Page 1 1 UNITED STATES SENATE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS COMMITTEE ON FINANCE - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -x INTERVIEW OF: : ELISABETH F. ZENTOS : : - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -x Room SD-342 and via Webex Dirksen Senate Office Building Washington, D.C. Monday, July 20, 2020 10:07 a.m. INTERVIEW OF ELISABETH F. ZENTOS Page 2 2 APPEARANCES: For the Witness: JOSHUA A. LEVY, ESQ. ZACHARY BLAU, ESQ. Levy Firestone Muse LLP 1401 K Street, N.W., Suite 600 Washington, D.C. 20005 For Senator Johnson: JOSEPH C. FOLIO, III, Chief Counsel, HSGAC SCOTT WITTMANN, Senior Professional Staff Member, HSGAC BRIAN DOWNEY, Senior Investigator, HSGAC LYDIA WESTLAKE, Senior Advisor, HSGAC SARAH SMERLING, Professional Staff Member, HSGAC WILLIAM SACRIPANTI, Research Assistant, HSGAC For Senator Grassley: JOSHUA FLYNN-BROWN, Deputy Chief Investigative Counsel, Finance Committee QUINTON BRADY, Investigative Counsel, Finance Committee Page 3 3 APPEARANCES: (Continued): For Senator Peters: ZACHARY SCHRAM, Minority Chief Counsel, HSGAC ALAN KAHN, Minority Chief Investigative Counsel, HSGAC ROY AWABDEH, Minority Senior Counsel, HSGAC SOUMYALATHA DAYANANDA, Minority Senior Investigative Counsel, HSGAC For Senator Wyden: DAVID BERICK, Minority Chief Investigator, Finance Committee DAN GOSHORN, Minority Senior Counsel, Finance Committee JOSH HEATH, Minority Investigator, Finance Committee MICHAEL OSBORN-GROSSO, Minority Investigator, Finance Committee For the Department of State: WILLIAM K. KILLION Bureau of Legislative Affairs KENNETH A. THOMAS Office of the Legal Advisor Page 4 4 MAJORITY EXHIBITS MARKED 1) Press Release, 05/12/14 52 2) Letter, Johnson and Grassley to Pompeo, 04/30/20 62 3) Letter, Johnson and Grassley to Pompeo, 11/06/19 62 4) New York Times article, 12/08/18 73 5) Agenda for Examination of the US Adversarial Criminal Justice System, 01/18/16 to 01/23/16 94 6) News article, 12/06/19 102 7) News article, 12/18/19 102 8) Email, Ciaramella to Hartwell, 01/12/16 105 9) White House visitor log, 01/19/16 120 10) Email, Ciaramella to Jamie Gusack, et al., 01/18/16 136 11) Email, Zentos to Montgomery, et al., 01/21/16 165 12) Email, Zentos to Ciaramella, 01/19/16 183 13) Email, Telizhenko to Zentos, 02/01/16 185 14) Email, Telizhenko to Zentos, 03/01/16 187 15) Email, Zentos to Telizhenko, 03/04/16 188 16) Email, Telizhenko to Zentos, 03/10/16 192 17) Email, Zentos to Telizhenko, 04/13/16 194 18) Email, Telizhenko to Zentos, 04/28/16 195 19) Email, Telizhenko to Zentos, 05/04/16 196 20) Email, Telizhenko to Zentos, 07/09/16 197 21) Email, Zentos to Shulyar, 10/17/15 204 22) Email, Zentos to Ciaramella, 12/26/15 206 Page 5 5 MAJORITY EXHIBITS (Continued) MARKED 23) Email, Kasanof to Zentos, 03/31/16 208 24) Email, Ciaramella to Zentos, 06/17/16 209 25) Email, Zentos to Ciaramella, 06/18/16 212 26) Email Nuland to Pyatt, 03/30/16 214 27) Email, Shulyar to Zentos, 06/06/16 217 28) Email, Zentos to Shulyar, 06/06/16 219 MINORITY EXHIBITS MARKED A) Letter, Levy and Blau to Folio, 07/18/20 123 B) Letter, Breckenridge to Ferriero, 03/13/20 125 C) Statement on the Ukrainian-American Strategic Partnership, 05/23/20 128 D) Washington Post article, 07/01/20 130 E) Letter various Senators to Poroshenko, 02/12/16 179 F) The Hill article, 10/03/19 180 G) Letter, Feinstein and Peters to Graham, Johnson and Grassley, 12/17/19 222 H) Letter, Peters to Johnson, 02/27/20 223 I) Letter, Peters to Johnson, 03/17/20 224 J) Letter, Peters and Wyden to Johnson and Grassley 07/16/20 225 Page 6 6 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 MR. FOLIO: All right, Josh. Now we're officially 3 ready to go. I'm assuming that's Ms. Zentos to your right? 4 MS. ZENTOS: Yes. Hello. 5 MR. FOLIO: Hi, Ms. Zentos. How are you? 6 MS. ZENTOS: Good. How are you doing? 7 MR. FOLIO: Very well, thank you. We very much 8 appreciate you taking the time. We understand you're 9 squeezing us in between transfers of post, so we very much 10 appreciate that as you prepare to head off to your next 11 assignment. 12 MS. ZENTOS: Thank you. Happy to be here to answer 13 your questions. 14 MR. FOLIO: Great. I'm just going to walk through some 15 welcoming remarks and instructions. Anyone, please feel 16 free to let me know if I'm not coming through clearly or if 17 I'm speaking too quickly, which I sometimes do, and I'll 18 slow down. 19 So this is a transcribed interview of Ms. Elisabeth 20 Zentos. I'm sorry. Ms. Gray is our court reporter. Ms. 21 Gray, I just want to confirm that you're on the line and 22 that you're able to hear me okay. Is that correct? 23 THE COURT REPORTER: Yes. 24 MR. FOLIO: Thank you. 25 So, again, this is a transcribed interview of Ms. Page 7 7 1 Elisabeth Zentos conducted by the Senate Committee on 2 Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs as well as the 3 Senate Committee on Finance. This interview was requested 4 by Chairman Ron Johnson and Chairman Charles Grassley as 5 part of the Committees' ongoing investigation of whether 6 there were any actual or apparent conflicts of interest or 7 any other wrongdoing with regard to the Obama 8 administration's Ukraine policy or Burisma Holdings as well 9 as related matters. 10 On April 30, 2020, Chairmen Grassley and Johnson 11 requested Ms. Zentos' appearance for a voluntary transcribed 12 interview and certain categories of documents. In response 13 to her counsel, Mr. Joshua Levy, he notified the Committee 14 that there were no responsive records, categories of 15 requested material. 16 Ms. Zentos, can you please state your full name for the 17 record? 18 MS. ZENTOS: Yes. Elizabeth Ferrell Zentos. 19 MR. FOLIO: Thank you. My name is Joseph Folio. I am 20 the Chief Counsel for the Homeland Security Committee. I'm 21 with Committee staff. I'm going to identify other folks-- 22 just to try and keep this an orderly process--in the room 23 with me, and then I'll identify or give an opportunity to 24 the folks who are joining us virtually to identify 25 themselves. Page 8 8 1 Joining me also--I'm sorry, Josh. Go ahead. 2 MR. LEVY: Yeah, if my name is stated for the record 3 already, I just had a question about something you had said, 4 and we can say it after you take the roll. That's fine. 5 MR. FOLIO: Okay. So, in addition to myself for 6 Chairman Johnson's staff, I'm also joined in the room by 7 Scott Wittmann, Brian Downey, Lydia Westlake, Will 8 Sacripanti, and Sarah Smerling. and then for Chairman 9 Grassley's staff, I'm joined in the room by Joshua Flynn- 10 Brown and Quinton Brady. 11 We also have representatives from Ranking Member 12 Peters' staff and Ranking Member Wyden's staff. I'll ask 13 Zack to take the lead and introduce the folks from Ranking 14 Member Peters' staff who are joining us today. 15 MR. SCHRAM: My name is Zachary Schram with Ranking 16 Member Peters, and I'm joined in the office, although 17 virtually in different offices, by Alan Kahn, Soumya 18 Dayananda, and Roy Awabdeh. 19 MR. FOLIO: Dave Berick, would you like to introduce 20 people present for Ranking Member Wyden? 21 [No response.] 22 PARTICIPANT: Dave, you're muted. 23 MR. FOLIO: Dan, are you available to step in for Dave? 24 [No response.] 25 MR. FOLIO: All right. So I can see-- Page 9 9 1 MR. GOSHORN: This is Dan Goshorn with Senator Wyden's 2 staff on the Finance Minority. From our team here today, we 3 have Dave Berick, Josh Heath, and Michael Osborn-Grosso. 4 MR. FOLIO: Thank you, Dan. 5 MR. SCHRAM: So we ought to resolve the audio on Dave's 6 end. Dave, we can't hear you. I don't know if it's a 7 microphone issue or... 8 MR. SACRIPANTI: Dave is unmuted. He should be able to 9 speak. 10 MR. SCHRAM: No, it's not working. 11 MR. FOLIO: It might be helpful, Dave, to check the 12 microphone access on your computer. 13 MR. GOSHORN: We will be Dave's proxy for the time 14 being while we get him sorted out, so go ahead. 15 MR. FOLIO: Good. Thank you. 16 So, Josh, I was going to in my script have a spot to 17 introduce you formally, but happy to do that now, or if you 18 had an issue you wanted to raise, please go ahead. 19 MR. LEVY: Feel free to introduce. 20 MR. FOLIO: So now I will explain how the interview 21 will proceed. The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure do not 22 apply to any of the Committees' investigative activities, 23 including transcribed interviews. 24 The way questioning will proceed is that we will 25 alternate between the majority and minority staffs, each Page 10 10 1 taking 1-hour turns. The majority staff will begin and 2 proceed for an hour, and I'll call out the time. The 3 minority staff will then have an hour to ask questions, and 4 we will rotate back and forth until there are no more 5 questions and the interview will be over.