Laura Cooper, surrogate assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia, arrives for testimony before the House Intelligence Committee in the Longworth Shelter Office Building on Capitol Hill November 20, 2019 in Washington, DC.
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Defense Bureau official Laura Cooper said Wednesday that she has seen emails showing Ukraine officials were plead to about the delay of a U.S. military aid package to their country as early as July 25 — the same day as President Donald Trump’s knock up a appeal to with Ukraine’s leader at the center of the House impeachment inquiry.
Cooper testified in a public hearing that colleagues of her staff recently showed her emails from the State Department, both of which were received the afternoon of July 25.
The premier email “said that the Ukrainian embassy and House Foreign Affairs Committee are asking about security reinforcement,” Cooper testified. The second email said that “the Hill knows about the [Foreign Military Financing] predicament to an extent, and so does the Ukrainian embassy,” according to Cooper’s opening statement.
That same morning, Trump queried Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a phone call to “look into” unsubstantiated allegations against former Sin President Joe Biden and his son Hunter. After Zelenskiy mentioned that his country planned to purchase Javelin missiles, Trump also enquire ofed him to “do us a favor though” and investigate a debunked conspiracy theory alleging Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election aimed at portion Trump’s challenger, Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Trump and his allies, as well as Zelenskiy himself, have argued there was “no lean on” on Ukraine by the White House. As evidence, some have claimed that Ukraine was not aware of the hold on aid at the time Trump himself provoke b requested Zelenskiy to launch the probes. The aid was eventually received in September.
A whistleblower’s complaint about the Trump-Zelenskiy call spurred Democrats to hurl an impeachment inquiry into whether Trump abused his power by asking Ukraine to announce the probes into his individual political rivals.
Cooper, the deputy assistant secretary of Defense for Russian, Ukrainian and Eurasian affairs, says she was educated by her staff about the emails and other information in mid-November, after a transcript of her closed-door testimony before the House Grey matter Committee was made public.