A top U.S. diplomat told impeachment investigators Saturday that he tried to garner support for Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, among State Department officials earlier this year, but his efforts were unsuccessful, The New York Times reported.
Philip Reeker, the acting assistant secretary of state in charge of European and Eurasian Affairs, testified privately Saturday that this spring, he pressed both David Hale, the third-ranking State Department official, and T. Ulrich Brechbuhl, the counselor to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, to support Yovanovitch.
But officials declined to publicly support the former ambassador at the time. Yovanovitch was recalled from her position in May after months of facing accusations by critics, including President Trump and his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. She was told in that month, after she was removed from her position, that she had done nothing wrong, but she was not trusted by the president, the New York Times reported.
Yovanovitch testified earlier this month that she was also dismissed after insisting that Giuliani’s requests for investigations go through official channels. She declined to do “all this offline, personal, informal stuff,” an unnamed former diplomat told the Associated Press earlier this year.
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Reeker, whose testimony was subpoenaed by House Democrats, said he also supported another unsuccessful effort by a senior State Department diplomat, Michael McKinley, to secure a public statement supporting Yovanovitch, the New York Times reported.
McKinley told congressional investigators earlier this month that he resigned as a senior advisor to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo due in part to the department’s failure to support Yovanovitch.
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JUST IN: Official says he made several efforts to advocate for Marie Yovanovich during deposition https://t.co/7QkOqw07Zp pic.twitter.com/5rm2g3EsoJ
— The Hill (@thehill) October 27, 2019
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