After weeks of work behind closed doors, House Democrats are taking their impeachment inquiry into the president of the United States into public view.
The House Intelligence Committee have called two witnesses on Wednesday to describe how President Trump asked the president of Ukraine to launch investigations that Trump thought might help him in the 2020 election.
In exchange for those investigations, witnesses say, Trump was prepared to meet in person with his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and sustain financial assistance — appropriated by Congress — that Washington had been providing to Ukraine since it was invaded by Russia in 2014.
The White House froze Ukraine's aid for a period of weeks this year and then released it. Although Zelenskiy was close to booking a CNN interview in September, he never made the public commitment that witnesses have said Trump wanted.