Of law and our fierce constitutional patriotism. Now, it looked like President Trump might get away with his ukraine shakedown. After all most americans didnt know anything about it and the few who learned of it would be too afraid, too intimidated to cross the most powerful man on earth. President trump could rest easy. But if donald trump misjudged the american character, the framers of our constitution did not. I count 17 honorable Public Servants who came forward to testify over the intimidation and disparagement of the president. Is that right, mr. Goldman . Yes. There was 17. And i counted dozen Career State Department and National Security officials who served republican and democratic president s alike over decades who came to testify. In fact, four of President Trumps own National Security council staffers, hill, vindman, morrison and maguire came
forward to report trumps scheme to nsc lawyers as soon as they learned of it, didnt they mr. Goldman. Morrison and vindman went to the lawyers as soon as they heard of it, yes. And that moved me a lot. Because my father was a staffer on the National Security council under President Kennedy and he said the most important thing you can bring to work with you every day is your conscious. And he devoted his career to the idea people must speak truth to power when power becomes a Clear And Present Danger to democracy and to the people. So i want to talk about two of the many honorable government witnesses who went under oath and stood up for the truth. Mr. Goldman. Who is dr. Fiona hill. Was the senior director for the europe and russia director at the National Security council until july of this year. And she was President Trumps Senior Adviser on russia . Correct. Her family fled nazi german
and soviet russia. I think her family came from england. It was Marie Yovanovitch that was ambassador yovanovitch . Yes. Dr. Hill voiced her concerns to the nsc lawyers on july 10 and july 11th, long before anyone on the committee knew about it. Why was she why did she go to report what she had learned . What motivated her . She was concerned that ambassador sondland and Mick Mulvaney were entering into essentially a transaction whereby the ukrainians would open up investigations for President Trumps political interests in return for getting the white house meeting that President Trump had offered. And i want to talk about Deputy Assistant secretary george kent who served as a Career Foreign Service office for more than 27 years under five different president s, democrats and republicans alike. And he wrote or updated notes to file on four different occasions
to record his grave contemporaneous concerns about the president s conduct. Mr. Goldman, what were the events that led mr. Kent to draft notes to his file . There were several. There was a conversation at the end of june where several american officials had indicated to president zelensky that he needed to go forward with these investigations. There was one on august 16th, i recall, that he talked about. But you bring up a very important point. Which is all of these state Department Witnesses in particular, and frankly almost all of the witnesses other than ambassador sondland, took unbelievable meticulous notes. I would have dreamed for a witness like that as a prosecutor. And it makes for a very clear and compelling record and clear and compelling evidence that is based on contemporaneous notes. Do we have mr. Kents note in this process. We have no state Department Records including notes and
ambassador taylors first person cable and emails and so many documents that the few that we have gotten have been so helpful to the investigation why do we not have them . The state department refused to provide them notwithstanding our subpoena under the president s direction. You know, in authoritarian societies like Putins Russia or the kingdom of saudi arabia, people are terrified to speak out about the crimes of their political leaders but the United States a lot of people are not afraid. Even though President Trump is tried to intimidate or silent them. And hes trying to make our country more like russia and we can be thankful that you found a lot of heros who stood up for the truth in our constitution. I yield back. Gentleman yields back. Miss lesk yo. Thank you. My first two questions are for the American People. America, are you sick and tired yet of this impeachment sham . And, america, would you Like Congress to get back to work and actually get something done . Because i sure would. Mr. Castor, the rest of the questions are for you. And i would like yes or no answers if possible. Mr. Castor, my first question is important. Did any of the democrats fact witnesses present bribery, extortion or a high crime or a misdemeanor . Good heavens, no. Mr. Castor, the Deputy Assistant to the president of the National Security mr. Morrison listened in on the phone call. He testified that he was not concerned that anything discussed on the phone call was illegal or improper. Is that correct . He was worried about leaks. Several democrat witnesses testified that it is fairly common for foreign aid to be paused for various reasons. Including concerns that the country is corrupt and Taxpayer Dollars may be misspent. Ambassador volker testified that this hold on Security Assistance to ukraine was not significant. Is that correct . Yes. A number of witnesses can also said the same thing. Former u. S. Ambassador to ukraine Marie Yovanovitch testified that in ukraine, and i quote, corruption is not just prevalent, but frankly is the system. Is that correct . Yes. All of the witnesses confirmed the environment as very corrupt. Mr. Castor, Ukraine EnergyCompany Burisma holdings had a reputation as a corrupt company, is that correct. Big time. According to the New York Times, hunter biden was paut of a broad effort by burisma to bring in a period when the company was facing investigations, is that correct. The new yorker had a extensive report on that as well. Obamas Deputy Assistant
obamas Deputy Assistant secretary of state george kent testified he raised concerns directly to Vice President bidens office about Hunter Bidens services on burismas bords is that correct, yes or no . Yes. Mr. Castor, in the July 25th CallPresident Trump referenced joe biden bragging about how he stopped the prosecution. We all saw that video earlier today. Where joe biden bragged about how he told ukraine if the prosecutor is not fired, youre not getting the money. Mr. Castor, is this the same prosecutor that looked into burisma . It is. The Assistant Attorney General said and i quote,
emolument opportunities to unqualified individuals in order to influence Government Officials is corruption, plain and simple. Mr. Castor, here is another key question. Given that, one, burisma had a reputation of being a corrupt company, two, obamas own state department was concerned about hunter biden serving on burisma board at the same time that Vice President biden was acting as the point person to ukraine, and, three, obamas Assistant Attorney General said in a similar scheme what that that corruption that there was corruption plain and simple, do you think then it is understandable, reasonable, and acceptable for President Trump to ask the ukrainian president to look into the Hunter Biden Burisma potential corruption scheme . Yes. Mr. Castor, there are four undisputable facts that will never change that prove there is no impeachable offense. There was no quid pro quo on the July 25th Call. Ukraine leadership did not know the aid was held up at the time of the july 25th telephone call. Ukraine received the white house meeting phone call and aid even though, four, ukrainian didnt initiate any investigations. Do you agree . Ukraine received a meeting with Vice PresidentPence In Warsaw and a meeting not at the white house but in new york at the united nations. Mr. Castor, did mr. Turley testify that this Impeachment Inquiry has not passed chairman nadlers threeprong test. He did. Thank you. And i yield back. Thank you. The gentle woman from washington is recognized. Thank you. Mr. Goldman, lets focus on
the republican claim that President Trump withheld military aid to ukraine because he was supposedly concerned about corruption rather than the fact that he abused his office for personal gain. And let me be clear, we actually do not have to read the president s mind on this. As your report notes on page 10, as we will see on television, he told us himself exactly what his intent was. What exactly did you hope zelensky would do about the bidens after your phone call . Well, i would think that if they were honest about it, they would start a Major Investigation into the bidens. It is a very simple answer. So the first and best witness about the president S Corrupt Intent was donald trump. There is also plenty of Corroborating Evidence so lets review the basic facts that weve already established. First, President Trump does not even mention the word corruption during either of liz calls with
president zelensky and he disregards all of the Talking Points that were prepared for him on corruption by the National Security council. Second, investigations of the bidens and a debunked Conspiracy Theory about the 2016 election were not supported by official u. S. Policy and, third, congress authorized military aid to ukraine, ukraine passed all of the checks that the United States established to ensure that it was taking appropriate actions to fight corruption and there was unanimous consensus among the state department, Department Of Defense and National Security council that the president should release the military aid that ukraine critically needed to fight russian aggression. So, mr. Goldman, between the time that President Trump put a hold on military aid to ukraine, and then released the aid, the president never conducted an actual review or Corruption Assessment on ukraine, did he . That is correct. There was no witness testified
that there was any review or any investigation of any sort related to the ukraine aid. And isnt it also true that the Defense Department actually determined not to conduct a review on ukraine after the president froze the military aid because ukraine had already met all of the Corruption Benchmarks in may of 2019 . Yes. And everyone involved in ukrainian policy believed that they were on the right path and president zelensky in particular. In addition to ukraine having satisfied all of the relevant Corruption Assessments prior to u. S. Military aid being withheld, there is significant Witness Testimony that both the state department and the Ukrainian Embassy actually advised that a white house meeting with president zelensky would help further an anticorruption agenda, correct. Both the anticorruption agenda and the Aggression Fighting fighting at gression from russia. And, in fact, President Trumps budget actually cut funding for fighting corruption
in ukraine. Now mr. Castor argues that President Trump withheld military aid to ukraine because he was skeptical of foreign assistance in general. But in both 2017 and 2018 didnt President Trump release military aid for ukraine without any complaints about corruption . Thats correct. So mr. Goldman, the president was perfectly fine giving military aid to ukraine in 2017 and 2018, but somehow not in 2019. So what changed . Joe biden started running for president. Vice President Biden started running. And i would add the Mueller Report came out which did not even though it did not charge the president , it indicated it implicated the president and his campaign in welcoming the assistance from russia and utilizing it. And the sequence of events and all of the Corroborating Evidence makes it Crystal Clear that President Trump didnt care about corruption at all. In fact, as he told us himself on national television, he simply cared about his own politically motivated
investigations into his political rival. And you saw the clip where ambassador sondland picked up the phone, called President Trump and then mr. Holmes asked him what the president thought about ukraine and quickly what was mr. Sondlands answer . Mr. Sondland said the president does not give a bleep about ukraine. He only cares about the big stuff. Meaning the Biden Investigation that mr. Giuliani was pushing. And by the way just to add, that is a direct evidence conversation between President Trump and ambassador sondland on that day and there are mr. That we have not talked about on the minority side. So we know what President Trump was interested in based on his words, his actions, and Witness Testimony. The president of the United States wanted ukraine to announce an investigation into a political rival for his own personal, political benefit to interfere in our election and he was willing to use u. S. Military aid which is Taxpayer Dollars and an essentially white house meeting as his leverage. That is unacceptable and a grave
abuse of power. I yield back. The gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chairwoman. In the navy we had a saying. Bluff. Which is bottom line up front. Let me give everybody the bottom line. Were here because democrats are terrified that President Trump is going to win reelection. That is really what this all comes down to. Let me get into the specifics. Were here dealing with impeachment. Because democrats dont want to talk about the Red Hot Trump economy. They dont want to talk about the fact that we have the lowest unemployment rates in 50 years. Were dealing with impeachment because democrats dont want to talk about how the president has worked to protect American Companies from chinese aggression and renegotiated trade deals to benefit american workers. How hes eliminated burdensome regulations that hurd the
economy and that help job creators. Congressional democrats dont want to be reminded that the American People, that the democrat agenda includes such laughable ideas like banning airplanes, giving Illegal ImmigrantsTaxpayer Funded Health Care and taking private Health Insurance away from the American People. That is really why were here. This whole process is just a distraction. It is an attempt to hide the far left radical agenda. So lets talk about the facts. Schiffs report claims the administration froze military aid for ukraine without explanation. Yet the facts are that President Trump gave more military aid to ukraine than president obama. President obama gave ukraine wellwishes