Impeachment Inquiry Cheat Sheet: Bill Taylor’s Past Testimony

Taylor testified behind closed doors in the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility on October 22 — an arrangement that drew criticism from Republicans. The “impeachment inquiry” was only authorized nine days later.

Unlike past inquiries, the president is not being allowed legal representation in any of the hearings prior to a final round in the House Judiciary Committee. Moreover, the minority party cannot object to any witnesses called by the majority — again, a departure from the precedents in the Nixon and Clinton impeachment inquiries.

Taylor is being called as the Democrats’ first witness because of all the witnesses, he offered the clearest statement of his belief — his “clear understanding” — that the U.S. was withholding aid to Ukraine until President Volodymyr Zelensky made a public commitment to investigate possible Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and to re-open an investigation into Burisma Holdings, the company on whose board Hunter Biden — the son of former Vice President Joe Biden — sat from 2014 until this year, including when his father was in office.

1. Taylor testified that it was his “clear understanding, security assistance money would not come until the President [of Ukraine] committed to pursue the investigation.” This is the most definitive statement of a “quid pro quo” in all of the testimony heard by the impeachment inquiry thus far, at least on those transcripts that have been made public.

What Democrats aren’t telling you: Taylor testified that he had no firsthand knowledge of any such quid pro quo, and that he had never spoken to Trump directly: “I had no conversations with the President.” (Democrats do acknowledge in their “excerpts” prepared for the media that Taylor testified that he heard, third-hand, that the president said there was no “quid pro quo.”)...

More at Breitbart - 3 additional points about what the Democrats/Media AREN'T telling you.

Scott Adams (political commentator and Dilbert author) had this to say about Pollack's article in his Periscope from today:

All right. Number one for today, you have to say - because most of you are interested in the the hearings today.

Before the hearings, make sure you read Breitbart - and specifically I tweeted it - Joel Pollack's article in which he calls out what some of the important parts of the transcript are.

And here's the fun part - he shows you what the Democrats don't tell you - also from the transcript.

So it's: "Here's what the Democrats said - and it's in the transcript - and here's the part they didn't tell you."

Which kind of refutes the first part or it clarifies it - so to see it in that format is somewhat brilliant, and I think Joel is probably going to have some more of these, and it's one of the most one of the most useful pieces of journalistic reporting you'll ever see.

I have to tell you when I read it - as I was reading through it, I could feel my opinion of the whole situation changing in real time, because it was stuff I'd never heard and it's right from the transcripts.

Right from the transcript, and I hadn't heard it and it was important, so I feel as though we're not being served by the media in general.

But Joel [Pollack] has stepped up and done some incredible work for us all.

Joel is also the first person who told me that PG&E apparently had donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Governor Newsom in California, and for his wife's - I guess some charity she was working on - and what's the biggest problem in California?

The biggest problem in California is PG&E - ah, well - that's the homeless, I suppose - and we've got this enormous financial disincentive for the governor to get tough with PG&E if he needs to.

So that's something also I didn't hear anything from any other source, so kudos to Joel.

The biggest problem in California is PG&E - ah, well - that's the homeless, I suppose - and we've got this enormous financial disincentive for the governor to get tough with PG&E if he needs to.

And the holding company for one of the SoCal utilities has or had Jerry Brown's sister on the board of directors. Buying pols is cheaper than doing maintenance.

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