A West Point graduate who served for six years as an Army infantry officer, including with the 101st Airborne Division in Vietnam, Taylor is among the country’s most experienced diplomats, and has served in every administration of both parties since 1985.
Former officials of both parties described Taylor in glowing terms and suggested that his credibility would be difficult for Trump’s allies to question.
“Ambassador Bill Taylor is a person of integrity with a strong, ethical base,” said R. Nicholas Burns, a former undersecretary of state in the Bush administration. “I would also describe him as a true patriot. His entire professional life has been in service to the U.S.”
Stephen Sestanovich, who served as the State Department’s ambassador-at-large for the former Soviet Union under President Bill Clinton and who has traveled in Ukraine with Taylor, echoed that praise.
“You couldn’t ask for a more credible, universally respected, upright public servant to testify on the facts of this case,” he said, adding, “You want to go against Bill Taylor, you’ve got the whole city against you.”
The administration disputed that view on Tuesday. The White House press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, insisted in a statement that Trump “has done nothing wrong,” and lashed out at “a coordinated smear campaign from far-left lawmakers and radical unelected bureaucrats waging war on the Constitution.”
But few, if any, people who have worked with him see a radical in Taylor, who is soft-spoken and conservative in demeanor. Instead they describe someone motivated by American ideals since he served in the military and then entered government, first as an Energy Department employee and then a staff member for Sen. Bill Bradley, D-N.J.
