The new evidence on Ukraine
This appeared in Saturday’s Washington Post.
New evidence in the Ukraine affair has revealed several important new facts. One is that President Donald Trump’s firing of U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch last spring was part of an explicit trade-off with a corrupt Ukrainian prosecutor who promised dirt on Joe Biden. Another is that Trump’s demand that Ukraine’s president announce an investigation of Biden, along with the threat of retaliation if he did not, was communicated to the Ukrainians months earlier than previously known.
The new evidence significantly bolsters the case that Trump abused his office. It also underlines how much more there is still to learn about the dealings he and his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, undertook in Kyiv, even as the president’s trial on impeachment charges is set to begin in the Senate on Tuesday.
Much of the new evidence comes from Lev Parnas, a former collaborator with Giuliani and donor to Trump who turned against them after his indictment on federal campaign finance charges.
The White House dismisses Parnas as a man with a motive to lie, and it’s true that some of his allegations need verification. But the Soviet emigre businessman also gave House investigators texts, emails, calendars and other documents that appear to substantiate key charges.
Texts between Parnas and Yuri Lutsenko, a former Ukrainian prosecutor, make clear that Lutsenko made allegations about Biden in the expectation that he would be rewarded with the firing of Yovanovitch, who had accused him of blocking corruption investigations. “If you don’t make a decision about Madam – you are bringing into question all my allegations. Including about B,” one Lutsenko text to Parnas read. He got his wish: “He fired her again,” read a text from Giuliani to Parnas in April, shortly before Yovanovitch was recalled on Trump’s orders.
Parnas told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that he also played a key role in conveying Trump’s demand for an investigation of Biden to Volodymyr Zelensky, who became Ukraine’s president last May. Giuliani had sent Zelensky a letter asking for a meeting but called off the trip after it was publicized. Parnas said he was then dispatched by Giuliani in early May to deliver a tough message to an aide to Zelensky: Unless he announced a Biden investigation, relations would sour, starting with the cancellation of Vice President Mike Pence’s attendance at Zelensky’s inauguration.
Parnas has produced a note he made on hotel stationery – “get Zalensky [sic] to Annouce [sic] that the Biden case will be Investigated” – and his story is also backed by testimony during the House impeachment inquiry, according to which Trump told Pence to cancel his trip to Ukraine the day after Parnas said he told Giuliani that the Ukrainians were not responsive.
Parnas insists Trump knew all about his activities in Ukraine, as did Pence, Attorney General William Barr and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. He didn’t offer proof. But given the evidence he did deliver, the need for the Senate to conduct a thorough trial, with testimony from witnesses in a position to confirm or deny the allegations, has become ever more urgent.