Article snippet: KYIV, Ukraine — To Democrats who say that President Donald Trump’s decision to freeze a $391 million military aid package to Ukraine was intended to bully Ukraine’s leader into carrying out investigations for Trump’s political benefit, the president and his allies have had a simple response: There could not have been any quid pro quo because the Ukrainians did not know the assistance had been blocked. Following testimony by William B. Taylor Jr., the top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, to House impeachment investigators Tuesday that the freezing of the aid was directly linked to Trump’s demand for the investigations, the president took to Twitter on Wednesday morning to approvingly quote a Republican member of Congress saying neither Taylor nor any other witness had “provided testimony that the Ukrainians were aware that military aid was being withheld.” But in fact, word of the aid freeze had gotten to high-level Ukrainian officials by the first week in August, according to interviews and documents obtained by The New York Times. The problem was not a bureaucratic glitch, the Ukrainians were told then. To address it, they were advised, they should reach out to Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, according to the interviews and records. The timing of the communications about the issue, which have not previously been reported, shows Ukraine was aware the White House was holding up the funds weeks earlier than U.S. and Ukrainian officials had acknowled... Link to the full article to read more