let me say so they're staying home is returning to the let's talk with a phone call and chris that dave home says that he that he overheard such an unusual thing that he described being in a restaurant with gordon song live and gordon is on his cell phone talking to u.s. president donald trump that he could over here this conversation just how rare or unusual is a situation that the day holmes described pretty much on press and then as one of your guests i think mentioned before it places the president at the center of what looks like a criminal conspiracy be somewhat investor sentiment to us about you and importantly ambassador song than agrees with mr holmes as a counter of the call the only thing you object susie about your son says he doesn't didn't mention the bidens but apart from that he said yes this is what we talked about we talked about advancing the investigations and i told the president president from ukraine selenski president lewinsky would do whatever he wanted it's

an extraordinary phone call the fact that it was an unsecure line as you mention is also extraordinary. dr hill also said she she didn't speak of. russia's goals as something that was there in the past she basically frame this is something that they were still currently trying to do their goals being to deal with the u.s. presidency regardless of who the president was as i said to blame ukraine the goal of that being she says to basically drive a wedge between the west and the u.s. and the west and their allies the fact that she's described this is something that is still currently happening is that a challenge to congress and maybe specifically to the republicans to do something about it. of course it should be as your coverage pointed out before we're seeing in israel a prime minister who's been being held accountable to law the question will be whether our system of united states is capable of doing that and it will depend on

congress congress needs to stand up for the national interest to defend our election against attacks from russians and to hold the president accountable right now because that's going to be a pretty good wrap up there so we're going to turn this over to the chairman adam schiff now thanks gentleman i want to get a few basic facts on the table of individuals that were involved. in the 2016 election just to see who you know and who we've met with i saw start with you mr holmes. have you met with the do you know alexandra chalupa . the fumes could you put your microphone on. you know do you know. nelly or 'd you're not going to your bruce or you know going simpson no thank you same question for you

dr hill. you know have you met with alexander chalupa no nelly or no bruce or only in the chorus of my previous position as the russian television sophos russia where he attended some of the meetings i presided over years ago that's a long time ago correct glenn simpson no dr hill in your testimony you. said that. you know in your deposition excuse me. that christopher steele. was your counterpart at one time is this correct that's correct yes. you testified that you met with christopher still in 2016 i assume that's still for act that's correct yes and the only thing we didn't get on that is do you know about when that was in 2016 and how many times i'm afraid i

don't i actually had met with him by us me actually in the deposition when the most recent time that i had met with him and 2016 and he retired from of the british intelligence services in 2009 which is that and i'm asking about 206-2016 i don't recall but i did meet with him sometimes before to 2016 but you don't remember the date i don't time the fed now. you stated in your deposition that a colleague had showed you the still dossier before it was published who was that colleague that was one of my colleagues at the brookings institution and who was. that was the brookings institution president strobe talbott who had been sent a copy of this and he shared it with you that was the day before it was published in buzz feed. you mention in your deposition also that you thought that it was a. the exact quote of the dossier i was a rabbit hole so it's still your testimony that's correct do you do you know who

paid for still to do. to generate the still dossiers 3 several of them at the time i did not know i understand from the media that it was through g.p.s. fusion if that's not correct you know who was and there was a law firm involved but you know who the source of the money was i didn't at the time know i did know but do you know now i've read in the parts and thanks to your colleagues as well that it was the d.n.c. is on lead to believe and the clinton campaign i don't know that for sure. mr castro. you afternoon welcome back from lunch hope you had some sandwiches or something delicious welcome to. dr phil thank you for your service also thank you for your participation in the deposition on october 14th columbus day we were we were with you most of the day so appreciate that mr holmes thank you as well i your of

a late entrant into into this. situation and things sure didn't escalate quickly we we spoke with you last friday night about. what we thought was going to be a 32nd vignette about a 2 minute phone call and. turns out you you know with your 40 minute opener today you have a lot of information to share so we appreciate you being here dr go you your last day at the national security council was a july 19th that i was correct yes so. you were involved with the july 25th cause and you weren't involved with any of the relevant activities related to the pause in the aid i was not that's correct and as of july 19th did you believe that a call was going to be scheduled for the 25th i personally did not believe that it was going to be scheduled no and what was what was the thinking at the n.s.c.

as of july 19th about such a call but i've learned from other depositions to be clear here that perhaps there was some awareness that there might be a call. to somebody and if you may recall showed an exchange with the person who was taking of my position to mars and then which he indicated that there might be a call coming up i was not aware of ok were you in whatever differences let's just say obviously an understanding about that call and were you in favor of such a call as of the 19th actually i was not and i did says something about us in the opening policy discussions today ok and how about that or bolton to your knowledge . well i know that i'm busted just some limb said in the e-mail that bolton was in agreement to my knowledge but was not in agreement at that particular juncture and to my knowledge you know his opposition was it was based on the fact that he didn't feel the call had been properly prepared and as i said earlier that we wanted to make sure that there was going to be a fulsome bilateral u.s. ukraine agenda that was discussed which is usual with these calls and. you were you

surprised that a cauldron only was scheduled i was when i learned about it that's right and the age of any communications with anyone back in your old staff with about how i came to be i did not know. you did learn about the the pause in the security assistance aid. i learned about us on july 18th of the day before i left i was correct and. there were several meetings about this i believe you testified to i said that i knew that was going to be amazing in that time frame there was one put on the schedule for the following week but of course i had left and so i didn't attend and so fair to say it stops and starts in in a like this sometimes do happen that's correct. and i believe you testified that there was a freeze put on all kinds of aid in a system speakers it was in the process. at that time there were significant reviews of foreign assistance going on that's also correct and what else can you

tell us about the about the foreign assistance. as i am just being a directive for a whole scale review of foreign policy foreign policy assistance and the ties between our foreign policy objectives on the assistance this is being going on actually for many months and in the period when i was wrapping up my time there had been more scrutiny of then specific assistance to specific sets of countries as a result of the overall view review and at this time as well. ambassador volcker ambassador someone they had they had become a little bit more involved if you crane policy well ambassador volker was always involved in ukraine policy at least since the beginning of his appointment as the special envoy full negotiations towards the wall between ukraine and russia and done by us and what he tell us about about master volcker and possible is extraordinary countries diplomats i've worked with him in many capacities previously you know his bio he's been the ambassador to nato. had

a number of positions at the state department and actually i know him personally so you know the truth that i was trying to get out is who knows who and his mates i know ambassador volker really well on a person of those well ok and he said he's a man of integrity that's correct and always acted in the best interest of united states absolutely yes when did you 1st learn of ambassador simon's involvement. well it came in different was to some lenders the bosses the e.u. had some perfectly logical involvement in the korean portfolio we work very closely with the european union on matters related to ukraine the ukrainian. dialogue with russia was in a format known as the minsk process which was led by the french and the germans and ambassador volcker. trying to find out ways in which he could work closer to the french and germans to move along the road on the resolution of the conflict between

ukraine and russia and obviously the european union as the umbrella organization for europe in terms of funding and a systems was heavily active in offering financial assistance to the ukrainian government as well as humanitarian assistance in the conflicts so it's perfectly logical that ambassador son will replace some kind of role as our ambassador to the european union did you really concerns when. when he presented himself to you is somebody with a major role i did at the time in which he presented it to me this was after evanovich had been pushed out of her position and it was a dark juncture that ambassador sunderland's role seemed to grow larger. and did you express any concerns to him directly i did express concerns to him directly what were those concerns i asked him quite bluntly and a meeting that we had in june. of 2019 this is after the presidential inauguration

when i've seen that he had started to step up in much more of a proactive role on ukraine you know what was his role here and he said that he was in charge of ukraine and i civil who put you in charge. and he said the president did surprise you when he told you had it did surprise me we had no directive we hadn't been told this ambassador bolton had never indicated in anywhere that he thought that and was playing a leading role in ukraine i believe used the term a large remits that he characterized he had been given a large remit from the president 8 i can't remember what i said we met but it was part folio he was comes to me you know these are all synonyms he was talking to was about the fact that he'd been given a very broad portfolio by the president he said his job was to go out and make deals in europe and as you know yourself i listened to his testimony yesterday very carefully as well he said to anything that had to do with the e.u.

itself and the european union member states was within his portfolio we are. going about it is their position and he conceded he may have been spinning a little bit when he said that the president specifically gave him that role and he indicated that his authority was coming and we little bit from more from the secretary of state at any point time was that related to you at different points he mentioned talking directly to the chief of staff mulvaney and he also talked about socrates pump air but he was very. emphatic the other people in the room in the meeting in which he asserted this to me that it was the president who had put him in charge of this were you encouraged as of your your last day day in the office that u.s. policy towards the ukraine was headed in the right direction i was not and were. well i was concerned about 2 things in particular one was again the removal

of ambassador and again i will say for the record that the president has a perfect right to remove any ambassador at any time for any reason but i was very concerned about the circumstances in which her reputation had been maligned repeatedly on television and in all kinds of exchanges i felt that that was completely unnecessary if the president wanted to remove an ambassador which he did quite frequently it was a number of ambassadors removed who were not political but career officials that was done but without these kinds of interventions i wondered what that message was being sent so that was that us and then on the 2nd front it was very clear at this point that there was let's just say a different channel in operation in relations to ukraine one that was domestic and political in nature and that was very different from the channel or the loop however you like it that i and my colleagues were in while we were focused on bilateral relations and us foreign policy towards ukraine and these 2 things said diverge to at this point in the run up to rich's separation from post did you have

any communications with officials at the state department about your concerns ideas and who did you relate those concerns to i realize those concerns directly to my counterparts who was acting assistant secretary phil rico who i know you've spoken to i also spoke to david hale in the context of a larger meetings about many other issues and again i covered a broad portfolio myself and we often would talk about individual items and i had private discussions with deputy secretary sullivan and he of course is the period before committees here in the course of his nomination to be ambassador to russia and to spoken about that himself. ok and you you advocated dollars officials about your concerns about the information being spread about a master you're out of the tried to that's correct. the trumpet ministration changed courses from its predecessor and provided lethal defensive assistance to

the ukraine are you in favor of arming the variance with the javelins i was not initially in 2015 before i joined the government and i'm sure that many people on the committee have seen that i wrote an opinion piece with a colleague at the brookings institution juncture because i was very worried about particular point in time that the ukrainian military was not in a fit state to really take on board sophisticated weapons be the defensive all offensive weapons and i worry that there was not a long term sustainable plan given the overwhelming force that the russians could apply against the ukrainians however when i came into government in 2017 and started to interact with all of my colleagues in the pentagon and you had laura cooper here yesterday i realized in fact that that been an awful lot of work done on this and that there was a clear and consistent plan for the sustainability long term of the ukrainian military so i changed my mind ok and you're here and they're going to leave the

only witness that we've spoken to that has been able to articulate the opposition to providing the javelins and as we understand it during the obama administration the interagency consensus was in fact to provide the javelins but but it but they were not provided were you aware of the decision back and i was and i think it was very much made on a political this is about come so that this would provoke the russians depending on how this was presented and we were very mindful of us also when there were discussions internally about the lethal defensive weapons inside of the administration and mr holmes you're on the ground in kieve and javelins have now been authorized provided what's the view from the field the u.s. embassy as to the effectiveness of the javelins. they are in it they are an important a strategic deterrent they're not actively employed in combat operations right now

but the mere idea of it or the russians to advance substantially using certain kinds of armor that the ukrainians would have this capability deters them from doing so it also thereby sends a very important symbol symbolic message to the ukrainian military that they have access to these high end technology and we trust them to do it i don't add also they they've offered to buy some using their own funds the initial traunch was provided through. a program to do that but they've now offered to spend their own money to buy more so i think they think they're important and ambassador taylor's testified mr kent has testified that this is in fact the consensus of the interagency providing the javelins is is it the. in your experience of working with ambassador taylor was he also very very much an advocate for this yes. mr holmes i want to go back to him some americans now want to talk

a little bit about ukrainians the ukrainian government officials. are you familiar with this or heedless think oh yes if you met with him have. you it was a journalist that he was in the parliament he currently in the parliament journalist again journalist again. are you aware that when he was in the parliament that he had provided information to. fusion g.p.s. operative named ellie for. i'm not aware of nearly or i'm not aware of who he provide information to i'm aware that as a journalist he's provided information. well this was he was in the parliament at the time this is the 2016 campaign he provided widely known as the black ledger have you heard of the black ledger i have and. the black ledger is

that scene is credible information yes black ledger is credible yes. moeller did not find it credible do you dispute what bob miller's findings were they didn't use it in the prosecution or in the report i'm not aware that bob miller did not find it credible i think it was evidence in other cable proceedings it's credible it was not question those proceedings about x. product so the motivation or sinko as it was reported to was to go after a truck campaign official and undermine trump's candidacy are you aware that if you mean by the release of the black ledger i think less shame goes a motivation was the same motivation he's always express which is to expose corruption in ukraine right but he's admitted motivation was to partly at least undermine the trump candidacy that he did not support he has not said that to me if

if he said that to you i'll take your word for it. and you're aware that the. you heard dr hill's testimony but the still dossier that contained initially that initial information that was fed in the f.b.i. were you aware that the democrats had paid for that information was there i never had any involvement directly without accusing involvement as asking if you did not even if you knew at the time but you now know today that the democrats have paid for that information so i do want to be clear that all that happened before i arrived in ukraine so i don't have any firsthand not accusing any involvement of you or the still dossier understood but i do want to be clear about that and then and then in addition i have read about those issues but i'm not an expert on them but you're not disputing that the democrats democrats and the clinton campaign were the source of funds that funded the still bussy i wouldn't be in

a position to dispute that sir do you think it's appropriate for political parties to run operatives in foreign countries to dig up dirt on their opponents you know dr hill do you think it's appropriate for political parties to pay operatives to dig up dirt on their opponents i dunno. mr castro turned to the. president's alliance he's inauguration ambassador volcker testified that he was. very pleased with the size of the delegation although the vice president was unable to to make the trip secretary perry ambassador volker master silent and i understand dr hill you were involved with some of the logistics in putting putting the delegation i don't see any other what can you tell us about. the vice president's role. in attending or not attending well i know that you've

heard the testimony of jennifer williams from the vice president's office and i defer to her as being much closer to the decision making about the vice president's attendance i will say that i and many others hope that the vice president would be able to attend while i know from my perspective because i was not involved intimately in discussions with the vice president or his immediate stuff was that there was some questions about the schedule as you all know the president and vice president can not be out of the country at the same time there was some questions about presidential travel in the same time from. you know there was quite a bit of back and forth as to whether it would be really feasible for the vice president the time frame to go so that was what i was aware of i wasn't aware to the extent of the discussions that obviously ms williams was involved and the president is traveling in japan and then he was headed to your d.-day anniversary the vice president's office according to ms williams provided 4 days at the end of end of may the 293031st june 1st. and as it turned out the

ukrainians decided i believe it was on may 16th to schedule the inauguration for 4 days later and by this point time. the vice president had been rerouted for a trip to canada about the u.s. m.c.a. . and i just. want to. ask you whether you don't have any evidence that the vice president was encouraged not to attack and for any other reason do you i personally do not but again i defer to ms williams the. and miss williams testimony was that she just she heard from. the chief of staff's assistant that the vice president one was not able to go to. the leap. the reason for that was related to

any of these investigations hasn't been fully established i want to just note. from the materials you provided for your deposition. if there is a discussion whether president orbán may have influenced president trumps decision on that may 13th that day and the you do remember when the meeting was with president obama i do when was that that was in may that's correct to do and what time of day it was on the 13th to be honest usually these meetings are around lunch time sometime in the timeframe in the kind of early to mid part of the day i can't speak for sure and i just want to be very clear that i cannot speak about heads of state engagements ok the jennifer williams testified that she learned about 111115 in the meeting with president obama and was it was not scheduled until. later in the afternoon according to your schedule it was right around 145 as

a consistent with your recollection all about the lunch time time found out that he went on his lunch i guess. but overall given the 4 days' notice given secretary perry's involvement do you think the delegation was. good sized. i do not mean i also make a point that we don't try to make these delegations law this is on the taxpayers' dime and it's pretty expensive getting people there if you have to get military. you know we try to keep them small if we had a longer lead time you know pops we would have made the arrangements but you know 4 days is not a lot of time to make an arrangement and secretary perry had become interested in some of the energy related issues in the ukraine i actually recommended that secretary perry be the leader along with others and what do you tell us about his involvement in some of the ukrainian policy while secretaries and gage meant and this made again perfect sense given his role as of energy also his deep knowledge

of the energy industry his former governorship you know secretary perry himself is an extraordinary good advocate of u.s. interests particular in the energy sphere and one of ukraine's achilles heel in addition to its military disadvantage with russia is in fact energy ukraine remains for now of them in transit point for russian oil and gas pipelines to europe and this has been manipulated repeatedly especially since 2006 by the russian government and in fact i mean many of you here will remember in the reagan era there was a huge dispute between the united states and europe about the. about whether it made sense for europe to bill's pipelines from the then soviet union to bring gas to european markets. mr holmes what was what was your view of the of the delegation do you think it was the right sized group very level of prestige to signal to the

incoming one to give ministration of the u.s. stands behind them i think it was fine that were ok. since we're on the topic of ukraine energy it's a good way for us to segue into breece mo which i assume both of you are familiar with you've heard about it for many many years. you're on the ground there now mr holmes i know you weren't there but at the time but in september 2015. then in bassett or to ukraine geoffrey pyatt obama appointed career ambassador i'm sure you know him i do credible yes sessile i'm sure. he called for an investigation into the owner of brie sma president bruce moe are you familiar with that yes. as you know about deputy assistant secretary of state's

hence concerns about the potential conflict of interest with hunter biden sitting on the board of bree smith. i would defer to george can too or is involved at the time it is an expert on those issues as you know that the financial records show that this ukrainian natural gas company breece murat had more than 3 $1000000.00 to the american accounts of under biden i've heard that june are you familiar with that dr hill only from newspaper reports. that you know that greece ms american and this is back to you mr holmes did you know that greece was american legal representatives met with ukrainian officials just days after the vice president forced the firing of the country's chief prosecutor you know as you know that greece was american lawyers trying to secure a meeting with the new state prosecutor the same day the predecessor of the church

opens show conspiring was announced you know as you know that joe biden called ukrainian president for change at least 3 times in february 2016 shortly after the president and owner of bree smith's home was raided on february 2nd by the state prosecutor's office no. as you know that devon archer 100 biden reached out to the deputy secretary of state tony blinken shortly after the raid on very smart you know so dr hill did you know about i want to go through and ask all those questions also and i also did not know that she did not know about any of us. so you obviously know that the president had concerns about greece and i have concerns about 2016 election meddling by the ukrainians. when you were

when you were in there as as head of the ukraine desk. did you ever raise any of these or brief the president or raise it up to about sort of bolten about any concerns through 201718 that concern 2016 election meddling or. or concerns the whole briefing process didn't really work in the way that you know suggesting that. if the president about any of this information would have been provided for him just to be very clear ukraine was not a top foreign policy priority in this period in the same way that many other issues that we could talk about from syria to turkey and others so there weren't that frequent briefings on ukraine the briefings would take place when there was a scheduled meeting with the ukrainian head of state is that as we know they

haven't been to many of those so just to as far as you know you did no no briefings no papers answer no questions as it relates to the 2016 election or briefs mode during your time there i know i did not know i was asking dr you told us during your deposition that you indeed. that there are there are perceived conflict of interest troubles when a child of a government official is involved with something that the government official has a social policy role and correct i think any family member of any member of the u.s. government congress all the senate's is open to all kinds of questions about optics of cops and you outside influence if they take policy in any kind of activity that could be misconstrued as being related to the haven't all of the family members books was a much of course yes i do think that's the case in america embassador son and he testified to. every now and then he made

a habit of name dropping his interactions the president that's correct and i believe you also told us there were instances where you would run into him on the campus and he would say oh i'm here to see the president i've been in to see the president and you. on your last day and i think when the deposition transcript was released. your. your counsel indicated that that was. completely fabricated on a bass or someone's part and i just want to give you an opportunity to address that yes some i mean unfortunately this is the federal government we don't have coffee machines you know readily in our office if you come to my office in that time the best i could have offered you was a cup of water from the water fountain outside of my office so you know the coffee that just on london i showed was actually we ran into each other or rather he found

out i was going to be there and then asked me to meet him for coffee in jackson hole wyoming in 2018 in august so this is a full year before i left i was a very nice coffee step up see you know conflicts of those 2 meetings together the meeting that he was referring to he had come in to meet with our director for the european union this was in my last week in the office and as i was in the office at the same time for a brief period before going into another meeting and it was my last week in the office we agreed to sit down with the director of the european union with actually colonel men and the assistant that. someone had brought with him from the state department so there are actually 4 of us in that meeting and in 40 it wasn't over coffee. and you know he went on to indicate that you know he went on to indicate that you were upset you were upset with the survivors really in the media obviously i can't do math sorry enough you indicated you were upset you're upset with

ambassador been upset with the way things are going in i believe your counsel said there was an outright fabrication well i think you might recall in my deposition on october 14th that i said that very unfortunate i had a bit of a blow up with ambassador sunderland i had a couple of testy encounters with them one of those was in june 18 when i actually said to him who put you in charge of ukraine and banal of me i was a bit rude and that's when he told me the president which me up. this other meeting was about 1520 minutes exactly as he depicted it was i was actually to be honest angry with him. you know. i had to say it but often when women show anger it's not fully appreciated it's often you know pushed onto emotional issues perhaps or deflected onto other people and why i was angry about was that he wasn't coordinating with us not actually realise having listened his deposition

that he was absolutely right that he wasn't coordinating with us because we weren't doing the same thing that he was doing so i was upset with him that he wasn't fully telling us about all of the meetings that he was having and he said to me but i'm briefing the president i'm breezing chief of staff mulvaney i'm briefing secretary pompe arrow and i've talked to a possible who else do i have to deal with and the point is we have a robust into agency process that deals with ukraine it includes mr holmes it includes ambassador taylor's the shah in ukraine is includes a whole load of other people but it struck me one yesterday when you put up on the screen just someone's e-mails on who was on these e-mails and he said these that people need to know that he was absolutely right because he was being involved in a domestic political errand and we were being involved in national security foreign policy and those 2 things have just. so he was correct and i had not put my finger

on the at the moment but i was ever to sit with him and i'm with him that he wasn't fully coordinating and i did say to him and gordon i think this is all going to blow up and here we are and after i left to my next meeting. i was directed to the european union talked to him much further for a full half hour a molester trying to ask him about how we could coordinate better how this could coordinate better up after i had left the office and his feeling was that the national security council was always trying to block him what we were trying to do was block as from straying into domestic a personal politics and that was precisely what i was trying to do but i must have some land is not wrong that he had been given a different remit than we had brain and it was at that moment that i started to realize how those things that diverge and i realize in fact that i wasn't really being fair to him bus to sunderland because he was carrying out what he thought he had been instructed to carry out and we were doing something that we thought was

just as though perhaps even more important but it wasn't in the same channel dr hill i very much through. our choice want to drill down on this a little bit the president the united states commander in chief was concerned about the 2016 elections and breeze he had his personal attorney working these issues because he was under investigation by robert mueller special counsel partly beginning with an investigation that started with the still dossier that we've already established that the democrats and paid for and had then fed into the f.b.i. so the end of the day the commander in chief concern about 2016 election meddling by ukraine as it sounds like you just had just earlier testified that you weren't aware of that but if that was the concern of the president try to get to the bottom

of it and that's the concern of of ambassador stalin who was trying to set up meetings. on behalf of to make to ensure really that meetings occurred and phone calls occurred to strengthen the relationship. a little and i understand people at the n.s.c. people state department at issues with that but the end of the day isn't it the commander in chief that makes those decisions my point is that we at the national security council were not told by the president directly or through ambassador bolton that we were to be focused on these issues as a matter of u.s. foreign policy toward ukraine so when you're talking about the korean and 2016 i never personally heard the president say anything specific about 2016 in ukraine i've seen him seeing something plenty of things publicly but i was not given a directive in fact i was given a directive on july 10th by

a bus to bolton very clearly to stay out of domestic politics. just for sake of a time and i think as of july 19th. they hadn't even engage with regional jani and i don't believe that happened until a little bit later so you believe by july 19th they were already engaged in those types of activities we had already had a discussion with kurt volker over which she was in the deep positions of his assistant chris anderson that indicated that he had met with rudy giuliani at this point on a bus a sunday and made comments about meeting with giuliani and as we know in the may 23rd meeting they had been instructed to meet with giuliani they gave us every impression that they were meeting with rudy giuliani at this point and media giuliani was also saying on the television and indeed has said subsequently that he was closely coordinating with the state department it was my belief that they were meeting with him ok and there's some i mean there's some ambiguity in the direction

their work with rudy giuliani ambassador volker said the president dismissed ukraine and said oh if you want to work on just go talk to rudy and ambassador simon took. a little bit differently and i believe that a master vocal was primarily the interlock a tour with mr giuliani and that was happening i didn't didn't start until the end of july i only learned subsequently from. possessions so i just want to tell you in that particular timeframe i was not aware of the us and in fact gotten some learned did refer to rudy giuliani and again i'm just a bull had warned volcker not so meets with rudy giuliani in a meeting. mr maris i'm told us both as their position is public hearing that you had related concerns about our current women's judgment i did not really any concerns in general terms about kernel of inman's judgment so i

was somewhat surprised when i heard mr morrison make that assertion and when i read his deposition there was a very specific point that was made and again these are personal issues and i'm sure that nobody here would like to have their private personal issues put before a committee but you've asked me about this so i had a couple of very short transition meetings with mr morrison and again mr morrison did not work in all directions he was taking over the position which he held for 3 months i had worked. as the director the senior director for europe as it was at the time for more than 2 years at this point and i'd been working for a year with kind of in the midst of inman and in the cost of one of the meetings sometime in the june time fam i sat down with mr morrison and with a deputy refer to him in his deposition john heiress who was also working and we went through our organizational charts went through who was staying who was rotating out and leaving in the summer and we talked about everybody's strengths and weaknesses and i always asked my stuff to do

a quick feedback as well to talk about what i wasn't doing my ties i'd like to learn too and i said that i was comes about the way things were trending in ukraine policy so i. kind of inman is a highly distinguished decorated military officer he came over to us from the chairman's office and the joint chiefs of staff and we were evaluating and look at him and it's him in the context of what his future positions would be in the context of the u.s. army. and i was comes that if for example colm gilman might decide to leave the military the popsie was and is well suited for something that would be much more political i did not feel that he had the political antenna to deal with something that was straying into domestic politics not everyone is suited for the us that does not mean in anywhere that i was qwest kept questioning his overall judgment nor was i questioning anywhere his substantive expertise he is excellent on issues

related to ukraine dollar moldova on russian defenses use he had been in charge of the russia campaign in. thinking through at the at the chairman's office and in the pentagon this is a very specific issue because by june we saw the things which are verging need a completely different sensitivity some people in my office have worked at the highest levels of advisory positions and mr morrison had come from capitol hill he knew politics inside out and we said the colonel vinland did not and we were concerned about how he would manage what was becoming highly charged and potentially parsis an issue which had not been before. government related to us during his deposition or you subsequently was. sort of cut out of a lot of the decision making in involvements with the with the embassy in ukraine was that something you recommended not with the embassy in ukraine i mean we did pull him back from the meeting in the oval office and subsequently we were very

concerned about these political aspects of this and we did not feel after when july 10th colonel than when was justified be alarmed when he realised that there was this highly political aspects of the meeting that we were looking for eventually with president. and mr holmes i want to. at the end of august we understand that bassett or taylor was engaged in. obtaining some information for the president about the european allies burden sharing in the region as the decision about aid was being debated. so sir after the hold was placed on the security assistance and many people i think we're scrambling to try to understand why. i believe in senator johnson who had said the president was concerned about burden sharing perhaps others as well and so trying

to interpret why this might happen we were looking into the facts of what the europeans provide have provided and what we provided. very illuminating we learned united states has provided combined civilian and military assistance to ukraine since 2014 of about $3000000000.00 plus 21000000000 dollar 31000000000 dollar loan guarantees that's not those get paid back largely. so just over $3000000000.00 the europeans at the level of the european union plus the member states combined since 2014 my understanding have provided a combined $12000000000.00 to ukraine and you were able to communicate that information back the end of august but i believe so yeah we were this is done in collaboration with other missions the e.u. to nato and others yes and do you think that was the information the white house was looking for. we don't know if the concern was that we weren't that others weren't weren't spending as much as we were to support ukraine then that information showed

a different story ok and the aid was subsequently lifted there's a pause in the eighty's left that shortly thereafter. it was in yes in early september in mid september go back. it concludes the 45 minute rounds will now go to member questioning recognize myself for 5 minutes 1st as a threshold matter i want to say to the witnesses to be a bit cautious when members represent are you aware of this factory where that fact you know that so and so testified to this or testified to that if you have personal knowledge of it that's fine. but and then and i'm saying this is deliberate sometimes members get it wrong so let me just clear the record on one of the things that was suggested to you that the vice president canceled his trip because of a conflict with a trip to canada that was not ms williams testimony or testimony was i asked my colleague why we should stop trip planning and why the vice president would not be attending and i was informed that the president had decided the vice president

would not attend the inauguration so just offer that caution. dr i want to ask you you may be aware. of some of the attacks on colonel them and. suggesting that he has a dual loyalty that he's not really loyal to america he's loyal to ukraine i want to ask you as a fellow immigrant what you think of those kind of accusations when they leveled against colonel them and or other americans i think it's very unfortunate something this is a country of immigrants you know with the exception in a pops of very few people still here everyone emigrated to the united states at some point in their family history. this is what for me really does make america gross i mean i'm sure that every single person here some people perhaps came reluctantly others came by choice as i did but this is from a this is the essence of america it's why i wanted to be here why i wanted to stay

here and i think it's unfair to cuss to gays anyone everyone has some kind of populous to them i'm an anglo american pops and on the british american i'm a naturalized citizen i do not believe that my loyalty is to the united kingdom my loyalty is here to the united states this is my country in the country that i serve and i know for a fact that every single one of my colleagues in the many naturalized citizens in my office and across the national security council felt exactly the same way i think it's deeply unfair thank you. you mentioned something your testimony. when i have this exactly right that i think about this on that one point told you his role was to make deals is that right that's correct i want to get other people out as well to be to be clear i want to ask you about one of those deals the one that buster bolton described as a drug deal. at the suggestion or the indication rather when mr gold was actually questions about the july 10th meeting in the fact there were 2 meetings one

investor bolds presence and then another in the wardroom that there was more you had to say about that do you want to walk us through that a little more detail well the reference that bolton made was after i returned from the boardroom and related to him what i had heard he says so there was a the sequencing of meetings which i know that there's been some columns about the sequencing here and discrepancies between various depositions. so what happened immediately after the meeting that i'm possible cause a little short was that he told me to hold back in the room and he was a scorching out the ukrainian visitors along with secretary buses fulcrum some blue and and i guess. because i'm a government worker because any general is indicting the prime minister sitting prime minister of israel benjamin netanyahu with a number of charges including bribery and corruption he is now basically defending

himself this investigation is going on for quite some time he has called this an attempted coup against him language that we have also heard u.s. president donald trump use when he has been facing allegations as well our correspondent unless true some very fast it has been listening as well so eri remind us how we got to this point. well just just to talk about what netanyahu is is saying right now he's come to the cameras about an hour after his chief legal officer the attorney general of the country has charged him with a series of crimes including bribery for crimes alleged have been committed one in office that's never happened in israeli history before and according to netanyahu this is something he said throughout the investigation when the attorney general rick recommended that he be charged early this year in february he's consistently said that this is a politicized investigation that is the line that he's going with now in this most

bombastic of politicians has come out in a very sort of hollowed out looking frame of mind he's is very he looks as if this has come as a big shock even though of course it won't be any surprise to him we've all known that these charges were on the way and he's saying things like that he respects the legal establishment but something is wrong when something like this happens at the very most sensitive time in israeli politics because right now of course we remain in this political status in israel with no one able to try to form a government after the election he's talking about and attend to the overthrow of a prime minister by a biased investigation he's saying that the investigators themselves need to be investigated and that the fact that this is trying to bring down a right wing prime minister and that he doesn't want to dominate the media well of course his his focus on his critics will say his obsession with his media coverage

and his own public image is very much at the heart of this he's alleged to have tried to manipulate his media coverage in return for favors that he could only do through the government of israel and in the most serious charge the attorney general says that amounts to bribery and that's why he's brought these charges today. in the language she is using it is striking because this is a this process it's not a coup it's a legal process that is allowed. so go ahead here you want us how could you want to get in there. no i had just a touch of reality that's actually what the attorney general himself was saying i think he was trying to head off these very these very points when he came out and after announcing the indictments said that this was not in any way a biased investigation he said it was a sad day for him personally do this with

a heavy heart but a full heart because he was up holding his duty to the state of israel because when laws are broken then the law must be upheld and so he is obviously aware both of netanyahu history of trying to reject this entire these these 3 cases in this entire investigation as politically motivated and he must have been aware that it would almost certainly come back with such allegations as he is doing right now in their aftermath and as you're saying this does go back quite some time the investigation began in step in december 26th in there are 3 separate cases in one he's alleged to have taken and his wife taken and demanded extremely expensive gifts such as cigars and champagne worth hundreds of thousands of dollars from wealthy business people and the charge there is fraud and breach of trust because of conflict of interest promises of favors from netanyahu or the attorney general so that they weren't carried out there wasn't a completion of

a quid pro quo the next case case 2012 the owner of the of the what most widely read newspaper in the country trying to or the 2nd most widely read newspaper trying to get netanyahu to hamper the activities of his competitor by offering better coverage in that case he's been charged with offering a brive a bribe it didn't go through the net and you know hasn't been charged with bribery rather attentive or other fraud and breach of trust again but the most serious one is case 4000 in that case he's alleged to have changed regulator e. frameworks to the value. some $500000000.00 u.s. dollars for the main stakeholder in the country's big telecoms company because he also owned an online news site again and the issue was trying to get better coverage from that news site allegedly in return for help in these other businesses and so that is the state of the investigation nothing really has changed in the

prison dartmouth hearings when a lawyer is trying to argue for these cases either to be dropped all the charges minimize that has not happened and now you know who is in serious legal trouble ok harry fawcett with the wrap up of the charges there and just to remind people and that is the prime minister benjamin netanyahu addressing the media right now just a few hours after the attorney general announced that he has chosen to indict benjamin netanyahu after a a years long and best a geisha in an investigation the netanyahu says is tainted and says amounts to a an attempted coup so let's go tomorrow bashar his al jazeera senior political analyst and listen in listening in as well this is a sitting prime minister's never been indicted put this in some sort of context for a smart one. well to the best context tonight is what we were hearing earlier and what we are hearing now which are the parallels between israel and the united states between prime minister netanyahu and president trump because i just listened

to the 1st part of netanya his presser and his press conference if you were and i can tell he is using the same defense strategy as president trum unfortunately for prime minister netanyahu he is a prime minister in a parliamentary democracy as it were quote unquote not a president in a presidential system hence he lacks a lot of the rights privileges and or thought it is of the american president and yet i think he's impressed enough by the american president strategy that he's using it the same now and he just started in his press conference at tacking the israeli media at tacking the israeli deep state. attacking the israeli opposition even attacking these israeli judiciary and he said yeah you might you might think i'm going too far but yes those in the judicial system and the prosecutor office they are all out to get me and they are all out to derail the my

professional carrier so he is out to get everyone basically. talking to this base just as the old trump talk to his base hoping that his base will stick by him because as we heard earlier from mary until now there is no precedent really for a prime minister being indicted in what would happen to him what we know from not the neo himself is that when his predecessor prime minister olmert was indicted he told him he could no longer carry his duties as prime minister now that he had been invited indicted so i think everyone is probably no redress inglis to a prime minister not to know himself using his own words against him saying look you've been indicted you have already served so many years. is or have can afford

them other leader you cannot get out of the duties of the prime minister especially in this sort of sensitive time photos or why you are under indictment on 3 not one not 23 charges marwan let's talk about that sensitive time now of course the the attorney general you know already had a press conference where he said that this was not about politics may or may not be but there are there are still a political situation when it's a prime minister that has banned indicted and this is in the middle israel being in this limbo where there is no government that has been formed. what now what does this mean for forming a government. well you have now 3 possible scenarios i would say scenario number one is that he that nothing now would stick to his guns and up until this morning most of his likud list to the knesset and most of his base was still sticking by him as

a winning card if you were that he could still take the liquid to the next elections and win it for them now after the indictments it's not sure that his base or the majority of his own parliamentarians in the code will stick by him and it's not it's not clear to me whether his coalition partners would stick by him now that he's been indicted which takes us to the 2nd possible scenario 'd which is that he would have been pressured to step aside and if he does and the political pressure from within and without including from the president that then the likud would be able to form a coalition government with the next party blue and white party that gun sparty and the so-called national unity government then can go ahead with you know more than almost 70 seats in the knesset and v a lot of israeli.