William Taylor has emerged as an unlikely central player in the events that are at the heart of the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.
The retired career civil servant was tapped to run the US Embassy in Ukraine after the administration abruptly ousted the ambassador. He was then drawn into a Trump administration effort to leverage US military aid for Ukraine.
And then he apparently grew alarmed.
"I think it's crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign," he wrote at one point in excerpts of text messages released by impeachment investigators in Congress.
Now, members of Congress will hear directly from Taylor.
The former Army officer is scheduled to testify behind closed doors Tuesday in an inquiry trying to determine if Trump committed impeachable offenses by pressing the president of Ukraine into pursuing information that could help his campaign as Trump withheld military aid to the Eastern European country.
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Taylor had been serving as executive vice president at the U.S. Institute of Peace, a nonpartisan think tank founded by Congress, when he was appointed to run the embassy in Kyiv after Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch was removed before the end of her term following a campaign against her led by Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.
He was chosen for the post because he was among only a handful of former officials with experience in Ukraine who would be perceived as neutral by local officials and wouldn't raise objections at the White House, according to a colleague.
"It was a very short list, but Bill was at the top of it," said the colleague, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. "We were very grateful he agreed to do it." Taylor, who had served as U.S. ambassador to Ukraine from 2006 to 2009, was welcomed back to Kyiv as a steady hand.
"He's the epitome of a seasoned statesman," said John Shmorhun, an American who heads the agricultural company AgroGeneration.
He said Taylor's experience has shown in his handling of the Trump administration's efforts to pressure Ukraine. "He seems to know the difference between right and wrong," Shmorhun said.
"We need guys like Bill Taylor working in Ukraine, helping to deal with the politics in Ukraine, having a strong arm."