Rudy Giuliani pressured Ukraine govt to probe Joe Biden in 2019, new audio leak reveals

In new audio of a July 2019 call, former US President Donald Trump’s longtime adviser Rudi Giuliani can be heard ‘relentlessly’ pressurising the Ukrainian government to investigate the baseless claims regarding then-presidential candidate Joe Biden. The audio of the phone call between Giuliani, US diplomat Kurt Volker, and Andriy Yermak, a senior adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was obtained by CNN which has not been heard by the public previously. Reportedly, the Giuliani call took place before Trump’s ‘infamous’ call with Zelensky. Both conversations involving Trump and his senior adviser later became the core of his first impeachment where the House accused him of involving a foreign government for his presidential campaign as he sought reelection.

As per the report, Giuliani, Volker and Yermak spoke for nearly 40 minutes with Trump’s adviser repeatedly telling his Ukrainian counterpart that Zelensky should publicly announce investigations into possible corruption by now US President Joe Biden in the foreign country along with the other claims of Ukraine meddling in 2016 presidential elections against Trump. Both claims are separate and proved false. As per CNN, the new audio of the call that took place in 2019 evidently demonstrates Giuliani’s efforts in convincing the Ukrainian government to help Trump.

"All we need from the President [Zelensky] is to say, I'm gonna put an honest prosecutor in charge, he's gonna investigate and dig up the evidence, that presently exists and is there any other evidence about involvement of the 2016 election, and then the Biden thing has to be run out," Giuliani said, according to the audio quoted by the media outlet. "... Somebody in Ukraine's gotta take that seriously."

Ongoing investigation into Giuliani, Ukraine dealings

The call was obtained by the media publication as there is an already ongoing investigation into Giuliani and his Ukraine dealings which would also look into if Trump’s senior adviser violated the US lobbying laws while coordinating with ex-officials who provided him information regarding Bidens that could help in favour of former US President’s reelection. 

In late April, the FBI even raided Giuliani’s home and office but reportedly it is unclear if his call with Yermak is part of the investigation or not. Previously, a partial transcript of the Giuliani-Yermak call was published by BuzzFeed News in April while Time magazine was the first to publish some crucial excerpts from the same telephonic conversation in February. In all the revelations Giuliani can be heard pressing repeatedly for the investigations in Ukraine, as per the audio recording. 

IMAGE: AP