[hearing on trump case] on November 13 local time, the people of the US House of Representatives held the first public hearing on the impeachment investigation of President trump. Two witnesses: William middot, charg é d'affaires A.I. of the United States in Ukraine; Taylor and George middot, Deputy Assistant Secretary of state for Europe and Asia Europe affairs; Kent testified.
The Wall Street Journal 13 reported that the US House of Representatives has opened a seven week public stage of impeachment investigation. This is the fourth such inquiry in American history. The first public hearing was held in the conference hall of an office building, which lasted more than 6 hours. Both witnesses testified behind closed doors and disclosed some new information on the 13th.
At the hearing, the question that any witness should answer was made public for the first time, which is also the core argument of the impeachment investigation: whether trump abused his power to withhold security assistance to Ukraine in order to threaten the Ukrainian government to investigate the people trump wants to investigate, including his potential political enemy Biden.
The two witnesses first made it clear that "they are not trump's opponents". Taylor testified that the US government handled Ukrainian affairs through conventional diplomatic channels and "unconventional channels", which were handled by Trump's private lawyer Rudy middot; Giuliani led. Kent also said that this treatment shocked him.
At the hearing, Taylor also revealed an important information, which was a new content that had not been before. Taylor said that his assistant heard trump talking on the phone with us ambassador to the European Union Sunderland on July 26. Trump asked about the investigation in Ukraine. Sunderland said that Ukraine was ready to move forward. Taylor stressed that in Sunderland's view, trump is more concerned about investigating Biden than Ukraine itself.
In this regard, Republicans publicly defended trump. They tried to describe part of Taylor's testimony as "hearsay" and stressed that the investigation promoted in Ukraine is a necessary means to combat corruption in that country. They also tried to construct some unproven theories that Ukraine, not Russia, intervened in the 2016 election.
An article published by CNN said that the first public hearing of impeachment investigation had achieved the expected results, and the whole day's debate gave both parties enough time to think about the progress of the investigation. The two witnesses have something new to repeat their views when they testified behind closed doors last month. The Republicans also carried out several rounds of 'counterattacks'.
On the day of the public hearing, trump met with visiting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Oval Office of the White House. He talked about the first public hearing of impeachment investigation being held at the same time, saying that the investigation was' witch hunting 'and' scam ', and said that he was too busy to watch the hearing that day. I think I will get a report'. Trump said he "knew nothing" about the phone conversation with Sunderland mentioned by Taylor at the hearing.
A recent public opinion survey conducted jointly by the Wall Street Journal and NBC found that 53% of Americans supported the impeachment survey and 44% opposed the impeachment survey. About 49% believed that trump should be impeached and removed from office, while 46% opposed it.
The hearing on the 13th opened the prelude to a series of public evidence collection. Mary middot, former US ambassador to Ukraine; Jovanovic will testify publicly in parliament on the 15th. Another eight witnesses will attend a public hearing next week. It is reported that the objects of all hearings are officials who have provided closed door testimony. In the future, many current and former officials from the National Security Council, the State Department and the Pentagon will attend the hearings.