i bought a vvip ticket to the inauguration. that s a lot of money, isn t it? it s a lot of money. and after that, the president makes you ambassador to the european union, eventually the ambassador to ukraine is removed and as you told us in your deposition, you became a central figure as it relates to ukraine. that s a pretty big responsibility? i don t know that i said i was a central figure. i was one of several people who were tasked to work on the ukraine file. and would you ever in that big responsibility take any actions that were not authorized by president trump? well, by president trump or the leadership in the state department. were you ever hauled in to the leadership of the state department for any actions you had taken around your work on ukraine? no. as to rudy giuliani, on may 23rd the president told you,
communications with president trump as it relates to the inquiry and, of course, can you correct me if i get it wrong. on may 23rd you had a group meeting that included what you call a vanilla request about ending corruption involving ukrainian oligarchs, correct? correct. on july 25th you called president trump to say you were on your way to ukraine but nothing of substance occurred on that call, correct? correct. on july 26th you had a five-minute call at a restaurant that you didn t originally remember because it did not strike me as significant at the time, unquote but once refreshed recalled that it the primary purpose was a rapper named a$ap rocky, correct? correct. on september 9th and most importantly reading from your deposition, you called president trump to ask him what do you want from ukraine. he responded i want nothing, i want no quid pro quo, i want zelensky to do the right thing. i want him to do what he ran on and what he ran on was fighting
over the last few days about these investigations into burisma and biden and the 2016 crowd strike server. and you in that conversation with mr. giuliani basically debunked all of that. now, at that time at that breakfast who else was with you at that breakfast? there was someone that mr. giuliani brought along. i later learned this was lev parnas who we ve learned a lot about since then. so mr. lev parnas was at that breakfast that mr. giuliani had with you. and we now know that mr. parnas has since been indicted for foreign campaign contributions to president trump s political action committee. is that correct? i have seen that. all right. on may 23rd, you were in that discussion with the president and at one point he referred to
zelensky wouldn t be the reformer that he campaigned on. that was a supposition that i made because of the meeting with the president on may 23rd. i thought that would be what is behind it. and in fact the aid was lifted shortly after he was able to convene a parliament. i believe he let me get the dates straight. yes, i believe he was able to convene the parliament around the first of seof september and then the aid was released. and he pushed through a number of anti-corruption initiatives. that began with the parliament seated on that day and it was a 24-hour session and then continued for some time. and that was an encouraging sign. it started off very encouraging way, yes. and other than these things going on the background with the pause in the aid, the u.s. relationships with ukraine you testified are you stated it was about as good as you would want them to be?
that he campaigned on? that was a supposition that i made because of the meeting with the president on may 23rd, i thought that could be what was behind it. in fact the aide was lifted shortly after he was able to convene a parliament? i believe he let me get the date straight. yes, he was able to convene the parliament around the 1st of september, and i believe the aide was released on the 11th of september. when he was able to convene a parliament, he pushed through anticorruption initiatives? that began with a parliament seated on that day, a 24-hour session but then it continued for some time. that was an encouraging sign? it started off in a very encouraging way. yes. other than these things going on in the background with the pause in the aide, the u.s. regulations with the ukraine, you testified, you stated it was about as good as he would want them to be? can you repeat the question,