Pence advisor thought Trump request was for personal political agenda

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   Don Wposted 5 years ago

   "President Donald Trump on Sunday attacked Jennifer Williams, a special advisor to Vice President Mike Pence, a day after the House Intelligence Committee released testimony in which she called the July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky "unusual and inappropriate...
   
   I found the specific references to be — to be more specific to the president in nature, to his personal political agenda, as opposed to a broader … foreign policy objective of the United States," Williams said.
   
   She also said her notes from the phone call indicate that Zelensky mentioned the gas company Burisma, where Hunter Biden had a seat on the board. However, the White House record of the call did not include any mention of Burisma."
   https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/17/trump-a … riate.html

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      Randy Godwinposted 5 years agoin reply to this

      Yes, we all know the "transcript" of the call was edited heavily, Don. How else would a 35+ minute phone call be reduced to around 10 minutes. But then, it's more of a memorandum than a true transcript.

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      GA Andersonposted 5 years agoin reply to this

      I followed your link Don, and it raises a question.
      
      Would a mention of Burisma in the call be a negative?
      
      My first thought is that if Pres. Zelensky mentioned Burisma first it might be exculpatory to the president.
      
      Now, follow me a bit.  Suppose, (I know it is a stretch, but it is a hypothetical), Burisma was a known point of corruption. Suppose that both parties knew there was something about the Burisma investigation that wasn't Kosher. Now suppose that the quid pro quo was perfectly clear to both parties. Is this Trump abuse of office scenario still a one-sided effort?
      
      GA

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         IslandBitesposted 5 years agoin reply to this

         My first thought is that if Pres. Zelensky mentioned Burisma first it might be exculpatory to the president.
         
         My first thought is that if Pres Zelensky mentioned Burisma first and that might be exculpatory to the president, they would've added it to the "transcript".

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            promisemposted 5 years agoin reply to this

            Do you mean the complete transcript that Trump refuses to release?
            
            Or the heavily edited public version that is missing multiple comments about Biden?

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            GA Andersonposted 5 years agoin reply to this

            You could be right IslandMom, now there is more to wonder about in the complete transcript.
            
            GA

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         Don Wposted 5 years agoin reply to this

         Without the exact wording it's hard to say. But we know the transcript is already intended to be exculpatory evidence. So I think it;s more likely that those references (Vindman said there were further references to Biden too) were not favorable, or the person who removed them believed they were not favorable to Trump. Whether they are favorable or not, is probably less pertinent than the fact the transcript was edited to show Trump in (what was believed to be) a better light.
         
         My questions to the administration would be: what does the full, unedited transcript say? Who edited it? Why? Did Trump order the edits made (either directly or indirectly)? If not who did? Did Trump know about the edits? If so, when?

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            Don Wposted 5 years agoin reply to this

            Update: in his testimony today Vindman said it's his informed speculation that "the folks that produce these transcripts did the best they can, and they just didn't catch the word [Burisma]". That's plausible as the word doesn't sound similar to any common word in the English language I know of. I think it would be hard to parse the word if you didn't already know the name. He said, the transcript released used the word "company" instead of Burisma, which he believes is not a "significant omission". Absent any new evidence to the contrary, I'm satisfied with that explanation as to why "Burisma" was omitted from the partial transcript that was published.

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            GA Andersonposted 5 years agoin reply to this

            Those are fair questions Don. I wonder if the full transcript will come out in the Senate trial? It seems like it will almost have to.
            
            GA

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