Ukrainian Timeline without opinion….

The impeachment of Donald Trump either brings a sense of glee, or a sense of anger, depending on whom you ask. After several weeks of testimony from many witnesses, it’s hard to put away bias and simply look at facts. After all, aren’t the facts what is important to a case, not emotions?

There have been so many opinion articles either pushing for or destroying witnesses, depending on your personal bent, that it has become difficult to see exactly what transpired. Who knew what and when? Due to the sheer volume of information, it is helpful to sit down and map out events by dates, to create a timeline.

Below is a timeline, based on public information, that does not have opinioin or theory. There is no attempt to “guide” to a conclusion, but rather, just the facts. “Just the facts, M’am.”

What we know:

July 2017 Kurt Volkner appointed US Special Representative for Ukraine negations

March 2018 Gordon Sondland appointed EU ambassador (Ukraine is not in the EU)

March, 2019 Yovanovitch was warned by a Senior Ukranian official she was being targeted by Giuliani and associates because of he anti-corruption work which was hampering Giuliani’s financial interests in Ukraine.

March 27, 2019 Deputy Ass Sec of State for European and Eurasian Affairs George Kent flagged an email to his colleagues a “totally manufactured/fake list of untouchables.” This was a list claimed by former Prosecutor General Yurily Lutsenko had claimed Yovanovitch had given him. Kent noted that “one sign of it being fake is that most of the names are misspelled in English.” Kent states, “This list appears to be an effort by Lutsenko to inoculate himself for why he did not pursue corrupt Poroshencko associates and political allies to claim that the US told him not to.” Later, Kent was told to “keep his head down,” as Giuliani had started attacking him by name. In essence, if you don’t want to end up like Yovanovitch, be quiet.

April 21, 2019- Zelensky is elected

April 30, 2019- Ukrainian American Lev Parnas and Belarusian- American Igor Fruman complain that Yovanovitch has been “unfriendly” to them in their personal business at rally with Trump. Trump states at the dinner that Yovanovitch should be fired. (Parnas and Fruman are associates of Giuliani who were later charged with violating prohibitions against foreign funding of election campaigns after committing to raise money for Sessions bid for re-election to the Senate.)

May 6, 2019 Yovanovitch was recalled by Trump and fired ending a 33 year career. The smear was that Yovanovitch was disloyal to Trump, spread by Giuliani. John Bolton warns a deputy, “Giuliani is a hand grenade.” Giuliani had begun, at the President’s behest, to get to the new President of Ukraine to publicly announce an investigation into Burisma and the Biden’s.

May 10, 2019 Giuliani tells Fox News that Zelensky is surrounded by Democrat Operatives and “enemies of the president, and, in some cases, enemies of the United States.”

May 12/13, 2019 Lev Parnas states he met with Ukrainian officials in May, in Kiev and warned the incoming official that Pence would not attend Zelensky’s inauguration and the US would freeze aid to Ukraine if the country did not announce an investigation into the Biden’s.

May 20, 2019- Zelensky is sworn in as President. Vice President Pence did not attend. Rick Perry attended the inauguration. Two of Perry’s longtime friends received a potentially lucrative contract from the Ukrainian government after recommending them to Zelensky personally.

May 23, 2019 Trump states that Ukraine is full of “terrible” and corrupt people who had “tried to take me down”. He orders officials to coordinate future Ukraine matter with Giuliani. (Related to conspiracy theory that Ukraine interfered and not Russia.)

May, 2019 Per Laura Cooper, Ukraine had met their anti corruption requirements for the release of their aid package.

June, 2019 William Taylor appointed acting Ambassador to Ukraine. Taylor was appointed by Pompeo.

June, 2019 Sondland, EU Ambassador appointed by Trump states in his testimony that SOS Mike Pompeo was “in the loop” through the monthlong effort by Trump to pressure Ukraine into opening investigations into the Democrats and Biden. Sondland in his congressional testimony states he was working at the “express direction” of Trump to facilitate a quid pro quo with Zelensky for a visit to the White House and and possible release of aid to Ukraine.

July 10, 2019 Fiona Hill testifies that she was an eye witness to Sondland informing the Ukrainians that if they wanted a face-to-face meeting with Trump in the Oval Office, meaning Zelensky, they needed to investigate Trump’s political rival, the Biden’s. In regards to Vindman, Hill states, “July 10, Lt. Col. Vindman was justifiably alarmed when he realized that there was this highly political aspect of the meeting that we were looking for eventually with President Zelensky,”

July 10, 2019 Two Ukranian officials press for an Oval office meeting with Trump and Zelensky. Sondland, in the meetings, states that Mick Mulvaney promised that Zelensky would be invited if Ukraine publicly announces the “investigations”.

Sondland again presses the Ukrainians to make public investigations, but was more specific to Burisma and the 2016 election as targets. Fiona Hill halts the meetings.

Hill and Vindman report the meeting to John Eisenberg, Chief Legal Adviser to the National Security Council. Bolton tells Hill to give a message to Eisenberg: “I am not part of whatever drug deal Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up.”

July 18, 2019 OMB announces Trump is freezing $391 million in security aid to Ukraine per presidential order to the budget office.

July 25, 2019- DOD official Laura Cooper states Ukraine was aware of the hold on their assistance with “some kind of issue,” and were aware it was suspended in August. Trump unilaterally held up the funding to Ukraine without any indication as why to any department.

July 25, 2019- Trump has a call with Zelensky. In the call Trump says after stating how much the US has done for Ukraine over any of the European allies and Zelensky says Ukraine would like to buy more Javelins, Trump says, “I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it.” This is in reference to the conspiracy theory that it was Ukraine, not Russia, that interfered with the elections. Later in the call, Trump tells Zelensky, “Rudy very much knows what’s happening and he is a very capable guy. If you could speak to him, that would be great.” Trump goes on to smear Yovanovitch calling her a “bad news.” Then Trump says, “There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it… It sounds horrible to me.”

* February 11, 2016, Biden speaks to Poroshenko, President of Ukraine, and states, “that is essential for Ukraine to continue to take action to root our corruption and implement reforms. This was when Biden touts his withholding 1 Billion in loan guarantees unless Shokin is fired.

* February 16, 2016 Shokin resigns due to pressure and intense criticism.

*May 2016 Vitaliy Kasko, the former Deputy of Prosecutor General of Ukraine told Bloomberg in an interview, “There was no pressure from anyone from the U.S. to close cases against Burisma owner Zlochevsky.” Stating that Shokin, Attorney General, refused to pursue any corruption cases at all.

*August 14, 2016 Evidence surfaces of payments to Paul Manafort of work in 2014

* August 22, 2016 Marie Yovanovitch becomes new Ambassador to Ukraine

* September 2016 Zlochevskiy’s American lawyer, John Buretta, a former U.S. DeputyAssistant Attorney General says that a court Kyiv ordered the case closed because no wrong doing had been presented. (Yovanovitch had nothing to do with the courts decision.)

Trump would later state, “The only reason I made that call was because Rick asked me to. Something about an LNG (liquified natural gas plant.)

July 26, 2019 A meeting between Sondland and Yermak took place that Holmes was left out because Sondland and Yermak wanted “the meeting to be one-on-one with no note-taker.”

Sondland calls Trump on an unsecured cellphone. Trump asks, “Are they going to do the investigation?” Sondland replies, “He’s gonna do it. He’ll do whatever you want. He loves your ass.”

*Bill Taylor testified that his aide asked Sondland what Trump thought of Ukraine, “Sondland responded that President Trump cares more about the investigations of Biden, which (Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy) Giuliani was pressing for.”

July 27, 2019 Sondland tells Taylor that Zelensky “needed to make clear” to Trump that he was not standing in the way of “investigations”.

June 28, 2019 Taylor has a call with Zelensky, Volkner, Sondland, and Perry in which it “was made clear that some action on Burisma/Biden investigation was a precondition for an Oval Office meeting,” Holmes testified in his congressional hearing.

August 9, 2019 The Ukranian’s have learned by now that the aid is frozen. They are directed to Mulvaney. “I think POTUS really wants the deliverable,” Sondland texts to Vokner

Sondland and Volker begin working on a draft language for Zelensky to announce the investigations.

August 12, 2019 CIA officer detailed to the WH files a WB complaint.

August 16, 2019 In a memo to Bolton, Vindman states that the National Security Council, the State Department, and the Defense Department all agree the military assistance to Ukraine should be released. An aide later said, the “president doesn’t want to provide any assistance at all.”

August 22, 2019 Sondland emails Pompeo about the “logjam” of Ukrainian policy and the held assistance.

August 27, 2019 John Bolton tells Ukrainians that Trump wants to meet with Zelensky on September 1st. Bolton tells Zelensky that aid will not be released before the “Warsaw meeting” and the release of the aid would actually “hang on whether President Zelensky was able to ‘favorably impress’ President Trump” at the Warsaw meeting.

Holmes testifies that the hold had not been released due to Trump’s dissatisfaction that they had not publicly called for an investigation into Burisma/Biden.

September 1, 2019 Pence is in Warsaw and meets with Zelensky who asks Pence about the aid. Pence says he will speak to Trump. Sondland tell Yermak, a Ukrainian official, not to expect the money unless Zelensky makes a public announcement about Burisma.

Zelensky later prepares an announcement for Sept 13 hoping to satisfy Trump.

September 9, 2019 WB report becomes public alleging a quid pro quo stated by IG as “credible.”

September 9, 2019 Trump has a conversation with Sondland and states, “I want nothing. I want nothing. I want no quid pro quo. Tell Zelensky to do the right thing.” Sondland says Trump was “not in a good mood that day.”

September, 2019 Trump is asked if he delayed the aid to Ukraine. Trump states, “I didn’t delay anything.”

September 11, 2019 Funds are released to Ukraine. Per Cooper, only 86% of the funds were able to be released by the end of the fiscal year, which is a crime as no official process had been taken to halt payment or reschedule of congressionally appointed payments. Further stating that neither the DOD or Congress had been notified.

September 13, 2019 Holmes testifies that Zelensky was supposed to do an interview on CNN, or on the 16th as they planned to announce that a certain investigation that was “on hold” will progress. Holmes testifies he ran into Yermak and “stressed” to him “the importance of staying out of US Politics.” and that Taylor “said he hoped no interview was planned.

Holmes continued in his testimony, “Yermak did not answer, but shrugged in resignation as if to indicate they had no choice. In short, everyone thought there was going to be an interview, and the Ukrainians believed they had to do it.” The interview was cancelled.

Sondland would testify in his congressional testimony, Zelensky “had to announce the investigations. He didn’t actually have to do them, as I understood it.”

September 25 Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces a formal impeachment.