Sondland is about to blow a hole in Trump’s Ukraine defense

[wvit1001]

Ever since former U.S. special envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker handed over those text messages, President Trump’s defenders have pointed to one of them as supposedly exonerating Trump. “Bill, I believe you are incorrect about President Trump’s intentions,” Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, told another diplomat. “The President has been crystal clear no quid pro quo’s [sic] of any kind.”

This text has been a linchpin of the Trump Ukraine defense. But on Saturday night, the linchpin broke.

Sondland will also indicate that he was merely relaying Trump’s defense, which he had discussed with the president on a phone call before the text message:

Sondland plans to tell lawmakers he has no knowledge of whether the president was telling him the truth at that moment. “It’s only true that the president said it, not that it was the truth,” said the person familiar with Sondland’s planned testimony, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic matters.
...
The person familiar with Sondland’s testimony said the ambassador “believed Trump at the time and on that basis passed along assurances” that Trump was not withholding military aid for political purposes.

But Sondland’s testimony will raise the possibility that Trump wasn’t truthful in his denial of a quid pro quo as well as an alternative scenario in which the president’s interest in the scheme soured at a time when his administration faced mounting scrutiny over why it was withholding about $400 million in security assistance to Ukraine and delaying a leader-level visit with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

“Whether he’s deciding it’s getting too hot to handle and he backs off whatever his position really was a month earlier, I don’t know,” the person said of Sondland’s understanding.

Sondland is expected to say that for months before the Sept. 9 message, he worked at the direction of Rudolph W. Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney, to secure what he would call in another text message the “deliverable” sought by Trump: a public statement from Ukraine that it would investigate corruption, including mentioning Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, by name. In exchange for the statement, the president would grant Ukraine’s new president a coveted White House audience.



https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/gordon-sondland-is-about-to-blow-a-hole-in-trumps-ukraine-defense/ar-AAIIBJV?li=BBnb7Kz

[D2D]

More bullshit from a left that time after time spews ever more bullshit never once being proven correct!

[wvit1001]

no this is what's happening d2.

[D2D]

Just more fiction from corrupt Democrats!

[JigSaw-II]

D2D and all the rest of the right wing TDS'ers can call it bullshit all they wants, it isn't going to change the fact, trump is not going to have a good week, again...

[D2D]

All you have is imagination and hatred!

[JigSaw-II]

(( All you have is imagination and hatred! ))


Imagination is a good thing, right D2D?  As for the hatred, you can blame trump for that.  trump's hatred has a tendency to rub off on good people...

[D2D]

No, imagination is bad in your case as it overrides your perception of reality!

Remember it was hate filled leftists who rioted and demanded President Trump's impeachment even before he took office!

[wvit1001]

Reality is proving your trolling is nothing but trolling d2.

[JigSaw-II]

(( No, imagination is bad in your case as it overrides your perception of reality! ))

No no no D2D.  My imagination actually helps my perception of reality.

(( Remember it was hate filled leftists who rioted and demanded President Trump's impeachment even before he took office! ))

No, I don't remember D2D. Suppose you refresh my memory.  I'm sure there is a new article somewhere...

[wmdn_bs]

D2D is entertaining though. Kind of like I imagine watching him against Kenneth Jennings on Jeapordy. 

[D2D]

The blind leading the blind!