Gordon Sondland caught red handed
Donald Trump must have known that Bill Taylor’s impeachment testimony was going to be devastating for him today, because Trump has spent the day trying one asinine distraction after another. Taylor’s newly released opening statement does indeed drive a stake into the heart of Trump’s presidency. But it also places someone else directly behind the eight ball.
Bill Taylor testified in detail today that Gordon Sondland told him that Donald Trump was unwilling to give anything to Ukraine unless the President of Ukraine made a public statement in support of the fake Biden scandal. Taylor took contemporaneous notes of all of this, which counts for a lot in legal circles. Considering that Sondland testified last week that he was unaware of the quid pro quo nature of Trump’s Ukraine policy, it means Sondland just got busted for perjury.
That’s not just our interpretation. Democratic Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi emerged from Bill Taylor’s testimony and asserted that “After today, Mr. Sondland is going to have some explaining to do.” This suggests that the House impeachment inquiry is planning to use the threat of an eventual felony perjury referral to pressure Sondland into coming back and cooperating honestly.
In other words, Gordon Sondland can fully sell out Donald Trump now and hope it convinces the House not to ring him up for perjury once Trump no longer controls the DOJ, or Sondland can stick to his story and hope that Trump ends up pardoning him (hint: Trump won’t pardon him). Whatever criminal liability Sondland already had for his role in Trump’s Ukraine scandal, it just got worse.
