https://www.washingtonpost.com/national ... story.htmlKey impeachment witness Gordon Sondland sues Mike Pompeo and U.S. for $1.8 million in legal fees
Sondland says Pompeo promised the State Dept would reimburse him job-related attorney fees, until he testified trump wanted quid pro quo. Now Sondland is suing. He was reimbursed about $80K but not the full amount.
My first impression, he's so screwed. Hopefully the IAALs will disagree.
The complaint alleges that Pompeo told Sondland that government lawyers would not be made available to represent him but that if he hired his own counsel, his attorney fees would be covered by the U.S. government. Top aides to Pompeo also acknowledged this commitment, the suit alleges, but “everything changed” after Sondland delivered his testimony alleging a “quid pro quo” and then refused to resign despite a request from one of Pompeo’s most trusted aides, Ulrich Brechbuhl.
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Sondland is demanding that the U.S. government cover the fees or Pompeo pay out of his own pocket. The suit argues that Pompeo’s actions as secretary of state should not be subject to governmental immunity because the promise “was self-serving, made entirely for personal reasons for his own political survival in the hopes that Ambassador Sondland would not implicate him or others by his testimony.”
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“Was there a quid pro quo?” Sondland said during his testimony. “With regard to the requested White House call and White House meeting, the answer is yes.”
“Everyone was in the loop,” he said. “It was no secret.”