Yovanovitch Was “Appalled” When She Saw What Trump Thought of Her

Caroline Brehman/Congressional Quarterly via ZUMA

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Marie Yovanovitch, our former ambassador to Ukraine, describes her reaction when she saw how Donald talked about her in private:

“It was a terrible moment,” she told the House Intelligence Committee on the second day of public impeachment hearings….In the July 25 phone call, according to a rough transcript released by the White House, Mr. Trump called Ms. Yovanovitch “bad news” and said that “she’s going to go through some things.”

….Asked her reaction when she read that, Ms. Yovanovitch said: “Shocked. Appalled. Devastated that the president of the United States would talk about any ambassador like that to a foreign head of state — and it was me. I mean, I couldn’t believe it.” Asked what the words “going to go through” sounded like to her, she said, “It sounded like a threat.”

Them’s the breaks. When you resist repeated suggestions from Rudy Giuliani to focus on getting the Ukrainians to lie about Joe Biden, you have to figure your time is up. He’s America’s Mayor, after all, working on behalf of what’s good for the country, not just some geriatric mook using government resources to smear Joe Biden. Amirite?

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Russian bots are impersonating us. Trump and his allies want to silence us. AI wants to (and does!) steal our content. The list goes on. But with 50 years of experience, we know we were built for this moment: We’re ready to keep diving deep and uncovering the truth, then getting that to you right here, completely accessible and never behind a paywall.

While our work is free to read, watch, and listen to online, it’s incredibly costly to make. Court documents, travel, research: It all adds up. Because we’re a nonprofit newsroom, we rely on reader support to fund our investigations. Will you stand with us in these extraordinary times, as headlines clamour for our attention and disinformation is rampant? We can’t get the truth out without you.

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