private lawyer, was taking a direct role in ukrainian diplomacy. on april 25th, mr. zelensky s childhood friend and campaign chair was appointed the head of the security services of ukraine. indicated he had been contacted by, quote, someone names giuliani who said he was an adviser to the vice president. i reported mr. bacano s message. over the follow months it became apparent mr. giuliani was having a direct influence on the foreign policy agenda that the three amigos were executing on the ground in ukraine. in fact, at one point during a preliminary meeting of the inaugural delegation, someone wondered aloud why mr. giuliani was so active in the media with respect to ukraine. my recollection is that ambassador sondland stated, quote, dammit rudy, every time rudy gets involved he goes and fs everything up. the inauguration took place on may 20th and i took notes in the
washington, d.c., where she learned that she would be recall early. the barrage of allegations drect directed at yovanovitch, a career ambassador, is unlike anything i ve seen in my professional career. following president-elect zelensky s victory our attention in the embassy focused on getting to know the zelensky administration and preparations for the inauguration scheduled for may 20th, the same day that ambassador yovanovitch departed post permanently. it quickly became clear that the white house was not prepared to show the level of support for the zelensky administration that we had originally anticipated. in early may, mr. giuliani publicly alleged that mr. zelensky was, quote, surrounded by enemies of the u.s. president and canceled a visit to ukraine. shortly thereafter, we learned that vice president pence no longer planned to lead the presidential delegation to the inauguration. the white house then whittled down an initial list for the official presidential delegation
who noticed what was happening, who had key conversations that could be validated by others. and now you have people in a position who dealt directly with the president who knew exactly where his mind was, what his priorities were. and i think the larger point talking about republican senators who will be jurors. the fact that the president pursued a conspiracy theory tht directly helped russia. so if they believe that there was an abuse of power, who benefited because a really damning part of that. the president s allies keep saying there couldn t be any quid pro quo because the ukrainians didn t even know there was a suspension, a withholding of the u.s. military assistance until much, much later. yesterday we heard laura cooper, deputy secretary of defense say on july 25th, shortly after the president s phone conversation with president zelensky, they got a call from the ukrainian
believed would help his re-election campaign. the first investigation was of a discredited conspiracy theory that ukraine and not russia was responsible for interfering in our 2016 election. the second investigation was into the political rival trump apparently feared most, joe biden. trump sought to weaken biden and to refute the fact that his own election had been helped by a russian hacking and dumping operation and russian social media campaign directed by vladimir putin. trump s scheme stood in contrast to the longstanding bipartisan foreign policy of the united states, by undermining military and diplomatic support for a key ally and set back u.s. anti-corruption efforts in ukraine. in conditioning a meeting with zelensky and then military aid on securing an investigation of his rival, trump put his personal and political interests above the united states. as ambassador sondland would later tell career foreign service officer david holmes
when he was named as part of the u.s. delegation led by secretary rick perry to president zelensky s inauguration. lieutenant colonel alexander vindman also attended the inauguration and as holmes recalls, during a meeting with president zelensky, took the opportunity to advise the new ukrainian leader to stay out of u.s. domestic politics. another concern that arose for dr. hill around this time was her discovery of a potential nsc back channel on ukraine. hill learned an nsc staff member who did not work on ukraine and for her may have been providing ukraine-related information to president trump that dr. hill was not made aware of. according to holmes, following this zelensky inauguration, sondland and perry took a very active and unconventional role in formulating our priorities for the new zelensky administration and personally reaching out to president zelensky and his senior team.