Senior national security official feared leaks of Trump's call to Ukrainian leader could be damaging
Source: Washington Post
Timothy Morrison, a former White House national security official, told House investigators in sworn testimony that he feared leaks of the contents of the July 25 call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky would be damaging, so he recommended restricting access to the transcript.
Morrison, an expert on Russia and Ukraine who served on the National Security Council before leaving the job at the end of October, said he knew immediately after listening to the call where Trump asks Zelensky to investigate the Bidens that they needed to keep it under wraps.
"I recommended to them that we restrict access to the package," Morrison said, according to a transcript of his Oct. 31 testimony released by House Democrats on Saturday.
Democrats also made public the transcript of the deposition from Vice President Pence's special advisor on Europe and Russia, Jennifer Williams. "The testimony released today shows that President Trump's July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky immediately set off alarm bells throughout the White House," said Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff (Calif.), Foreign Affairs Chairman Eliot L. Engel (N.Y.) and acting Oversight Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney (N.Y.) in a joint statement.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/senior-national-security-official-feared-leaks-of-trumps-call-to-ukrainian-leader-could-be-damaging/2019/11/16/3e88d768-08b9-11ea-8ac0-0810ed197c7e_story.html
Original article -
November 16, 2019 at 4:41 p.m. EST
In his sworn deposition to House investigators, National Security Council official Timothy Morrison said he suggested to NSC lawyers that "we restrict access to the package" -- a reference to the July 25 call in which President Trump pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for investigations of former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter.
House committees conducting the impeachment investigation released a transcript of Morrison's remarks on Saturday.
This is a developing story. It will be updated.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2019/11/16/senior-national-security-official-feared-leaks-of-trumps-call-to-ukrainian-leader-could-be-damaging/
Here is the release tweet from Adam Schiff -
Link to tweet
TEXT
Adam Schiff
✔
@RepAdamSchiff
Morrison corroborates others who said Ukraine was told military aid was conditioned on announcing investigations Trump wanted. Bolton told Morrison to tell the lawyers.
Williams learned that Trump told Pence not to attend Zelensky’s inauguration.
Read:https://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=849 …
Committees Release Morrison and Williams Transcripts as Part of Impeachment Inquiry
intelligence.house.gov
6,317
4:20 PM - Nov 16, 2019
Press release - https://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=849
Committees Release Morrison and Williams Transcripts as Part of Impeachment Inquiry
Washington, November 16, 2019
Washington, D.C.—Today, Rep. Adam B. Schiff, the Chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Rep. Eliot L. Engel, the Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, the Acting Chairwoman of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, released the transcripts from joint depositions of Deputy Assistant to the President Timothy Morrison and Vice President Pence’s special adviser on Europe and Russia, Jennifer Williams.
The Chairs issued the following statement announcing today’s release:
“The testimony released today shows that President Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky immediately set off alarm bells throughout the White House. Both witnesses provided the Committees with first-hand accounts after personally listening to the call in the White House Situation Room.
“Mr. Morrison confirmed Ambassador Taylor’s testimony to the Committees that the Ukrainians were told that U.S. military assistance, not just the White House meeting, was conditioned on their public announcement of political investigations that the President wanted. Additionally, following the September 1 meeting between President Zelensky and Vice President Pence, Mr. Morrison confirmed that Ambassador Sondland informed one of President Zelensky’s top aides that American military aid was conditioned on the investigations. Mr. Morrison informed John Bolton of the meeting and was told by Mr. Bolton to go see the lawyers, which he did.
“Ms. Williams testified that the President’s requests were ‘unusual and inappropriate’ and shed light on ‘possible other motivations behind a security assistance hold.’ She also confirmed, like Lt. Col. Vindman, that the Ukrainian President specifically mentioned ‘Burisma’ during the call, even though the White House call record does not reflect that. Importantly, Ms. Williams also testified that in mid-May, President Trump instructed Vice President Pence to cancel plans to attend President Zelensky’s inauguration before the date for the inauguration had been set.
“We look forward to the public testimony of both of these officials.”
The testimony of Jennifer Williams can be found here.
Key excerpts of Jennifer Williams’s testimony can be found here.
The testimony of Timothy Morrison can be found here.
Key excerpts of Timothy Morrison’s testimony can be found here.
Background:
H. Res. 660, which was passed by the House of Representatives on October 31, 2019, authorizes the Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence “to make publicly available in electronic form the transcripts of depositions” with “appropriate redactions for classified and other sensitive information.”
Pursuant to this resolution, and consistent with the Committee’s rules and longstanding bipartisan practice, the Committee has begun preparing transcripts from the impeachment inquiry for public release, which includes a thorough, nonpartisan security review to protect classified and other sensitive information.
As part of this process, the Committee is redacting (1) personally identifiable information; (2) the names of non-senior Executive Branch personnel and Intelligence Community employees; (3) the names of committee staff who did not ask questions or make on-the-record statements; and (4) classified or potentially classified information or other sensitive information not pertinent to the subject of the impeachment inquiry.
In addition, consistent with the Committee’s rules, each transcript has been made available to the witness for inspection, including to identify technical, grammatical, and typographical corrections. The Committee has also taken into consideration requested redactions from witnesses, if they fall within the parameters above.
Although the transcripts list Members of the three Committees who were present at the outset of a deposition, they do not necessarily reflect the attendance of all Members who may have joined or departed a deposition at different points.
The Committee will release individual transcripts on a rolling basis as this process is completed.
###
= new reply since forum marked as read
Go Dems! 
His testimony from that closed session is being released today, and can be seen here: https://www.npr.org/2019/11/16/779467476/read-testimony-of-tim-morrison-former-russia-director-for-national-security-coun
He was actually on the call (from 7/25 that led to impeachment inquiry). In his testimony, Morrison confirmed that Trump pressured Ukraine for Biden dirt, but also said he didn't think it was illegal to do so. Then he promptly resigned, for "unrelated reasons".
He'll be back for open testimony on 11/19.
impeachment inquires over it!
Thanks Timothy.
on the Ukraine investigation.
