President pushed for Ukraine Biden probes, officials say

Witness to House investigators: ‘There was no ambiguity’

WASHINGTON — There was no hinting around. It was a straight-up trade, two key White House officials told impeachment investigators. If Ukraine’s new leader wanted an Oval Office welcome from Donald Trump — and he did — he would have to open a public probe into the president’s Democratic foe Joe Biden and his son.

“There was no ambiguity,” said Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, an Army officer assigned to the National Security Council, recounting an extraordinary day of meetings at the White House last summer.

According to transcripts released Friday in the House’s impeachment inquiry, Lt. Col. Vindman and Fiona Hill, a former White House Russia adviser, both gave firsthand descriptions of scenes central to the congressional probe.

Lt. Col. Vindman testified that Gordon Sondland, a Trump donor serving as ambassador to the European Union, told the visiting officials that if they hoped to win that coveted face-to-face meeting, “the Ukrainians would have to deliver an investigation into the Bidens.”

The Bidens? the House questioners pressed. In the White House Ward Room, he mentioned the word “Bidens”?

“To the best of my recollection, yes,” Lt. Col. Vindman testified. “My visceral reaction to what was being called for suggested that it was explicit.”

In another episode that day, Ms. Hill testified, national security adviser John Bolton “immediately stiffened” as Mr. Sondland “blurted out” that he had worked out with acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney just that trade: a Ukraine probe for an Oval Office welcome.

“Well, we have an agreement with the chief of staff for a meeting if these investigations in the energy sector start,” Ms. Hill recalled — a reference to Burisma, the firm where Mr. Biden’s son was on the board.

Then Mr. Bolton abruptly ended the meeting.

Pressed on how it came to be that Mr. Sondland, a wealthy businessman who has become a key figure in the impeachment probe played such a pivotal role in Ukraine policy, Ms. Hill testified she was dismayed by the idea.

“He said he was in charge of Ukraine,” Ms. Hill recalled.

She testified that she challenged the new ambassador to the point of being admittedly “rude” to him. “Who says you’re in charge of Ukraine?” she said. “The president,” he replied. The hundreds of pages of transcripts showed the investigation’s deep reach into the White House ahead of next week’s public hearings.

Lt. Col. Vindman alerted superiors about the meeting he described and also after he listened to the July phone call in which Mr. Trump personally appealed to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate Mr. Biden and an outlier theory of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

A whistleblower’s complaint about that call triggered the impeachment probe, which also focuses on allegations that Mr. Trump was holding up military aid to Ukraine, which fears aggression by its neighbor Russia, until he got a public declaration of the Ukrainian investigation.

Both officials are among nearly a dozen who have testified behind closed doors so far.

Mr. Trump insisted earlier Friday he has not been damaged by testimony. He also distanced himself from Mr. Sondland, whom he praised last month as “a really good man and great American.”

“I hardly know the gentleman,” he said.

Despite Mr. Trump’s dismissal, the new testimony has become pivotal. It puts Mr. Mulvaney more directly involved in the shadow diplomacy being run through Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and implemented by Mr. Sondland.

Rep. John Ratcliffe, a Texas Republican, sought to portray Mr. Trump’s request for a favor in his phone call with the Ukrainian president as falling short of a demand.

But Lt. Col. Vindman disagreed.

“When the president of the United States makes a request for a favor, it certainly seems, I would take it as a demand,” he retorted.

Lt. Col. Vindman, a veteran of the Iraq War, then added: “This was about getting a White House meeting. It was a demand for him to fulfill this particular prerequisite in order to get the meeting.”