Yup. Sure Looks Like Trump’s Entire Ukraine ‘Anti-corruption’ Team Was Corrupt—And Funded By An Unnamed Russian Source

Ken AshfordL'Affaire Ukraine, Russia, Trump & Administration, Trump ImpeachmentLeave a Comment

It was already clear that the whole scheme that Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani had cooked up in Ukraine was to extort an entire nation and grossly distort U.S. foreign policy merely for the purpose of smearing Joe Biden. But a series of arrests and grand jury indictments on Thursday drove home the point that Giuliani wasn’t alone in his shuttle-shakedown between the U.S. and Ukraine. He had at least a pair of little helpers—who have now been indicted on charges of funneling foreign money into U.S. elections and attempted bribery.

There’s still a lot to learn, but midway through the day, what’s already clear is that Trump’s entire “anti-corruption team” in Ukraine was corrupt. And to make it sweeter, it appears that the money being funneled into U.S. campaigns, including Trump’s, came at least in part from “a foreign national Russian citizen and businessman.”

Here is the information available as of Thursday afternoon.

  • Four men were indicted on campaign finance violations, in particular for funneling money from foreign sources and soliciting a U.S. congressman for help in getting rid of U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. The congressman has been unofficially identified as former Republican Rep. Pete Sessions.
  • Two of the men, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, have previously been identified by Rudy Giuliani as “clients.” Parnas and Fruman are now clients of another former Trump attorney, John Dowd, who represented them in legal filings on Thursday.
  • Parnas accompanied Giuliani to a meeting with U.S. Ambassador Kurt Volker in July. Volker mentioned this meeting in his appearance before Congress, describing it as “a long conversation about Ukraine.” That conversation included both the effort to get Ukraine to launch an investigation into Joe Biden and efforts to secure an investigation into supposed Ukrainian involvement in the 2016 election.

POTUS and the perps.

Related: US Energy Secretary Rick Perry has been subpoenaed by the House Investigation Committee.