Colonel Vindman’s testimony is significant not just because he’s the first witness who listened in on the July 25 call, but also because of his background: He’s a refugee from Ukraine who fought in the Iraq War. I talked to my colleague Sheryl Gay Stolberg, who wrote today about Colonel Vindman.

Sheryl, what makes Colonel Vindman’s story so astonishing?

When Alexander was three, his family fled Ukraine, then under the thumb of the Soviet Union, with almost nothing. His mother had died in Kiev. They had $750 and their suitcases. They sold their possessions while waiting for visas.

They came here the way so many Americans have, looking for a better life. When they got to New York, their father worked multiple jobs while he was learning English. Alexander said in his testimony that his father instilled in him a love of the United States and a desire to integrate himself in this culture, to assimilate. He and his brother grew up and served in the military. There’s nothing more American than that.

You talked to a family friend of the Vindmans, who said, “When you talk about what good immigrants do, look at what these immigrants are doing for this country.”