This brings me to the topic of todays proceedings. I would like to recap my recollection of the timeline in which these events played out. I testified about all of this at length in my deposition. In july, i became aware of a hold being placed on obligation of the State Departments military financing or fmf and dods usai fund. In meetings i heard the president directed the Office Of Management And Budget to hold the funds because of his concern for corruption in ukraine. Let me say at the outset i have never discussed this or any other matter with the president and never heard directly from him about this matter. At a senior level meeting i attended july 26th chaired by National Council Security Leadership as in all other interagency meetings on this topic of which i was wear, the
national Security Community expressed unanimous support for resuming funding in the u. S. National security interests. At the July 26th Meeting there was also a discussion how ukrainian anticorruption efforts
national security community expressed unanimous support for resuming funding in the u.s. national security interests. at the july 26th meeting there was also a discussion how ukrainian anti-corruption efforts were making progress. dod reiterated what we had said in our earlier certification to congress stating sufficient reform including anti-corruption to justify the usai spending. i and others at the interagency meetings felt that the matter was particularly urgent because it takes time to obligate that amount of money. my understanding was the money was legally required to be obligated by september 30th, the end of the fiscal year. the ensuing weeks until the hold was released on september 11th. i pursued three tracks, first starting july 21st at an interagency meeting i made clear to the interagency leadership my understanding that once dod
i asked to him confirm there would be no cnn interview, which he did. on september 25th, at the u.n. general assembly session in new york city, president trump met president zelensky face-to-face. he also released the transcript of the july 25th call. the united states gave the ukrainians no notice of the release. they were livid. although this was the first time i seen the details of president trump s july 25th call with president zelensky in which he mentioned vice president biden, i had come to understand well before then that investigations was a term ambassadors volker and sondland used to mean matters related to the 2016 elections and to investigations of burisma and the bidens. last friday, a member of my staff told me of events that occurred on july 26th.
brief the lawyers. dr. hill said that ambassador bolton referred to this deal as this is a drug deal after the july 10th meeting. ambassador bolton opposed a call between president zelensky and president trump out of concern that it would be a disaster. needless to say, the ukrainians in the meetings were confused. ambassador bolton and the regular ukraine policy-decision making channel wanted to talk about security, energy and reform. ambassador sondland participating in the irregular channel wanted to talk about the connection between a white house meeting and ukrainian investigations. also during our july 19th call, dr. hill informed me that ambassador volker had met with mr. guiliani to discuss ukraine. this caught my by surprise. the next day i asked ambassador volker about that meeting, i received no response. i began to sense that these two decision-making channels, the regular and irregular were
with then senior director for european and russian affairs, fiona hill and director of european affairs, lt. col. alex vindman at the nfc, they tried to assure me that they were not aware of any official clang in u.s. policy toward ukraine, omb s announcement not withstanding. they did confirm that the hold on security systems for ukraine came from chief of staff nick mulvaney, who maintained a skeptical view of ukraine. in the same july 19th phone call, they gave me an account of a july 10th meeting with ukrainian and american officials at the white house. they told me that partway through the meeting ambassador sondland had connected investigations with an oval office meeting for president zelensky. which so irritated then national security adviser john bolton that he abruptly ended the meeting, telling dr. hill and leiutenant general vindman they should have nothing to do with domestic politics. he also directed dr. hill to