election meddling, defending that as a legitimate concern. that republican defense of mr. trump became essential to the impeachment proceedings when fiona hill, respected russia scholar and former senior white house official, added a hard critique of it at her testimony on thursday. she told some of mr. trump s fiercest defenders in congress they were repeating a, quote, fictional narrative and that it likely came from a disinformation campaign from russian security services which themselves propagated it. quote, the revelations demonstrate excuse me, the revelations demonstrate russia s persistence in trying to sow discord among its adversaries and crucially showed that the kremlin apparently succeeded. as unfounded claims about ukrainian election interference seeped into republican talking points. we re going to have more on this story coming up tonight. one of the new york times reporters who broke this story is going to be joining us. we ll talk about the main thrust
conference with president putin and prime minister orban of hungary where putin says, second, as we all know, during the presidential campaign in the united states the ukrainian government adopted a unilateral position in favor of one candidate. more than that, certain oligarchs certainly with the approval of the political leadership funded this candidate or female candidate, to be more precise. mr. holmes, you spent three years as well in the u.s. embassy in russia. why would it be to vladimir putin s advantage to promote this theory of ukraine interference? first of all, to deflect from the allegations of russian interference. second of all, to drive a wedge between the united states and ukraine, which russia wants to essentially get back into its sphere of influence. so at these open hearings we have this dramatic warning from fiona hill that makes headlines nationwide, right? she s warning congress, particularly warning the republicans on the impeachment
line in the new york times. quote, american intelligence officials informed senators and their aides in recent weeks russia had engaged in a years-long campaign to essentially frame ukraine as responsible for moscow s own hacking of the 2016 election. and so who s promoting that russian disinformation? the president himself is obviously a lost cause. the president s campaign? they sent out this email in the middle of fiona hill s testimony. mike pompeo don t get me started, but mike pompeo appears to be hand in glove on the worst of the president on this stuff. house republicans, they re doing it, too. it s hard to stomach but maybe they re unwitting. maybe they don t believe the warnings that this looks like a russian intelligence op. they just don t believe the evidence that it is. maybe they haven t received that same classified briefing from u.s. intelligence agencies that senators have, but senators have been briefed. they know. so what s the explanation for this?
look at those newspaper front pages from this week and they will still have the same wow factor that they have for us today. let me show you some of today s front pages. this was the front page of the new york times today. you see the big all-caps headline there in the upper right. expert condemns flow of fictions on ukraine s role. and then the other four columns on the top of the front page are dominated by this gigantic dramatic photograph of fiona hill, until recently the top russia expert for the u.s. government. that s her being sworn in. and you see the dramatic white on black caption there with fiona hill s quote. in the course of this investigation i would ask that you please not promote politically driven falsehoods that so clearly advance russian interests. that was the new york times today. this was the headline in the arkansas democrat gazette today. again, another big dramatic
photograph of fiona hill, until recently the top russia expert for the u.s. government. that s her being sworn in. and you see the dramatic white on black caption there with fiona hill s quote. in the course of this investigation i would ask you please not promote politically driven falsehoods that so clearly advance russian interests. that was the new york times today. this was the headline in the arkansas democrat gazette today. again another big dramatic photof fiona hill at her testimony. and there s the headline. expert, ukraine meddling lie. and you see the subhead there, narrative furthered by russia, she asserts. here s that tampa bay times from florida. hill, discord serves putin. former security aid and expert fiona hill warns the gop of fictions and dramatic comments on thursday. up in the great state of maine this was the portland press