Trump rebuffs advisers over Ukraine aid

According to closed-door testimony in the impeachment hearings this week by Lt. Col. Alexander S. Vindman, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, President Trump’s top three national security advisers sought to persuade him in August to sign a memorandum restarting aid to Ukraine, but he refused.

The deputy secretary of state said on Wednesday that the president’s lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani was involved in a smear campaign to oust the ambassador to Ukraine, publicly confirming a key part of the saga behind the impeachment inquiry.