Fiona Hill Testifies - Giuliani Ran Shadow Ukraine Policy for "Domestic Political Errand"

Former National Security Council Russia expert Dr. Fiona Hill delivered searing testimony on November 21, 2019, exposing how Rudy Giuliani ran a shadow Ukraine policy for Trump’s “domestic political errand” that undermined U.S. national security and advanced Russian interests. Hill, a respected foreign policy expert who served in both Republican and Democratic administrations, testified that former National Security Advisor John Bolton called the irregular Ukraine channel a “drug deal” and instructed her to report it to NSC lawyers. In her opening statement, Hill directly confronted Republican conspiracy theories, declaring: “This is what the Russians want—to pit us against each other, to undermine our institutions, to bring down democracies.”

Background

Hill testified that she witnessed the divergence between official U.S. policy toward Ukraine—supporting the country against Russian aggression and promoting anti-corruption reforms—and Giuliani’s shadow diplomacy focused on pressuring Ukraine to announce investigations benefiting Trump politically. She described a July 10, 2019 White House meeting where EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland told Ukrainian officials they needed to deliver on investigations to secure a White House meeting with President Zelensky. Bolton abruptly ended the meeting and told Hill: “You go and tell [NSC Legal Advisor] Eisenberg that I am not part of whatever drug deal Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up on this.” Bolton later referred to Giuliani as a “hand grenade who’s going to blow everybody up.”

Hill confirmed that there were two parallel tracks of Ukraine policy: the “regular channel” she participated in, focused on legitimate foreign policy objectives, and the “irregular channel” run by Giuliani, Sondland, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, and Special Envoy Kurt Volker, which focused on political investigations. She testified that Giuliani’s activities were not “for a national security purpose” but rather “for a domestic political errand” to benefit Trump’s reelection campaign. Hill emphasized that this shadow diplomacy played directly into Russian interests by weakening U.S.-Ukraine relations and undermining Ukraine’s ability to resist Russian military aggression.

Significance

Hill’s testimony was particularly powerful because of her credentials as a nonpartisan Russia expert and her willingness to directly confront the conspiracy theories Republicans were promoting to defend Trump. She systematically debunked the false narrative that Ukraine, rather than Russia, interfered in the 2016 election—a conspiracy theory that Trump had demanded Zelensky investigate. Hill explained that this conspiracy theory was a “fictional narrative” pushed by Russian intelligence services to deflect from their actual interference operation. Her statement “This is what the Russians want” highlighted how Trump’s Ukraine scheme wasn’t just corrupt—it was strategically harmful to U.S. national security and beneficial to America’s adversary.

Hill’s account of Bolton’s reactions—calling Giuliani’s operation a “drug deal” and ordering her to report it to lawyers—provided crucial evidence that senior officials recognized the impropriety and illegality of Trump’s scheme but were overruled or ignored. Bolton himself refused to testify under subpoena, following Trump’s blanket obstruction directive, but his reported comments through Hill’s testimony revealed that even Trump loyalists understood they were participating in something improper.

Hill’s testimony concluded the public hearing phase of the impeachment inquiry and crystallized the key findings: Trump used the power of his office to pressure a foreign government to interfere in a U.S. election, he did so through an irregular channel that bypassed professional foreign policy experts, and his actions undermined U.S. national security to advance Russian interests. Her direct rebuke of Republican conspiracy theories—delivered with the authority of a respected Russia expert—made it clear that defending Trump required embracing Russian disinformation, a choice that would define the Republican Party’s approach not just to impeachment but to foreign policy more broadly in the years that followed.