Committees Release Vindman and Hill Transcripts as Part of Impeachment Inquiry

Depositions Reveal First-Hand, Direct Testimony on Instruments of Power Used for Political Gain

November 8, 2019

Washington—Today, Rep. Adam B. Schiff, the Chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Rep. Eliot L. Engel, the Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, the Acting Chairwoman of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, released transcripts from joint depositions of one current and one former White House official responsible for Ukraine policy:  Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman and Dr. Fiona Hill.

The three Chairs issued the following statement announcing today’s release:

“Lieutenant Colonel Vindman—an active duty military officer who was awarded the Purple Heart after being injured by a roadside bomb in Iraq—performed another duty to the country by testifying before the Committees about presidential misconduct that he witnessed during his service at the White House. Lt. Col. Vindman testified that the July 25, 2019, call between President Trump and the Ukrainian president led him to report immediately to lawyers at the White House his serious concerns about political investigations the President pressed for on the call.

“Lt. Col. Vindman also told the Committees that the ‘demand’ by President Trump for the announcement of a politically-motivated investigation into a U.S. citizen by a foreign country forced him to make a‘moral and ethical’ judgment, and led to his concern that the act could ‘undermine U.S. national security.’ He also detailed a pressure campaign waged by the President and his allies ahead of the call, and how he properly reported this activity to the same White House legal advisors.
“Dr. Fiona Hill—a respected Russia and Ukraine expert who served as Lt. Col. Vindman’s supervisor—detailed how senior officials at the White House, including National Security Advisor John Bolton, shared her serious concern about efforts prior to the July 25 call to push Ukraine to undertake these politically-motivated investigations, and about her efforts, at Mr. Bolton’s direction, to report this activity to senior White House officials.
“Lt. Col. Vindman and Dr. Hill—two courageous and patriotic Americans—testified despite pressure by the White House to silence their testimony. Their superiors in the White House have declined to cooperate with the inquiry, but transcripts released today show clearly that individuals close to the President were alarmed by a presidential scheme as illicit and corrupt as a ‘drug deal.’”


The testimony of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman can be found here.

Key excerpts of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman’s testimony can be found here.

The testimony of Dr. Fiona Hill can be found here.

Key excerpts of Dr. Fiona Hill’s testimony can be found here.

Background:

H. Res. 660, which was passed by the House of Representatives on October 31, 2019, authorizes the Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence “to make publicly available in electronic form the transcripts of depositions” with “appropriate redactions for classified and other sensitive information.”

Pursuant to this resolution, and consistent with the Committee’s rules and longstanding bipartisan practice, the Committee has begun preparing transcripts from the impeachment inquiry for public release, which includes a thorough, nonpartisan security review to protect classified and other sensitive information.

As part of this process, the Committee is redacting (1) personally identifiable information; (2) the names of non-senior Executive Branch personnel and Intelligence Community employees; (3) the names of committee staff who did not ask questions or make on-the-record statements; and (4) classified or potentially classified information or other sensitive information not pertinent to the subject of the impeachment inquiry.

In addition, consistent with the Committee’s rules, each transcript has been made available to the witness for inspection, including to identify technical, grammatical, and typographical corrections.  The Committee has also taken into consideration requested redactions from witnesses, if they fall within the parameters above.

Although the transcripts list Members of the three Committees who were present at the outset of a deposition, they do not necessarily reflect the attendance of all Members who may have joined or departed a deposition at different points.

The Committee will release individual transcripts on a rolling basis as this process is completed.

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Permalink: https://democrats-foreignaffairs.house.gov/2019/11/committees-release-vindman-and-hill-transcripts-as-part-of-impeachment-inquiry