The state of Virginia is under a state of emergency because of threats from armed militias (or, as Trump calls them, very fine people). The FBI arrested a trio trying to smuggle in an assault weapon with 1500 rounds.
And Trump just through napalm on the fire:
Also:
Heads Up:
And:
Devin Nunes to the honorable Ted Lieu: Take back everything about me working with Lev Parnas and Rudy or I’ll sue.
Ted Lieu responds: Bring it. Truth is the best defense.
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Cross-posting 
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New documents from Lev Parnas show more texts about possible surveillance of former US ambassador to Ukraine
Plus more texts proving Nunes’s involvement
House Democrats on Friday released new documents from indicted Rudy Giuliani associate Lev Parnas ahead of the Senate trial that includes new information about the apparent surveillance of former US Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and additional contacts between Parnas and an aide to Rep. Devin Nunes of California.
The new documents add to the growing trove of allegations and evidence that have come from Ukrainian-American businessman Lev Parnas this week. Democrats have released three sets of Parnas documents this week after his attorney provided materials to the committee last weekend, and Parnas did television interviews with CNN and MSNBC in which he implicated Trump and said the efforts were “all about 2020.”
READ: House Democrats release additional materials from indicted Rudy Giuliani associate Lev Parnas
The new documents include screenshots of undated text messages that appear to show Robert Hyde, a Republican congressional candidate in Connecticut, messaging with a foreign number from Belgium, which appear to describe efforts to surveil Yovanovitch. Hyde appeared to share the screenshots with Parnas, which is how they wound up on his phone that he turned over to House investigators.
The Belgian country-code number sends Hyde a screenshot of an official photo of Yovanovitch. The Belgium number, whose identity is not known, writes “My contacts are checking,” adding, "I will give you the address next week."
Hyde replied, "Awesome."
In another series of texts, the Belgian number tells Hyde at 2:05 p.m., “Nothing has changed she is still not moving they check today again,” shortly adding, "It’s confirmed we have a person inside."
"She had visitors," the Belgian number texted in another exchange.
The messages come after an earlier document release showed Hyde texting with Parnas about the apparent surveillance. Hyde has denied conducting surveillance of Yovanovitch.
The new documents also show communications between Parnas and Nunes aide Derek Harvey, in which they arrange interviews with Ukrainian officials and apparent meetings at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., including with Giuliani.
The new materials draw Nunes, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, even further into the efforts undertaken by Giuliani and his associates to push out Yovanovitch in Ukraine and dig up dirt on the President’s political rivals. Last month, Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee included in their impeachment inquiry report phone records of calls exchanged between Nunes and Parnas and other allies of President Donald Trump.
Nunes admitted Wednesday to speaking on the phone with Parnas, who has become a key figure in the Ukraine scandal, after previously saying such a conversation would have been "very unlikely."
The WhatsApp exchanges show that Harvey raised questions about foreign assistance to Ukraine in late March 2019.
On March 29, 2019, Harvey asked Parnas, “Can we get materials?”
Parnas told Harvey in an April text message that he would be interviewing “the general prosecutor that got fired by Biden,” who is Viktor Shokin. Parnas also references Ukraine’s then-prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko. Both prosecutors also spoke to Giuliani in his effort to dig up dirt on the Bidens.
"Let’s do our call at 12 and we can do the first prosecutor at 1 your time?" Parnas texts Harvey on April 17, 2019.
"Okay," Harvey responds.
Two days later, Harvey texts Parnas: “Lev. I think we are best served by sending the official letter and receiving documentation before any more interviews.”
The text exchanges between Harvey and Parnas includes multiple references to John Solomon, the former conservative columnist for The Hill who published columns attacking Yovanovitch.
In one text, Harvey tells Parnas in April 2019 that “Solomon needs to get me the material.”
There are multiple references to meetings apparently at the Trump Hotel, including a May 7, 2019, meeting with Giuliani and Solomon.
“Can you come now,” Parnas asks.
“Yes,” Harvey responds.
A spokesman for Nunes did not respond to a request for comment.
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Just making a side note here about the Trump push to make bribery of foreign officials legal.
He bribed Ukraine. This could well be a push to retroactively protect himself on the Ukraine extortion. Would anybody put it past him to try that?
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-17/white-house-considers-changes-to-law-banning-overseas-bribes
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Meeting between Giuliani and Barr at DOJ offices finally revealed
Further corroboration that Barr was “in the loop” with Giuliani and Trump in pressuring Ukraine to smear Biden.
So now we have:
- This meeting between Giuliani and Barr at the DOJ offices (link above).
- Parnas’s statement that Barr was “basically on the team” and helped set up meetings with Ukrainians as they carried out the scheme.
- Trump’s own conversation with the President of Ukraine in which Trump told him five times that the Attorney General is the point person on matters relating to investigating Biden. (transcript - search on “Attorney General”)
Am I missing anything else? The big question is why hasn’t Barr recused himself? I wish someone in Congress would take this on and call out Barr. At the very least, the House could take a vote, even if it’s just advisory, that Barr should recuse himself. More importantly, they should open a formal investigation into his involvement.
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New Impeachment Documents
The House Impeachment Managers Memorandum
The White House’s Response
Trump Legal Team Denies Impeachment Charges in First Official Response
In a six-page letter formally responding to the impeachment charges, President Trump’s lawyers rejected the case against him as illegitimate and called the effort to remove him dangerous.
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The things Parnas believed are truly cult-like and more than a little anti-Semitic in its rabid fear of Soros, akin to anything you can find in Q-Anonsense mythos.
“They used me, abused me, and threw me out with the trash.”
Lev Parnas Dishes on Kushner, Maduro, and Soros
In an interview from his lawyer’s office, the ex-Giuliani ally talked cannabis, conspiracies, and one very weird meeting with the lawyers of an indicted Ukrainian oligarch.
Should have seen this coming; Pam Bondi and Lev Parnas both lived in Florida and moved in the same circles, after all.
Um… can anybody confirm or deny this:
So somebody found me this in asking around, showing that is wrong. They can MOVE for dismissal, which is still bad, but they can’t out-of-hand dismiss.
House Impeachment Managers File Crushing Brief Arguing For Trump’s Conviction
House Impeachment Managers File Crushing Brief Arguing For Trump's Conviction via @politicususa
Trump’s tactics always shift the excuse from “I didn’t do it” to “yeah, I did it, but it’s not wrong”. Next usually comes “okay, so it was wrong, what are you going to do about it?”
Dershowitz and Starr may bring a slightly more reality-based Trump defense
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The Senate can move to dismiss at any point during the impeachment trial but they need a simple majority. That was the risk from the beginning.
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Schiff says NSA, CIA withholding Ukraine info due to White House pressure
This is the first time we’re hearing about the intelligence community withholding information from Congress. 
During an appearance on ABC’s “This Week,” Schiff was asked about a POLITICO report that intelligence agencies officials don’t want to testify in public during an upcoming hearing in the House Intelligence panel on global security threats, asking that the session be held in private instead. Trump slammed the intelligence chiefs one year ago for the assessment of Iran, calling them “extremely passive and naïve” on the issue.
Schiff confirmed that report, and then asserted that Ukraine-related information is being withheld from Capitol Hill. Schiff blamed the White House for the failure to turn over the information to lawmakers.
“And I’ll say something even more concerning to me, and that is the intelligence community is beginning to withhold documents from Congress on the issue of Ukraine,” Schiff said. “The NSA, in particular, is withholding what are potentially relevant documents to our oversight responsibilities on Ukraine, but also withholding documents potentially relevant that the senators might want to see during the trial.”
Schiff added: “There are signs that the CIA may be on the same tragic course. We are counting on the intelligence community not only to speak truth to power, but to resist pressure from the administration to withhold information from Congress because the administration fears that they incriminate them.”
An Intelligence Committee official later said, “Both the NSA and CIA initially pledged cooperation, and it appears now that the White House has interceded before production of documents could begin.”
There were no details on what documents were being withheld or how this information may play into the Senate impeachment trial.
Watch Here:
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Yeah, we found the full story. Apparently PV there never sources their stories. I worry, since that post had over 1k likes and re-tweets. Disinfo spreader.
The story there is that Trump’s LEGAL TEAM would have that power, which was the issue, and appears to be untrue.
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Did you report them to Twitter?
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Rachel Maddow’s Interview with Lev Parnas, Pt 2 - Highlights
The full transcript is at the link above. I’ve extracted the highlights below.
I left out Maddow’s commentary which was excellent, but I wanted to capture just the essence of the interview.
I’ve added section headings that reflect my interpretation of what Parnas was saying. The headings are my own words, not those of Parnas or Maddow.
Table of Contents - primary takeaways:
-
Parnas feels Barr is the real power behind Trump. He and his family fear Barr.
-
Parnas believes Joe Biden did nothing wrong – he helped rid Ukraine of a corrupt attorney general.
-
The former Prosecutor General of Ukraine pushed to oust our Ambassador – in exchange, he would provide smears on Biden.
-
Trump’s Energy Secretary, Rick Perry, is a co-conspirator.
-
Parnas again emphasizes that the announcement they were extorting from Ukraine had to be about investigating Biden, not just corruption in general. It was all about smearing Biden, not rooting out corruption.
-
Trump’s lawyer, Jay Sekulow, is a co-conspirator.
-
Trump helped Giuliani as they tried to get a visa for Shokin so he could come to the U.S. and smear Biden.
-
Trump shared his lawyer, John Dowd, with Parnas. Parnas believed Trump’s lawyer would help with his defense.
-
Instead of defending Parnas,Trump’s lawyer pressured him to sacrifice himself to save Trump. That’s when Parnas fired him.
-
Trump tried to fire Yovanovitch several times, but the State Department kept refusing before finally complying. Parnas witnessed one of the times Trump gave the order.
-
The purpose of Giuliani’s smear campaign against Yovanovitch was to persuade Pompeo to comply with Trump’s order to fire her.
Parnas feels Barr is the real power behind Trump. He and his family fear Barr.
LEV PARNAS, INDICTED GIULIANI ASSOCIATE: My only objective is to get the truth out because I never thought I was doing anything wrong. I still, you know, I regret certain things that I did, because, like, you know, hurting the ambassador, you know?
MADDOW: Yes.
…
And right now, the scary part, and that’s what I keep mentioning and people don’t understand is, there’s a lot of Republicans that would go against him. The only reason – if you’ll take a look, and you know very well because you have been following, the difference between why Trump is so powerful now, and he wasn’t as powerful in ‘16 and ‘17 –MADDOW: Uh-huh.
PARNAS: – he became that powerful when he got William Barr.
MADDOW: Yes.
PARNAS: People are scared. Am I scared? Yes, and because I think I’m more scared of our own Justice Department than of these criminals right now, because, you know, the scariest part is getting locked in some room and being treated as an animal when you did nothing wrong and – or when you’re not, you know, and that’s the tool they’re using.
I mean, just – because they’re trying (ph) to scare me into not talking and with God’s help, and with my lawyer next to me that I know will go bat for me no matter what, with the truth –
MADDOW: Yes.
PARNAS: – and I’m taking a chance.
My wife is scared. My kids are nervous.
…
Parnas believes Joe Biden did nothing wrong – he helped rid Ukraine of a corrupt attorney general.
MADDOW: In terms of the information, the allegations against Vice President Biden, Mr. Shokin makes allegations against Mr. Biden. Mr. Lutsenko also makes allegations against Mr. Biden. Do you believe that those allegations were true?
PARNAS: When we were dealing with it, when I was in the middle of the thick of things, I think I was kind of – I keep saying it’s a cultish environment being around President Trump because I mean, like, I’ve been in D.C. for two years, I never left the Trump Hotel type of situation.
So, I truly believe seeing different information that was handed to us at that time that Joe Biden was doing something illegal, not so much Hunter Biden but more Joe Biden.
But after analyzing all the evidence and sitting back and really – what’s it called – understanding what’s going on, I don’t think – I don’t think Vice President Biden did anything wrong. I think he was protecting our country and getting rid of probably a crooked attorney general.
And people used this to their advantage. A lot of rich people in Ukraine have their own agenda. And they use us here for their own political stuff. So I think this is – was a big one.
The former Prosecutor General of Ukraine pushed to oust our Ambassador – in exchange, he would provide smears on Biden.
MADDOW: In terms of the material that was handed over to intelligence, on March 22nd, Mr. Lutsenko texts you in Russian, there’s a translation that’s provided by the committee.
It says: It’s just that if you don’t make a decision about madam, you are bringing into question all my allegations including about B.
So when he says “madam” is he talking about –
PARNAS: Ambassador Yovanovitch.
MADDOW: – Ambassador Yovanovitch?
PARNAS: Correct.
MADDOW: And when he says, all my allegations including about B –
PARNAS: Burisma.
MADDOW: – is that about Burisma and Biden?
PARNAS: Yes.
MADDOW: OK. Do you know if it’s Burisma or Biden? I guess –
PARNAS: It was always Biden. Burisma, it was just – I mean, nobody cares about Burisma or Zlochevsky. It was – the concern was Biden, Hunter Biden.
MADDOW: In that text message to you, is Mr. Lutsenko saying in effect, listen, if you want me to make these Biden allegations, you’re going to have to get rid of this ambassador?
PARNAS: Absolutely.
…
Trump’s Energy Secretary, Rick Perry, is a co-conspirator.
PARNAS: That’s when we flew to Paris, and in Paris, we met Rudy before – and when we were in Paris with Rudy, basically, that’s when I found out that Perry was going to [Zelensky’s inauguration in Ukraine] – they decided to send Perry instead [of Pence].
MADDOW: Energy Secretary Rick Perry would be going.
PARNAS: Correct.
MADDOW: Did you – you learned that from Mr. Giuliani?
PARNAS: Correct.
MADDOW: Was Mr. Perry, to your knowledge, aware of what you and Mr. Giuliani were trying to do in Ukraine of terms of getting these investigations announced?
PARNAS: I don’t know to what extent he was told about me. I don’t know what he was told. Definitely he knew about Rudy because he was told – he called Rudy on his way there to ask him what to discuss and Rudy told him that to make sure to give him the message.
MADDOW: Mr. Giuliani told Secretary Perry what you need to convey to the Ukrainian government they need to announce an investigation into Joe Biden.
PARNAS: Absolutely.
MADDOW: Do you know if part of the message that Mr. Giuliani conveyed to Secretary Perry was also that Ukraine would lose their military aid, they’d lose their U.S. aid, if they didn’t announce those investigations?
PARNAS: I don’t recall them having a specific conversation about that.
MADDOW: OK.
PARNAS: It was more of just telling him what he needs to do to announce it. I don’t know what other conversation they could have had prior or after.
MADDOW: Uh-huh.
PARNAS: But I know that there was another conversation that Perry called after the inauguration telling him that he spoke to Zelensky and Zelensky’s going to do it.
MADDOW: Perry says, I spoke with Zelensky and I got him to agree.
PARNAS: Yes.
MADDOW: I got him to agree to announce the investigation.
Parnas again emphasizes that the announcement they were extorting from Ukraine had to be about investigating Biden, not just corruption in general. It was all about smearing Biden, not rooting out corruption.
PARNAS: Yes, and they did an announcement but they didn’t announce [an investigation into Biden].
See, this was the whole key. They would kind of say every time somebody would meet Zelensky, they would, like, agree and then they would walk it back.
So they announced something about corruption that he’s going to get corruption but Giuliani blew his lid on that saying that’s not what we discussed. That it wasn’t supposed to be a corruption announcement. It has to be about Joe Biden and Hunter Biden and Burisma.
MADDOW: He said the name, Biden, needs to be spoken, was his insistence?
PARNAS: Always, always.
…
PARNAS: I know that there was another conversation that Perry called after the inauguration, telling him that he spoke to Zelensky and Zelensky’s going to do it.
…
Trump’s lawyer, Jay Sekulow, is a co-conspirator.
MADDOW: Did you ever have any communications with the counsel to the president, Jay Sekulow, during the time that you were involved in all this?
PARNAS: Several conversations. One, in particular, which I would have to refresh my memory by looking at my text messages with him, but had to do with – I think it was Viktor Shokin’s visa, or something to do with Ukraine. And Rudy was busy at the time and basically told me that Jay was aware of everything, that he brought him up to speed, that I could call him and he was on top of it.
MADDOW: Was – by that did he mean that Mr. Sekulow was part of this effort to try to get Ukraine to announce investigations?
PARNAS: Oh, absolutely. One of the things I think was the best quote ever was when Mr. Sondland said everybody’s in the loop and –
MADDOW: You believe that everybody was in the loop?
PARNAS: I don’t believe. I know.
MADDOW: Yes.
PARNAS: I know they were in the loop. I was witness of conversations and – you know, between them. And everybody was in the loop.
Everybody didn’t agree with the loop. I mean, Jay Sekulow didn’t agree with what Rudy was doing, but knew what he was doing.
MADDOW: How do you know that he didn’t agree with it?
PARNAS: Because I heard them talk about it.
MADDOW: And was his objection?
PARNAS: He didn’t want to be involved in the Ukraine stuff. He – I don’t know what his – you’d have to ask him, what his (INAUDIBLE). My feeling from the conversations, and watching the way Jay approached that situation was he just didn’t want to be a part of it, and wanted to stay away from it.
Trump helped Giuliani as they tried to get a visa for Shokin so he could come to the U.S. and smear Biden.
MADDOW: You mentioned that you were trying to get Mr. Shokin a visa to come to the United States.
PARNAS: Correct.
MADDOW: Why were you trying to do that?
PARNAS: Well, after the conversation Mr. Shokin had with Mr. Giuliani that we had on Skype, they had discussed on the range they were going to have Mr. Shokin come here, and Mr. Giuliani wanted to debrief him here in front of Mr. Lindsey Graham, and – certain other people like the attorney general.
MADDOW: Because Mr. Shokin was going to say what?
PARNAS: He was basically going to testify and say that Joe Biden basically forced him out because he was going to investigate Hunter Biden and Burisma.
MADDOW: Was the president, himself, ever involved in the effort to get this visa from Mr. Shokin? In the text messages that were released, Mr. Giuliani appears to tell you he’s going to get number one involved in this effort to get Mr. Shokin into the U.S.
PARNAS: Absolutely.
MADDOW: Was that a reference to the president?
PARNAS: Absolutely.
MADDOW: Did the president ever work on it?
PARNAS: Of course.
Trump shared his lawyer, John Dowd, with Parnas. Parnas believed Trump’s lawyer would help with his defense.
MADDOW: How did you end up with Mr. Downing and Mr. Dowd representing you when the impeachment inquiry had contacted you for testimony?
PARNAS: That’s a good question, Rachel.
First of all, what happened was we were in Vienna when we got notified that we had a congressional, what’s it called –
MADDOW: Request.
PARNAS: Request.
MADDOW: Yes.
PARNAS: And I was there with Victoria Toensing and Joe DiGenova working on the Dmytro Firtash case. And first people came to was them, and I said, what do I do? They said, call Rudy.
I called Rudy, what do we do? Rudy’s first response was, I don’t worry about it, forget it. I was like, what you mean don’t worry about it? You’re an attorney. Please help me get an attorney. Rudy came back and said, oh, I have a great, John Dowd.
And we were like, OK. We got excited. I didn’t know who John Dowd was. But I knew he was the president’s attorney. It was a very, like, you know, exciting situation even though it was, you know, all this going on. It’s still, you know, like in the Looney Tunes.
But I would I called John Dowd, introduced myself like Rudy connected us and at first everything was good. Then, like, 15 minutes later I get a call from him saying, we have a problem that I’m not going to probably be able to represent you.
I said, what happened? He goes, I’ve been speaking with Jay Sekulow, and, you know, because I was the president’s attorney, I’m still kind of doing work for the president, there’s a conflict of interest unless he wants to waive it. I don’t think the president is going to waive that conflict.
Because at that point, John Dowd didn’t know who I was also. He didn’t think I had any relationship with the president. And I responded to him, I said I think he will. I said –
MADDOW: You think the president will waive the conflict.
PARNAS: Absolutely.
MADDOW: And let Dowd represent you.
PARNAS: Absolutely. I said, give Rudy a call, I’m sure we can work this out, I said because this is very important.
About 15, 20 minutes later I got called back from John Dowd. He said, you’re one lucky guy, I just got called from Jay Sekulow, I got the permission and I’m getting it in writing shortly.
Instead of defending Parnas,Trump’s lawyer pressured him to sacrifice himself to save Trump. That’s when Parnas fired him.
MADDOW: You got a request from Congress to come – for you and Mr. Fruman to come testify to the impeachment investigation.
PARNAS: Yes.
MADDOW: You were inclined to say yes.
PARNAS: Absolutely, I had nothing to hide. We were not doing anything illegal.
MADDOW: Your lawyer, John Dowd, however, advised you not to cooperate and said the president would give you cover for not cooperating?
PARNAS: It was a little more than that. I was brought into John Dowd’s house and he got Jay Sekulow on the phone and also Rudy and Victoria, then basically they came up with a situation that said that because I worked for Rudy and because I worked for Victoria and because Rudy worked for the president, we had three-way privilege and that basically Pat Cipollone was going to be writing a letter to Congress telling them to – that nobody’s cooperating, and that would protect us under the same order and he would follow up with that.
Again, this was the president of the United States – so, I mean, I thought, OK. I said if – here’s all the information I have. I did my duty. I gave him whatever paperwork I had.
…
MADDOW: Mr. Dowd was your attorney for a time and then you changed attorneys.PARNAS: I fired him in jail.
MADDOW: You fired him when you were in jail?
PARNAS: Yes.
MADDOW: What happened there?
PARNAS: And Mr. Downing.
Basically, when we were arrested, obviously, I had nowhere else to call. I didn’t know – we just retained Dowd and Downing. So I called Downing to come there and I started seeing in the process of the bail stuff the way things were going on that they were more concentrating on – I didn’t feel that they were trying to get me out, and at that point, I had a meeting with John Dowd and Downing inside the jail.
And John Dowd just instead of comforting me and, you know, trying to calm me down, telling me, like, it’s going to be OK, like, don’t worry, basically start talking to me like a drill sergeant and telling me, giving me orders, like, you know, be a good boy, like, you know.
MADDOW: He said “be a good boy”?
PARNAS: No, I don’t – I don’t want to quote him exactly on what the words, what he used in that because it was a while ago. I don’t remember exactly.
But it was – it was his condescending attitude toward basically, like, who do you think you are telling the president or Giuliani or anybody to, like, come out and because I – one of the things I said, I said, I can’t believe nobody is coming out in our defense and saying we didn’t do anything wrong, we’re good citizens, you know, we work.
And basically word for word, and then I said, if you don’t get out of here right now, something bad is going to happen because I don’t want to see the two of you.
And at that point, Downing hit the emergency button and the security took me out and took them out.
MADDOW: This is a very heated confrontation. You told Downing and Dowd to get out.
PARNAS: I threw them out.
MADDOW: Were they telling you to sacrifice yourself in order to protect the president?
PARNAS: That’s what I felt.
MADDOW: Is the implication of this story of the lawyers that you feel, that people loyal to the president and close to the president were trying to influence your defense and your case in a way that was against your interests but in the president’s interests?
PARNAS: Absolutely. I think they tried to keep me quiet.
…
Trump tried to fire Yovanovitch several times, but the State Department kept refusing before finally complying. Parnas witnessed one of the times Trump gave the order.
PARNAS: The president kept firing her and couldn’t (ph) – and she wouldn’t leave. So nobody could understand what was going on.
MADDOW: Public information, she was removed, at the time that she was removed, she was back in the United States at the end of the April, you’re saying that the president tried to fire before that.
PARNAS: He fired her probably at least, to my knowledge, at least four, five times. He even had a breakdown and scream, “fire her” to Madeline (ph), his assistant, the secretary, before he fired her. He said, Mr. President, I can’t do that.
MADDOW: He was directing the State Department to remove her and the State Department was refusing?
PARNAS: Correct.
MADDOW: But the basis of your belief that the president had tried to remove Ambassador Yovanovitch multiple times and it for some reason didn’t work is because you talked to the president about that?
PARNAS: About firing her, I spoke to the president once about that, or twice. Once or twice. Once directly at our dinner when he fired her actually at the dinner which was the most surprising thing ever I –
MADDOW: Tell me – tell me more.
PARNAS: Basically, at that dinner, we had a conversation, there was, like, six of us there, it was an intimate dinner.
MADDOW: At the White House?
PARNAS: It was – no, it was a Trump Hotel. It was a private – like area there. Looks like a little White House.
MADDOW: And the president was there?
PARNAS: Oh, absolutely. The president was there, his son, Don Jr., was there. I don’t know how the issue is – the conversation came up, but I do remember me telling the president the ambassador was bad-mouthing him and saying he was going to get impeached, something to that effect.
And at that time, he turned around to John DeStefano, who was his aide at the time, and said, “fire her”. And we all – there was a silence in the room. He responded to him, said Mr. President, we can’t do that right now because Pompeo hasn’t been confirmed yet. That Pompeo is not confirmed yet and we don’t have – this is when Tillerson was gone, but Pompeo was confirmed, so they go, wait until (INAUDIBLE).
So several conversations he mentioned it again. I don’t know how many times at that dinner, once or twice or three times. But he fired her several times.
MADDOW: He reiterated that she should be fired then he was ordering her to be fired.
PARNAS: Correct.
…
The purpose of Giuliani’s smear campaign against Yovanovitch was to persuade Pompeo to comply with Trump’s order to fire her.
PARNAS: That was not the only time he fired her because he fired her at least four other occasions that Rudy Giuliani went to the White House, had conversations with him and then came back and then informed me, Victoria, and Joe about what transpired. He fired her when he gave an order to Mike Pompeo once, which he didn’t do, Secretary Pompeo didn’t fire her.
Then Rudy came back and he told him, go speak to Pompeo. Rudy went to speak to Pompeo. They got into it.
Then they had another meeting at the White House where he told Bolton to fire her. Bolton didn’t want to fire her. Tell Pompeo to fire here.
Rudy got into it with all of them again. And at one point, he told Madeleine (ph) to fire her.
So, I mean, that was becoming comical because I couldn’t understand, you’re the president – that’s one of the things – when I say comical, it’s not more comical, but at that point, it was more of affirmation to me that there was people against the president of the United States if they’re not listening to his orders.
So that’s where I think the smear campaign started coming about. I think it was like a boost to them to help him if the media started, like, egging him on, that there was really something there, then he would just tweet and fire her.
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This is Engle of the House Foreign Relations Committee
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Reporters Challenge New Restrictions In Trying To Cover Senate Impeachment Trial
Ex-Watergate counsel thinks Trump might’ve written some of his impeachment legal brief because it’s so bad
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Read: White House Impeachment memorandum
The White House is arguing that both Articles of Impeachment are not impeachable offenses as laid out by the constitution. Claims high crimes and misdemeanors mean actual illegal conduct and not a breach of public trust as stated by Hamilton in Federalist 65. 
This is a stupid argument.
In the unauthorized subpoena section, the White House argues that the committees weren’t authorized by the full house to send subpoenas, even though the House passed Res. 660 to authorize the impeachment inquiry to begin in committee. I’m no lawyer but this seems weak. 
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In huge tactical error, Trump draws attention to Republican efforts to block Bolton from testifying in the Senate
The fact that Trump is lying here is not the real story (of course he’s lying – we already know that – on the left, one more lie is just another confirmation he’s unfit to be President – on the right, one more lie is just par for the course and they don’t care).
The big news here is that Trump just made Bolton’s testimony big news. Until today, I would conjecture, the vast majority of Americans may not have even known who Bolton is or why his testimony might be important. By pushing Bolton into the spotlight, Trump is making it much harder for Senate Republicans to pretend his testimony “doesn’t matter.” Now Americans will be asking, "What’s Trump hiding and why doesn’t he want Bolton to talk about it?"
President Trump falsely claimed Monday that House Democrats didn’t try to secure testimony from ex-national security adviser John Bolton as part of their impeachment inquiry, accusing them of being “in too much of a rush.”
Trump’s incorrect assertion comes as Senate Democrats are pushing for Bolton to be subpoenaed for testimony in the president’s impeachment trial, which is set to start in earnest Tuesday.
“They didn’t want John Bolton and others in the House,” Trump tweeted. “They were in too much of a rush. Now they want them all in the Senate. Not supposed to be that way!”
The president also took a factually dubious dig at Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who says he will force votes as early as Tuesday on calling witnesses like Bolton for trial testimony if his Republican colleagues refuse to make such a commitment off the bat.
“Cryin’ Chuck Schumer is now asking for ‘fairness’, when he and the Democrat House members worked together to make sure I got ZERO fairness in the House. So, what else is new?” Trump posted, even though he refused an offer from Democrats to participate in the second half of the impeachment inquiry.
Despite the tweets, House Democrats requested documents and testimony from Bolton as part of their three-month inquiry into the president’s pressure campaign for Ukrainian investigations of Joe Biden and other Democratic rivals.
But Trump ordered Bolton and several other former and current administration officials to stonewall any and all House impeachment requests for testimony and records.
Bolton complied with Trump’s orders and made it clear to Democrats that he would take them to court if they subpoenaed him, reasoning that a federal judge should decide which party to listen to.
Acknowledging that such a court case would likely drag on for months, Democrats never subpoenaed Bolton before impeaching Trump on Dec. 18 on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
Since then, Bolton has announced he’s willing to testify at Trump’s Senate impeachment trial as long as he’s subpoenaed.
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@anon95374541 House response to Donnie’s blather:
For reasons unknown the above tweet was taken down. Here it was from a screenshot the forum archived:
Looks like he has a new version up:
I think because he decided to use a version of the file on Medium:
And… he took that one down also. Argh.
Third time’s the charm?
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