"Equally fictitious is the notion that I am disloyal to President Trump," Yovanovitch told the House Intelligence Committee in a closed-door deposition last month. "I have heard the allegation in the media that I supposedly told our embassy team to ignore the president's orders since he was going to be impeached. That allegation is false. I have never said such a thing to my embassy colleagues or anyone eIse."

Yovanovitch offered similar testimony in her public hearing last week, even as Trump attacked her in real time. She answered "no" when asked whether she was a "never Trumper."

Trump removed Yovanovitch from her post just as his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani began mounting a pressure campaign to persuade Ukrainians to investigate former vice president Joe Biden. Trump and his son Donald Turmp Jr. fomented the allegations against Yovanovitch, which were also echoed by Sean Hannity on Fox News.

The effort roiled the State Department, and senior officials testified that there was intense internal pressure to issue a public statement on her behalf, but those efforts were rebuffed by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. When Yovanovitch returned to Washington, senior officials told her she had done nothing to deserve her ouster.

The claim that Yovanovitch refused to hang Trump's portrait echoes similar complaints from earlier in his tenure when Trump's official portrait was reportedly missing from thousands of government offices — until the White House released portraits of the president nine months after he was sworn in.

The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.