UKRAINE SCHEME

The scope of the investigation into Rudy Giuliani has expanded beyond a typical FARA probe to one about the national security interests of the US.

The Giuliani probe is expanding as federal investigators are looking into Roger Stone’s efforts to gain a pardon for Matt Gaetz’s friend Joel Greenberg. On the last After Show, we laid out the challenges facing Stone and Matt Gaetz’s investigation, as well as the investigation into Rudy Giuliani. Prevail publisher Greg Olear and LB were on the panel.

We began with Roger.

There’s something about Rudy….

Suddenly Rudy Giuliani’s world seems to be getting smaller. Last week, he was the subject of a federal search warrant at his home and office, which included the seizure of his electronic equipment. Now we’re discovering the charges under investigation are related to national security. 

Daniel Goldman, counsel for the Democrats in the first impeachment trial of Donald Trump, says he believed this investigation represents the financial side of the impeachment trial. Towards the end of 2019, I detailed this corruption scheme in a three part-serial called Ukraine Scheme. 

The impeachment trial centred around the actions of Rudy Giuliani and his two clients Lev Parnas and Igor Furman, to get the US ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, removed from office. Furman and Parnas have ties to Ukrainian organized crime figure Dmitry Firtash. 

Furman and Parnas were the tip of the spear in an operation to remove Yovanovitch, a career diplomat with a track record in fighting corruption.  

That campaign began in April 2018, when Lev Parnas attended a private dinner with former US president Donald Trump. Parnas pressured Trump to fire Yovanovitch because she was not supportive of then-president Poroshenko and his chief prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko.  

In May, Parnas and Furman posted an Instagram photo after a meeting with Pete Sessions, the former Congressman from Texas and one-time member of the powerful rules committee. After his meeting with Parnas and Furman, Sessions sent a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo laying out his concerns about the ambassador.

Sessions and Giuliani did not act out altruistic reasons. They were likely heavily influenced by money paid to them by people within the Ukrainian government through Parnas and Furman, often using arms-length organizations or private companies. 

Pete Sessions was the beneficiary of $3 million in donations from Furman and Parnas’ gas company to the National Republican Conference. Rudy Giuliani received half a million dollars from Furman paid through that fraud guarantee company or a similar kind of company.

Giuliani’s private consulting proposal struck directly with Lutsensko’s office, and husband-and-wife legal team Joseph E. diGenova and Victoria Toensing never materialized. 

Here’s our conversation about Rudy.