A lawyer said that the administration of US President Donald Trump dismissed Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Vendemann, the chief White House expert on Ukrainian affairs, after he testified against the president during his accountability.
Vendemann’s lawyer, David Pressman, said in a statement that he was taken outside the White House where he worked on the National Security Council.
"There is no doubt of any American about the reason for ending this man's work; Vendemann was asked to leave because he told the truth," he added.
Wendemann - during Trump's questioning in the House of Representatives last November - testified that Trump made an inappropriate request to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinsky during a phone call last July, and that became the focus of the investigation with the Republican president.
"I couldn't believe what I was hearing," he told a Democrat-led committee in the call. Trump asked Zielinsky to open investigations about his Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, and about a conspiracy theory that says Ukraine - not Russia - was behind the meddling in the 2016 US presidential election.
Trump, following the Senate’s decision to clear him of the accusations of abuse of power and obstructing the work of Congress, declared his "victory" for what the White House deemed a complete "acquittal" before the Democrats' rejection of their "worthless" result.
Although many Republicans acknowledged that Trump's behavior was a mistake, they eventually expressed their loyalty to him and voted for his innocence.