U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland just explicitly confirmed a quid pro quo with Ukraine and pointed the finger at President Trump during a stunning opening statement in the impeachment inquiry.

Sondland testified in the fourth day of public hearings in the impeachment inquiry into Trump, which is focusing on whether Trump improperly pressured Ukraine to conduct investigations that might benefit him politically, including by withholding military aid and linking a White House meeting Ukraine's president wanted with the resumption of the aid.

"Was there a 'quid pro quo?'" Sondland said in his statement. "As I testified previously, with regard to the requested White House call and White House meeting, the answer is yes."

Sondland placed blame on Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, for requesting a "quid pro quo for arranging a White House visit for President Zelensky" but also said Trump directed him to work with Giuliani and that Giuliani, in demanding Ukraine's president announce investigations involving former Vice President Joe Biden's son and the 2016 election, "was expressing the desires of the president of the United States."

Sondland additionally says that "everyone was in the loop," citing emails showing that "leadership of State, NSC, and the White House were all informed about the Ukraine efforts" from May through September, when the aid was released. Watch the full opening statement here. Brendan Morrow

President Trump is so mad at Attorney General William Barr that a senior administration official told The Washington Post there's a chance Barr could soon be fired.

Trump is "livid" for a multitude of reasons, including the fact that Barr told The Associated Press on Tuesday that he has not seen any voter fraud "on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election." Trump spent time on Wednesday complaining about Barr, officials familiar with the matter told the Post, and several people close to the president are working to convince Trump not to fire the attorney general.

One senior administration official told the Post it's possible Trump is even angrier that prior to the election, Connecticut U.S. Attorney John Durham did not make public whether he determined that law enforcement committed any crimes while investigating ties between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia. In October, Barr secretly appointed Durham a special counsel, which gives him more legal and political protection when President-elect Joe Biden takes office. This move angered Trump, people familiar with the matter told the Post, and is one reason why his relationship with Barr has been frosty for months.

Barr has been fiercely loyal to Trump, and before the election, tried to cast doubt on mail-in voting, arguing it would be vulnerable to fraud. A person close to Barr told the Post he decided to talk to AP because "he has to leave, and he does not want there to be questions about whether the department was sitting idly by under his watch with respect to investigating fraud." Catherine Garcia

The organizer of a swingers convention that is linked to at least 41 cases of coronavirus says if he could "go back in time, I would not produce this event again."

The "Naughty in N'awlins" convention was held in mid-November. Roughly 250 people attended the event, down from about 2,000 people in 2019, NOLA.com reports. Organizer Bob Hannaford said people had to test for COVID-19 before arriving, and half of them reported having antibodies; attendees were then given color-coded wristbands depending on their status.

Hannaford said participants were told to social distance and keep contact diaries, and several have shared with him that they became complacent on the last day of the event and that's "probably why they ended up positive."

One of the participants is now hospitalized with the virus and in serious condition, and Hannaford said that he wouldn't have organized the event "if I knew then what I know now. It weights on me and it will continue to weigh on me until everyone is 100 percent better." The pandemic has been raging in the United States since March, and cases were on the rise in Louisiana when the convention was held. Catherine Garcia

Ivanka Trump, President Trump's eldest daughter and one of his senior advisers, was deposed on Tuesday as part of a civil lawsuit alleging the misuse of inaugural funds, court documents show.

The District of Columbia attorney general's office sued the Trump Organization and Presidential Inaugural Committee in January, claiming that they misused more than $1 million by "grossly overpaying" for event space in the Trump International Hotel in Washington. The suit alleges that in one case, a nonprofit corporation called the 58th Presidential Inaugural Committee, in coordination with the Trump family, paid more than $300,000 to hold a private reception at the hotel for Ivanka Trump and her brothers, Donald Jr. and Eric, on Jan. 20, 2017.

"District law requires nonprofits to use their funds for their stated public purpose, not to benefit private individuals or companies," District of Columbia Attorney General Karl Racine said earlier this year.

Court filings show that Tom Barrack, the chairman of Trump's inaugural committee, was deposed on Nov. 17. The lawsuit alleges that during inaugural planning, Barrack "personally managed" discussions with the hotel about the event spaces used. Catherine Garcia

Former President Barack Obama is willing to set an example when it comes to getting a COVID-19 vaccine.

During an interview with SiriusXM Urban View host Joe Madison set to air on Thursday, Obama said if Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, says a vaccine is safe and can "immunize you from getting Covid, absolutely, I'm going to take it." Obama said he trusts Fauci "completely," and he may get the vaccine "on TV or [have] it filmed, just so that people know that I trust this science, and what I don't trust is getting Covid."

Obama told Madison he understands, due to historical events like the Tuskegee Study, "why the African American community would have some skepticism. But the fact of the matter is, vaccines are why we don't have polio anymore, the reason why we don't have a whole bunch of kids dying from measles and smallpox and diseases that used to decimate entire populations and communities." Catherine Garcia

On Wednesday, the United States broke two coronavirus records: for the first time, more than 200,000 new cases were reported in a day and more than 100,000 COVID-19 patients are hospitalized across the country.

The number of hospitalized patients is nearly double from the spring, during the pandemic's deadly first wave of infections. Philip Landrigan, the director of a global public health program at Boston College, told The New York Times that "any thinking person has to be worried. That we have so many hospitalizations speaks to the fact that we have done a very poor job of controlling this pandemic. It is spreading very rapidly, and in many places, it is basically spreading out of control."

At least 272,000 Americans have died of the coronavirus, with more than 2,700 deaths reported on Wednesday. The single-day fatality record is 2,967, set in mid-April.

On Wednesday morning, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Robert Redfield warned that the next three months "are going to be rough times. I actually believe they're going to be the most difficult time in the public health history of this nation, largely because of the stress that it's going to put on our health care system."

He estimated by February, the United States could be "close to 450,000" COVID-19 deaths, but he wants Americans to remember that "we're not defenseless," and everyone must do their part by wearing masks and practicing social distancing, measures that are proven to work. Catherine Garcia

Following the assassination last week of its top nuclear scientist, Iran on Wednesday imposed a law ordering the country's Atomic Energy Agency to immediately increase its enrichment of uranium.

Under the measure, the uranium will be enriched to 20 percent purity, a level that would give Iran the chance to convert its entire stockpile to bomb-grade levels within six months, The New York Times reports. Further, the law calls for the expulsion of international nuclear inspectors if U.S. oil and banking sanctions against Iran are not lifted by early February.

The law appears to be set up in a way to get President-elect Joe Biden to re-enter the nuclear deal with Iran that President Trump abandoned, the Times notes. It was ratified on Wednesday by Iran's Guardian Council, but President Hassan Rouhani said the government "does not agree with this legislation and considers it damaging for diplomacy."

Iran's top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, was killed on Friday, and while several global intelligence officials have pinned his assassination on Israel, the Israeli government has not taken responsibility. Iran has vowed to retaliate. Catherine Garcia