Selenski make a Public Statement about investigations i knew that investigations were important to President Trump we did not discuss any classified information other witnesses have recently shared their recollection of overhearing this call for the most part i have no reason to doubt their accounts its true that the president speaks loudly at times and its also true i think we primarily discussed asap rocky its true that the president likes to use colorful language anyone who has met with him it for any reasonable amount of time knows this well i cannot remember the precise details again the white house has not allowed me to see any readouts of that call and the july 26th call did not strike me as significant at the time actually actually i would have been more surprised. If President Trump had not mentioned investigations particularly given what we were hearing from mr giuliani about the president s concerns however i have no recollection of discussing Vice President biden or his son on that call or after the call and i know that members of this committee frequently framed these complicated issues in the form of a simple question was there a quid pro quo as i testified previously with regard to the requested white house call and the white house meeting the answer is yes mr giuliani conveyed to secretary perry ambassador volcker and others that President Trump wanted a Public Statement from president selenski committing to investigations of brewery smile and the 2016 election mr giuliani expressed those requests directly to the ukrainians and mr giuliani also expressed those requests directly to us we all understood that these prerequisites for the white house call and the right white house meeting reflected President Trumps desires and requirements within my state Department Emails there is a july 19th email this email was sent this email was sent to secretary pompei o secretary perry Bryan Mccormick who is secretary perry is chief of staff at the time miss canada who is the acting a pardon me who is the executive secretary at 4 secretary pompei o chief of staff mulvaney and mr maule deniz Senior Advisor rob blair a lot of senior officials a lot of senior officials here is my exact quote from that email i talk to as a lansky just now he is prepared to receive poetess call. Will assure him that he intends to run a fully transparent investigation and will turn over every stone he would greatly appreciate a call prior to sunday so that he can put out some media about a friendly and productive call no details prior to ukraine election on sunday chief of staff from all veiny responded i asked the n. S. C. To set it up for tomorrow everyone was in the loop it was no secret everyone was informed via email on july 19th days before the president ial call as i communicated to the team i told president selenski in advance that assurances to run a fully transparent investigation and turn over every stone were necessary in his call with President Trump on july 19th in a Whatsapp Message between ambassador taylor ambassador volker and me bassett or vole volcker stated had breakfast with rudy this morning thats ambassador bulker and Rudy Giuliani keying up call with your mac monday at Senior Advisor andre your mac must have helped most important is for us as a lenski to say that he will help investigation and address any specific personnel issues if there are any on august 10th the next day mr your mac texted me once we have a date which is the date for the white house meeting we will call for a press briefing announcing upcoming visit and outlining vision for the reboot of the u. S. Ukraine relationship including among other things aris maya and election meddling in investigations this is from mr your mac to me. The following day august 11th and this is critical i sent an email to councilor brecht bull and lisa khanna lisa can i was frequently used as the pathway to secretary pompei o as sometimes he preferred to receive his emails through her she would print them out and put them in front of him with the subject ukraine i wrote mike referring to Mike Pompei O Kurt and i negotiated a statement from selenski to be delivered for our review in a day or 2 the contents will hopefully make the boss happy enough the boss being the president to authorize an invitation selenski plans to have a big press or press conference on the openness subject including specifics next week all of which referred to the 2016 and the been recent this can i replied gordon ill pass to the secretary thank you again everyone was in the loop curiously and this was very interesting to me on august 26th shortly before his visit to kiev ambassador bolton is office requested mr giulianis Contact Information for me i sent him bassett or bolton the information directly they requested mr giulianis Contact Information on august 26th i was 1st informed that the white house was withholding security aid to ukraine during conversations with them bassett or taylor on july 18th 2019. However as i testified before i was never able to obtain a clear answer regarding the specific reason for the hold whether it was bureaucratic in nature which often happens or reflected some other concern in the interagency process i never participated in any of the subsequent d. O. D. Or d. O. s review meetings that others have described so i cant speak to what was discussed in those meetings nonetheless before the september 1st warsaw meeting the ukrainians had become aware that security funds had yet to be dispersed in the absence of any credible explanation for the hold i came to the conclusion that the aid like the white house visit was jeopardized in preparation for the september 1 warsaw meeting i asked secretary pompei 0 whether a face to face conversation between trump and selenski would help to break the logjam and this was when President Trump was still intending to travel to warsaw specifically on august 22nd i emailed secretary pompei o directly copying secretary at cana i wrote this is my email to secretary pompei oh should we block time in warsaw for a short polish side for potest to meet selenski i would ask selenski to look him in the eye and tell him that once ukraines new justice folks are in place in mid september that selenski hes a lansky should be able to move forward publicly and with confidence on those issues of importance to posts in the us hopefully that will help break the logjam the secretary replied yes. I followed up the next day asking to get 10 to 15 minutes on the warsaw schedule for this i said wed like to know when its locked so that i can tell is a lansky and brief him executive secretary can replied i will try for sure moreover given my concerns about the security aide i have no reason to dispute that portion of senator johnsons recent letter in which he recalls conversations he and i had on our august 30th by the end of august my belief was that if you crane did something to demonstrate a serious intention to fight corruption and specifically addressing barry sma and the 2016 then the hold on military aid would be lifted there was a september 1st meeting with president selenski in warsaw unfortunately President Trumps attendance of the warsaw meeting was cancelled due to Hurricane DorianVice President pence attended instead i mention to Vice President pence before the meetings with the ukrainians that i had concerns that the delay in aid had become tied to the issue of investigations i recall mentioning that before the lenski meeting during the actual meeting president selenski raised the issue of Security Assistance directly with Vice President hands and the Vice President said that he would speak to President Trump about it based on my previous communication with secretary pompei o i felt comfortable sharing my concerns with mr your mac. It was a very very brief pulis side conversation that happened within a few seconds i told mr your mac that i believe that the resumption of u. S. Aid would likely not occur until ukraine took some kind of action on the Public Statement that we had been discussing for many weeks. As my other state Department Colleagues have testified this security aid was critical to ukraines defense and should not have been delayed i expressed this view to many during this period but my goal at the time was to do it was necessary to get the aid released to break the logjam i believe that the Public Statement we had been discussing for weeks was essential to advancing that goal you know i really regret that the ukrainians were placed in that predicament but i do not regret doing what i could to try to break the logjam and to solve the problem i mentioned at the outset that throughout these events we kept state Department Leadership and others apprised of what we were doing state department was fully supportive of our engagement in ukraine efforts and was aware that a commitment to investigations was among the issues we were pursuing to provide just 2 examples on june 5th the day after the us e. U. Mission hosted our Independence Day we did it a month early acting assistant secretary phil reeker sent an email to me to secretary perry and to others forwarding some positive Media Coverage of president selenski as attendance at our event mr reeker wrote and i quote this headline underscores the importance and timeliness of selenski is visit to brussels and the critical and the critical perhaps historic role of the dinner and engagement gordon coordinated thank you for your participation and dedication to this effort months later on september 3rd i sent secretary pompei o an email to express my appreciation for his joining a series of meetings in brussels following the warsaw trip i wrote. Mike thanks for schlepping to europe i think it was really important and the chemistry seems promising really appreciated secretary pompei i replied the next day on wednesday september 4th quote all good youre doing great work he banging away state Department Leadership expressed total support for our efforts to engage the new Ukrainian Administration look i have never doubted the Strategic Value of strengthening our alliance with ukraine and at all times at all times our efforts were in good faith and fully transparent to those tasked with overseeing them our efforts were reported and approved and not once do i recall encountering an objection remains an honor to serve the people of the United States as their United States ambassador to the European Union i look forward to answering the committees questions thank you we will now proceed the 1st round of questions as detailed a member provided the Committee Members of the 45 minutes of questions conducted by the chairman a majority counsel fall by 45 minutes for the Ranking Member or minority counsel following them unless i specify additional equal time for extent of questioning will proceed on of the 5 minute rule and every member will have the chance to ask questions or recognize myself or a majority counsel for the 1st round of questions isis online and theres a lot of new material in your Opening Statement for us to get through but i want to start with a few. Questions before a passing over to mr goldman in your deposition you testified that you found yourself on a continuum that became more insidious over time can you describe what you mean by this continuum of insidiousness. Well mr chairman when we left the oval office i believe on may 23rd. The request was very generic for an investigation of corruption in a very vanilla sense and dealing with some of the oligarch problems in ukraine which were longstanding problems and then as time went on. More specific items got added to the menu including the upper recent and 2016 election meddling specifically the d. N. C. Service specifically and over this over this continue on. It became more and more difficult to secure the white house meeting because more conditions were being placed on the white house meeting and then of course on july 25th although you were not privy to the call another condition was added that being the investigation of the bidens i was not privy to the call and i did not know that the condition of investigating the bidens was a condition correct you saw that in the call records wrecked it was not in any record i received when you did yes see i saw that in september correct so under on this continuum the beginning of the continuum begins on may 23rd when the president structured to talk to rudi correct and you understood that as a direction by the president that you needed to satisfy the concerns that Rudy Giuliani would express to you about what the president wanted ukraine not to be to the entire group volker perry and myself correct now in your Opening Statement you confirmed that there was a quid pro quo between the white house meeting and the investigations into barisan and the 2016 election that giuliani was publicly promoting is that right right and in fact you say that other senior officials in the state department. And the chief of staffs office including Mick Mulvaney secretary pompei o were aware of this quid pro quo that in order to get the white house meeting they were going to have to be these investigations the president wanted her act and those again are investigations into 2016 and verismo slash the bidens 2016 barista bidens did not come up but you would ultimately learn that there is a moment the bidens when you saw the call records of course today i know exactly what it means i didnt know at the time and then on july 26th you confirm you did indeed have the conversation with President Trump from a restaurant and key that david holmes testified about last week is that right correct and you have no doubt no reason to doubt mr holmes recounting of your conversation with the president. The only part of mr holmes recounting that i take exception with is i do not recall mentioning the bidens that did not enter my mind it was a recent 2016 Election Year no reason to believe that mr holmes would make that up if thats what he recalls you saying you have no reason to question i do i dont recall saying by i never recalled saying by but the rest of mr holmes recollection is consistent with your own well i cant testify as to what mr holmes might or might not have heard through the phone i dont know how he heard the conversation are you familiar with this testimony vaguely yes and the only exception you take is to the mention of the name by correct and i think you said in your testimony this morning that not only is it correct that the president brought up with you investigations on the phone the day after the july 25th call but you would have been surprised i did not brought that up as a right right because we had been hearing about it from rudy and we presumed rudy was getting it from the president so it seemed like a logical conclusion. As holmes also testified that you told him President Trump doesnt care about ukraine only cares about big stuff that relates to him personally. I take it from your comment you dont dispute that part of the conversation well he made that clear in the may 23rd meeting that he was not particularly fond of ukraine and we had a lot of heavy lifting to do to get him to engage so you dont dispute that part of mr holmes recollection now in august when you worked with Rudy Giuliani and a top ukrainian age a draft a Public Statement for president selenski to issue that includes announcement investigations into bryza you understood that was required by President Trump before he would grant a white house meeting to president s alinsky thats correct and the ukrainians understood that as well i believe they did and you inform secretary pompei oh about that statement as well i did later in august you told secretary pompei oh that president selenski would be prepared to tell President Trump that his new justice officials would be able to announce matters of interest of the president which could break the logjam when you say matters of interest of the president you mean the investigations that President Trump wanted is that right. And that involved 2016 and or the bidens and 16 and verismo and when youre talking here about breaking the long jam youre talking about the log jam of the Security Systems correct i was talking logjam generically because nothing was moving that included the Security Assistance that in iraq and based on the context of that email this was not the 1st time you had discussed these investigations with secretary kerry pale as a no he was aware of the connections that you were making between the investigations and the white house meeting and Security Assistance yes did you ever take issue with you and say that connection is not there iraq. That i recall. You mentioned th