WASHINGTON (AP) ? The final testimony of an extraordinary week of impeachment hearings came from a former White House national security adviserwho wrote the book on Vladimir Putin ? literally ? and a political counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine who overheard a pivotal conversation between President Donald Trump and European Union Ambassador Gordon Sondland.
Takeaways from Day 5 of the impeachment inquiry before the House Intelligence Committee:
Fiona Hill, left, the former top Russia and Europe expert on the National Security Council, while joined by David Holmes, an official from the U.S. embassy in Ukraine, testifies during the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump. (Kirk McKoy/Los Angeles Times/TNS)
?FICTIONAL NARRATIVE?
Fiona Hill is a Russia expert who?s written extensively on the Kremlin, and she made that clear from the outset when she scolded Republican lawmakers for propagating what she said was a ?fictional narrative? ? that somehow Ukraine, not Russia, interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Those discredited theories have been advanced by Trump himself, who in a July 25 phone call at the center of the impeachment inquiry asked Ukraine?s leader to investigate the possibility.
Hill said the unwillingness by some to accept Russia?s role has profound consequences at a time when Russia?s security services have ?geared up to repeat their interference in the 2020 election.? Putin, she said, deploys millions of dollars to ?weaponize our own political opposition research and false narratives.?
?When we are consumed by partisan rancor, we cannot combat these external forces as they seek to divide us against each another, degrade our institutions and destroy the faith of the American people in our democracy,? Hill said.
She also implored impeachment investigators to stop advancing fictions that she said distract from the attention needed to fight Russian interference.
?In the course of this investigation, I would ask that you please not promote politically driven falsehoods that so clearly advance Russian interests,? Hill said.
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?THE BIG STUFF?
The July 26 lunch on an outdoor terrace in a Kyiv restaurant started out social enough. There was a bottle of wine and casual chatter about marketing strategies for Sondland?s hotel business.
