Among other reasons why today’s testimony by Lt. Colonel Alexander Vindman in the impeachment proceedings is a big deal is the fact that his is the first I’ve seen that directly contradicts Ambassador Gordon Sondland’s assertion that he did not know that targeting Joe and Hunter Biden was the purpose of the back-channel diplomacy that President Trump charged him with carrying out. This would mean that the hapless hotelier turned diplomatic lackey up and perjured himself before Congress — not a good look for a man who’s hoping to stave off a boycott of his Portland, Oregon-based hotel empire on the grounds that he’s just an honest businessman trying to serve his president. Vindman’s opening statement, published by various media sources last night, also includes an account of Vindman telling Sondland about the appropriateness of a demand that Ukraine investigate the president’s political rival, which again contradicts Sondland’s testimony that no one raised concerns to him about the pressure campaign on the Ukrainians.
I mentioned this weekend that Sondland interests me in part because he’s a test case for how public pressure might be brought to bear on Trump’s co-conspirators and enablers to ensure that this presidency is stopped in its tracks. He’s also fascinating as he represents a clear departure from the liberal aspirations of Portland (if not from the upper-class myopia of even avowedly liberal Portland elites). It’s somewhat gratifying to see others catching the Sondland dengue fever; Josh Marshall has just proclaimed him the “best character in this drama,” noting how fucked Sondland is at this point, and observing:
Entitlement, cluelessness, wanting desperately to be a player but not actually being one – it all makes for a perfect comedic awkwardness. Through texts and transcripts he manages to be cliched in his attempts to avoid paper trails and yet somehow fatally indiscrete. Sondland apparently thought he could thread the needle, remaining largely loyal to Trump while also keeping on the right side of the law and out of legal jeopardy. I doubt he’ll be the last. But he looks almost certain to be the first to be chewed up by this storm.
And lest you still think I’ve been too harsh on Sondland these past weeks, I refer you as well to this eviscerating piece by Oregonian columnist Steve Duin. Duin talked with Sondland several years ago as the latter was looking at renting some Portland property he owned to a strip club, over the protests of people who lived nearby. Sondland’s profession to Duin of his lack of reciprocal obligations towards his fellow citizens echoes his amoral service to Trump over the past year:
“You’re implying that because I serve on the art museum board, which is something I’m doing for the community, that somehow carries the responsibility to encumber my real estate,” Sondland said. “I don’t understand the connection. That doesn’t make any sense to me.”
[Sondland] couldn’t fathom a reason to “put an artificial restriction on our property. Why would we do that?”
The health and well-being of the erotic dancers on the poles? The families down the street? The property values in the shadow of Lottery Row?
That collateral damage didn’t register on his transactional balance sheet.
One final note on the Sondland front — it’s been reported that Sondland returned to Capitol Hill yesterday to review the transcript of his testimony, an exercise that we can assume is totally unrelated to newfound ambivalence about any self-incrimination in which he may have engaged. . .