As former United States ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch spoke before a House impeachment hearing, President Donald Trump launched a frantic attack on the distinguished career diplomat in an obvious attempt to smear her reputation –which stunned and angered Twitter users due to the personal nature of the attacks.

According to the president, “Everywhere Marie Yovanovitch went turned bad. She started off in Somalia, how did that go? Then fast forward to Ukraine, where the new Ukrainian President spoke unfavorably about her in my second phone call with him. It is a U.S. President’s absolute right to appoint ambassadors.”

He then added, “They call it ‘serving at the pleasure of the President.’ The U.S. now has a very strong and powerful foreign policy, much different than proceeding administrations. It is called, quite simply, America First! With all of that, however, I have done FAR more for Ukraine than O.”

Commenters on the president’s Twitter thread excoriated Trump for what Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) called “witness intimidation” moments later during the hearing.

You can see a sampling below:

….They call it “serving at the pleasure of the President.” The U.S. now has a very strong and powerful foreign policy, much different than proceeding administrations. It is called, quite simply, America First! With all of that, however, I have done FAR more for Ukraine than O.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 15, 2019

Marie Yovanovitch is an American patriot. Stop smearing the names of those who tell the truth.

— Ms. Krassenstein (@HKrassenstein) November 15, 2019

Yes he is.

But since he has no real defense, all he has left are petty, childish accusations and insults.

— Arlo Walker (@ArloTWalker) November 15, 2019

It is not only witness intimidation but obvious gender bias on respect for their work.

— Terry (@GrandmaTayters) November 15, 2019

Funny how you have all these bad people around you. I think that’s called projection. If you don’t understand projection, I can have @SpeakerPelosi explain it to you.

— The_Drake 🇺🇸🇨🇦🏴‍☠️ (@vampireontitus) November 15, 2019

Wow little man

— Jennifer (@hikewithfish) November 15, 2019

You have ZERO integrity credibility and believability

— JE Alvey (@Jeffreyalvey) November 15, 2019

you're a terrible person

— Matt Singer (@matthewjsinger) November 15, 2019

What is so AMAZING about this tweet is that while Yovanovich is testifying that Trump & co. removed her through baseless and false smears, Trump is lobbing baseless, outrageously false smears at Yovanovitch IN REAL TIME.

— Decent Trial Lawyer (@DecentTrial) November 15, 2019

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