Nov 27 (Washington Post):

“This is Ambassador Sondland speaking to me,” Trump said outside the White House last week, looking down to read notes he’d taken of Sondland’s testimony. “Here’s my response that he just gave: ‘I want nothing. . . . I want nothing. I want no quid pro quo.’ ”

Seems Trump feels  his defense is ironclad, because it is based on the sworn testimony of Ambassador Sondland.  If the Democrats are going to accept everything else that Sondland testified to, as the truth and was incriminating, then it stands to reason that they have to accept his recollection of this phone call.

I don’t agree that everything that came from Sondland was the truth.  The other phone calls could  be corroborated.   This “September 9 call” is suspicious and  I think evidence is mounting that the call did not occur.    The White House could immediately dispel this idea, as they have the phone records.  The State Department has Sondland records and will not provide them to Sondland.  Note Sondland is still the Ambassador to EU.

The Republicans on the House Intel Committee kept after Ambassador Sondland to be more detailed on the “no quid pro quo” call.  Sondland said that because the State Department would not allow him access to his records and he wasn’t much of a note taker, he could not be sure of the details.

It is very possible that the Sept 6 to 9 time period, just one phone call was made to Trump.  In this phone call, he stated that there was “no quid pro quo” but then said what was specifically required to release the aid.   An announcement by the Chief Prosecutor was not enough.   It had to be from Zelenskiy.  I think in Trump’s mind, he was on the winning side.  The worse the fighting was with the Ukraine, the more likely that he would comply with Trump’s demands.

Unlike Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump doesn’t email.  I think by using 3 amigos (Kurt Volker, Gordon Sondland and Rick Perry) as plus  Rudy Giuliani, to the Ukraine, Trump thought he could by-pass normal Foreign Service protocol.  Of course, it meant getting rid of our US Ambassador to Ukraine, Maria Yovanovitch, because she had three undesirable qualities:  honesty, intelligence and experience, and wasn’t going to be a good fit in the dirt seeking political  missions of Donald Trump, helping him get re-elected.  See CNN link.

The links below are very compelling.

Stay tuned,

Dave

Link:

Just Security:  Here’s the Proof that the Quid Pro Quo call never occurred

Washington Post Witness testimony and records raise questions about account of Trump’s ‘no quid pro quo’ call

CNN  Opinion (Nov 17)  What Rudy and ‘Three Amigos’ were up to