' strategy for Wednesday's impeachment hearing was to keep it simple. Republicans' strategy was to throw everything at the wall and hope something sticks.
- Scroll down to read more key takeaways from the first public impeachment hearing.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Two top foreign service officers laid out a damning portrait for the public on Wednesday of President Donald Trump's efforts to strong-arm a critical US ally into delivering political dirt while holding up military aid and a White House meeting.
Bill Taylor, the US's chief envoy in Ukraine, and George Kent, a top State Department official overseeing Ukraine policy, were the first two witnesses to testify in Congress' bombshell impeachment hearings into whether Trump abused his public office for private gain.
Kent testified to the former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani's efforts on Trump's behalf to get dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden from Ukraine. Kent told lawmakers Giuliani's campaign was not part of official US foreign policy but instead a personal mission to get the president damaging information on a political rival ahead of an election.
Taylor, meanwhile, directly confirmed a quid pro quo in which Trump withheld security assistance and a White House meeting while demanding Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky publicly commit to investigate the Bidens and baseless allegations of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 election.
Reuters/Joshua Roberts
Ambassador Bill Taylor, charge d'affaires at the U.S. embassy in Ukraine, testifies during a House Intelligence Committee hearing as part of the impeachment inquiry into U.S. President Donald Trump on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., November 13, 2019.
Here are the biggest takeaways from Wednesday's impeachment hearing:
- The Democrats' lawyer ran circles around the Republicans' lawyer
- Daniel Goldman, a veteran former federal prosecutor who asked questions for the Democrats, used the 45 minutes allotted to him to draw out a cohesive line of questioning and a vivid narrative from Kent and Taylor of Trump's pressure campaign in Ukraine.
- Goldman's performance contrasted starkly with that of Steve Castor, the lawyer for the Republican side who veered off course, was unable to establish a clear line of inquiry, and who often tried - and failed - to bait the witnesses into caving to GOP talking points.
- Twitter noticed the difference, too.
- The Democratic strategy: keep it simple.
- Goldman kept his questions short and sharp and let Taylor and Kent do all the talking.
- The result was a dramatic and lucid account of Trump's conduct from the two career officials, both of whom have no skin in the game and have a decades-long history of nonpartisan public service.
- The Republican strategy: throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. The following is a sample of the various defenses GOP lawmakers trotted out.
- There was no quid pro quo.
- Even if there was a quid pro quo, countries do that all the time.
- It doesn't matter that Trump initially withheld military aid, because Ukraine eventually got it.
- Trump was justified in holding up the aid because he wanted Ukraine to investigate itself for corruption.
- The Democrats colluded with Ukraine.
- The witnesses have never spoken directly to Trump, so they're not credible.
- The entire impeachment inquiry is a sham.
(Photo by Anthony Devlin/Getty Images)
Rudy Giuliani.
- Giuliani got thrown under the bus.
- Both Kent and Taylor detailed at length Giuliani's close involvement in getting Ukraine to give Trump what he wanted, as well as his smear campaign against Marie Yovanovitch, the US's former ambassador to Ukraine.
- Republicans have recently begun defending Trump by saying Giuliani went rogue and was acting of his own accord with respect to Ukraine. This defense is bogus for a few reasons:
- Giuliani has said he was acting as Trump's agent: "The investigation I conducted concerning 2016 Ukrainian collusion and corruption, was done solely as a defense attorney to defend my client against false charges, that kept changing as one after another were disproven," he tweeted.
- When Trump asked Zelensky during a July 25 phone call to investigate the Bidens, he specifically told Zelensky to work with Giuliani.
- Taylor said he'd never seen anything like this in his decades of public service.
- "Ambassador Taylor, in your decades of military service and diplomatic service representing the United States around the world, have you ever seen another example of foreign aid conditioned on the personal or political interests of the president of the United States?" Goldman asked.
- "No, Mr. Goldman, I have not," Taylor replied.
- Taylor: Leveraging a White House meeting to get what you want is one thing. Withholding military aid puts "lives at stake."
- At one point, Taylor highlighted that there's a difference between leveraging a White House meeting to force the Ukrainians to publicly commit to investigating the Bidens, and using military aid for that same reason.
- "The White House meeting was one thing," Taylor said. "The security assistance was much more alarming" because withholding that money puts "lives at stake."
- Kent blew a hole through all of Trump's talking points.
- In a telling exchange with Goldman, Kent emphasized that there's "no factual basis" to support allegations that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election.
- He reiterated that it was Russia, not Ukraine, that meddled in the race.
- He also said there's no evidence "whatsoever" backing up Trump's claim that Biden got a Ukrainian prosecutor fired to protect his son from being investigated.
- Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio was Trump's biggest attack dog.
- Jordan is not a member of the intelligence committee but was temporarily placed on the panel because of his long record of going to bat for the president.
- His questions on Wednesday had no factual basis and contained little substance. But he likely won Trump's approval with his sharp attacks on Taylor and Kent, and his demand that the whistleblower be hauled in to testify.
- Democratic Rep. Peter Welch landed a hell of a zinger at the end of the hearing.
- Jordan went on a lengthy rant against the whistleblower and said Congress will never get to question the person "who started it all."
- Welch hit back: "Thank you, I say to my colleague, I'd be glad to have the person who started it all come in and testify. President Trump is welcome to take a seat right there."
- Read more of Insider's impeachment coverage:
- Think Trump will get impeached? Gambling sites say the odds are in your favor
- Trump could be impeached, removed from office, and still win re-election in 2020
- Over half of the House of Representatives support the impeachment inquiry against Trump - see all of them here
- Everything you need to know about Trump's impeachment process: what's happened, who the players are, and what comes next