The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Giuliani was paid $500K by firm owned by arrested man By Josh Dawsey and Rosalind S. Helderman
Trump’s attorney says the money he received for services legitimate.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani was paid $500,000 last year by a company owned by one of two men arrested last week on a four-count indictment, including charges of conspiracy, making false statements to the Federal Election Commission and falsification of records.
The situation
Giuliani said that he was confident the money he received for work conducted on behalf of the Florida-based business called Fraud Guarantee and its owner Lev Parnas was legitimate and originated in the United States. “I know exactly where the money came from. I knew it at the time,” he said late Monday. “I will prove beyond any doubt it came from the United States of America.”
Giuliani had previously said he worked for Fraud Guarantee in 2018 and 2019 but had not confirmed how much he was paid.
What it means
The payment means Giuliani’s firm was earning $500,000 from Parnas just as Giuliani began working closely with Parnas and a business partner, Igor Fruman, to dig up dirt on Joe Biden and his family in Ukraine.
That effort was also discussed by Trump in a July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and is at the heart of the impeachment probe.
Previously
Parnas has said he began working with Giuliani in Ukraine late last year, introducing him to current and former Ukrainian officials who said they had information about alleged meddling by Ukraine in the 2016 election and an energy company on whose board Biden’s son Hunter Biden used to sit.
Giuliani said his firm was paid in two installments last fall, and he downplayed the $500,000 contract. “Some of our contracts are two or three million dollars. This was not an extraordinarily large contract,” he said.