Last week, the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee concluded a round of public hearings on US President Donald Trump’s conduct regarding his relations with Ukraine. The Democrats, who control the House of Representatives, claim that Trump compelled Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to launch an investigation into the affairs of former Vice President Joe Biden, who is running against Trump in next year’s presidential election. In exchange for such an investigation, Trump offered to meet Zelenskyy in the Oval Office and ensured him of the continued supply of US military equipment to Ukrainian troops fighting pro-Russian forces in the east of the country. The nine witnesses who testified about the Ukrainian deal at those hearings were all US officials who have recently served or are currently serving under the Trump administration. They testified despite pressure from the White House not to do so. Their testimonies were remarkable for their clarity and the key information they provided to Congress. By the second day of the hearings, it became clear that the basic facts of the matter were indisputable – namely that President Trump and his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, tried to link Zelenskyy’s visit to the White House and the provision of US weapons to the Ukrainian army with the launching of an official state investigation by Ukrainian authorities into Biden and his son. While this fact is irrefutable, the successive narratives of Democrats and Republicans about the meaning and implications of Trump’s behavior have been very different, which is to be expected in such a political situation. For Democrats, this was a clear case in which Donald Trump used his influence on a US ally to dig up dirt on a political rival. Trump’s behavior had nothing to do with the goals of US policy toward Ukraine. Conversely, Republican committee members argued that Trump had strong and valid reasons to investigate past Ukrainian activities toward the United States, including its supposed interference in the 2016 US presidential election in favor of then-candidate Hillary Clinton. According to this narrative, Ukraine, not Russia, may have been the main player who engaged in anti-American behavior in 2016. This theory, however, was rejected in detail by the US intelligence services and by the 2019 report on the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election (known more widely as the Mueller Report). It was also unequivocally rejected by Fiona Hill, one of the key witnesses in the hearings. Hill described this view as “a fictional narrative woven and published by the Russian security services themselves.” And she surely knows what she’s talking about: between April 2017 and July 2019, Hill served on the National Security Council as a key specialist on Russian and European affairs, including Ukrainian affairs. Before that, she was an intelligence officer covering the same areas for the National Intelligence Council. The next step in the impeachment process will therefore be a report by the Democrats over the next few weeks for submission to the House Judiciary Committee, which has a responsibility to prepare a list of indictable charges if evidence is sufficient and strong. Then, if the House of Representatives votes in favor of the indictment, the case will go to the US Senate, which would have to vote by a two-thirds majority to remove the president. But it seems highly unlikely that Democrats will get Republican support in their fight against Trump, both in the House and the Senate. In the coming days, however, more damaging evidence against Trump might come out. For the time being, the most we can expect is that some Republicans might claim that what the president has done is wrong, but does not amount to a crime requiring his removal from office. In this case, we will have to wait until the November 2020 elections to see how the public views Trump’s Ukraine affair. –Jeffrey Camp (translated by Asaf Zilberfarb)