November 5, 2019

Kafka in Foggy Bottom: impeachment transcript reveals fear of Trump tweets

Source: The Guardian

What shines through the testimony of Marie Yovanovitch is her disorientation. She is a veteran diplomat at the peak of her career, and in one of the most challenging but important posts in US foreign policy. But she had no clue what was happening inside her own government.

On 24 April this year, she received a call from Carol Perez, the director general of the foreign service, speaking to her in cryptic tones as if Yovanovitch’s life was in danger if she remained at her ambassadorial post in Kiev. She spoke as if there was a threat too awful to describe clearly on a phone line.

“She said that there was a lot of concern for me, that I needed to be on the next plane home to Washington,” Yovanovitch recalled in her testimony to the congressional committees conducting impeachment hearings. Taken aback, the ambassador to Ukraine wanted to know what the sudden panic was about. Perez just told her: “I don’t know, but this is about your security. You need to come home immediately.”

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/05/impeachment-marie-yovanovitch-ukraine-transcript-reveals-fear-and-chaos-in-the-state-department

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These guys weren't afraid of foreign threats, they were afraid of the president.

Makes their testimony look even better.