House Releases First Depositions From Trump Impeachment Probe

House investigators on Monday released transcripts from the closed-door interviews with two former State Department officials as part of their impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump . 

These are the first depositions the Democrat-controlled House has made public as they investigate Trump pressuring Ukrainian officials to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter while also withholding U.S. military aid from the country. 

The newly released interviews are from Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine , and P. Michael McKinley, a former senior adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Both were conducted last month. 

“As we move towards this new public phase of the impeachment inquiry, the American public will begin to see for themselves the evidence that the committees have collected,” the three House chairmen leading the inquiry said in a statement. “With each new interview, we learn more about the President’s attempt to manipulate the levers of power to his personal political benefit.”

Yovanovitch’s deposition largely focused on Trump calling her “bad news” during his July phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and forcing her out of her job in May. She also said she felt threatened by Trump’s vague comments that “[Yovanovitch is] going to go through some things.”

McKinley, who resigned last month so that he could give this testimony, defended Yovanovitch’s tenure in his deposition and spoke out against any efforts by the Trump administration to “procure negative political information for domestic purposes.”

You can read the full transcripts below.