‘Friday night massacre’: Sondland follows Vindmans as Trump cleans house of ‘traitors/heroes’ following failed impeachment
The recall of US ambassador to the EU Gordon Sondland seems to indicate that President Donald Trump is dismissing from service the officials who testified against him in the abortive impeachment proceedings.
“I was advised that the president intends to recall me effective immediately,” Sondland said in a statement on Friday evening, adding he was grateful to Trump for the opportunity to head the US mission in Brussels.
The announcement came just hours after Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and his twin brother Yevgeny were escorted from the White House, having apparently been removed from their posts on the National Security Council.
Sondland and Colonel Vindman were witnesses in the House-led impeachment proceedings against Trump last fall. After testifying that Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had not been inappropriate and that no “quid pro quo” had taken place, Sondland famously changed his written testimony to better match the narrative pushed by House Intelligence Committee chair Adam Schiff (D-CA) – only to qualify it during the public hearing by saying he had “presumed” things “in the absence of any credible explanation.”
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