State Dept official testifying on Capitol Hill has warned for months about Giuliani’s ‘disinformation’ campaign: report

George P. Kent, the deputy assistant secretary of state in charge of Ukraine policy who is testifying on Capitol Hill as part of House Democrats' impeachment inquiry, has reportedly been warning colleagues about Rudy Giuliani running a "disinformation" campaign since this past March.

The New York Times reports that Kent for several months has "raised concerns to colleagues early... about the pressure being directed at Ukraine by Mr. Trump and his private lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, to pursue investigations into Mr. Trump’s political rivals."

In particular, the Times' sources say that Kent would point to "Giuliani’s role in what he called a 'disinformation' campaign intended to use a Ukrainian prosecutor to smear targets of the president," including former Vice President Joe Biden and former Ukrainian ambassador Marie Yovanovitch.

Kent appeared on Capitol Hill this week even though the State Department reportedly sought to block his testimony, just as last week it successfully blocked the testimony of European Union ambassador Gordon Sondland, who has emerged as a key figure in the Ukraine scandal engulfing the Trump White House.

On Monday, former Trump National Security Council official Fiona Hill testified that she and other officials were disturbed by what she described as a "shadow" foreign policy being run by Giuliani that was designed to personally benefit the president.