The news about the mid-November 2019 impeachment hearings featured several Jews. (Getty Images/JTA Montage)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The first public hearings in the Trump impeachment inquiry began this week with quite a splash.

A bunch of Jewish actors are at play in this drama, and we’ve covered some before: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is caught in the middle of it all. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the Californian Democrat who is running the hearings. And Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, the associates of Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s lawyer, who are alleged to be instrumental in pressuring Zelensky to give in to Trump and provide damaging information on his political rivals.

In the hearings Wednesday, and in their aftermath, there were some new and familiar Jewish wrinkles. Here are a few:


Who was that lawyer?

Democrats handed the first 45 minutes of questioning to Daniel Goldman, and his restrained sarcasm immediately drew attention. “I want to spend a little time reading the transcript, as we’ve been encouraged to do,” he said. Trump has urged Twitter followers to “read the transcript” at least a dozen times. (Of course, Goldman proceeded to read parts of the transcript that backed the Democrats’ charges.)
Daniel Goldman, director of investigations for the House Intelligence Committee majority staff, left, asks questions to top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine William Taylor and career Foreign Service officer George Kent, as they testify before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2019, during the first public impeachment hearing of President Donald Trump’s efforts to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., right, listens. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Goldman is a former U.S. attorney who earned a reputation for busting mobsters and became a “TV lawyer” on NBC. (Watch him confess to popping the question to his wife with a ring inside a fortune cookie.) He’s also descended from Levi Strauss stock.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/the-jewish-players-in-the-trump-impeachment-hearings/#comments