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WASHINGTON — A key determine in former President Donald Trump’s scheme to strain Ukraine into investigating Joe Biden warned Republicans on Tuesday that they’ll by no means discover the dust they’re on the lookout for.
In a 10-page letter to Home Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) obtained by HuffPost, former Trump ally Lev Parnas outlined his personal efforts to hunt destructive details about Biden and his son Hunter Biden from a number of Ukrainian sources in 2019.
“All through all these months of labor, the intensive campaigns and networking performed by Trump allies and [Rudy] Giuliani associates, together with the enormously thorough interviews and assignments that I undertook, there has by no means been any proof that Hunter or Joe Biden dedicated any crimes associated to Ukrainian politics,” Parnas wrote.
Parnas is a Ukrainian American businessman and former affiliate of Giuliani, who acted as Trump’s private legal professional throughout his time period within the White Home. Parnas was sentenced to jail in 2022 for a number of offenses, together with marketing campaign finance and wire fraud violations, and is now beneath home arrest.
In 2019, Trump pressured Ukraine to announce an investigation into Joe Biden, whom he rightly nervous could be his strongest Democratic opponent within the subsequent 12 months’s presidential election. Biden’s son had served on the board of the Ukrainian fuel firm Burisma in 2016 when Biden, as vice chairman, pushed for the ouster of a Ukrainian prosecutor.
Democrats impeached Trump for abusing the ability of his workplace to get dust on a political opponent. Through the proceedings, State Division officers testified that ousting the prosecutor mirrored the pursuits of the U.S. authorities, not Biden personally, and that the prosecutor was corrupt and dishonest.
However Republicans have by no means accepted the international coverage institution’s consensus. And as a part of a sprawling investigation into the Biden household, Comer’s committee this 12 months has pursued an unconfirmed rumor that Biden sought a $5 million bribe from a Burisma government in alternate for an unspecified official act.
Parnas advised HuffPost earlier this month that he and Giuliani had tried to get the identical type of dust out of Ukraine for a 12 months and a half, “and we may by no means get it as a result of it was clearly not true.” On Tuesday, Parnas declined to remark additional, referring a question to his lawyer.
In his letter, Parnas described his efforts on behalf of Giuliani and provided to testify beneath oath.
“Giuliani tasked me with touring to Ukraine all through March, April, and Might 2019 to interview totally different individuals who had promised to provide us data and proof together with information of bribes, financial institution information, and incriminating tapes,” Parnas wrote. “But each time I went on these journeys and performed these interviews, I got here up with nothing.”
Parnas additionally repeated his earlier assertion that he and Giuliani had been advised within the spring of 2019 a couple of laptop computer belonging to Hunter Biden, lengthy earlier than materials from the laptop computer got here to huge consideration forward of the 2020 election.
The letter urged Comer to “abandon this effort to analyze the Bidens” — a extremely unlikely end result — calling it “nothing greater than a wild goose chase.” Along with alleged Ukrainian bribes, Comer has focused Hunter Biden’s work for international nationals from Romania and China.
Comer’s committee is about to listen to testimony Wednesday from an IRS agent who mentioned the Justice Division slow-walked an investigation into Hunter Biden’s alleged failure to pay taxes. The youthful Biden plans to plead responsible to misdemeanor tax costs in courtroom subsequent week.
Requested about Parnas’ letter Tuesday, Comer mentioned, “I don’t assume that that’s credible.”
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