Prosecutor in Trump-Ukraine scandal says he's talked with Rudy Giuliani 'maybe 10 times'

Former Ukrainian prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko might be a bit closer with Rudy Giuliani than President Trump's team might like.

In an interview with NBC News aired Friday, Lutsenko, who left his position late last month, addressed his now-recanted skepticism of the Biden family over the dismissal of previous prosecutor Viktor Shokin. "I don't know any possible violation of Ukrainian law" by either Joe Biden or his son Hunter Biden, Lutsenko said — though it seems Giuliani did push him to find one.

Lutsenko served as Ukraine's top prosecutor after Shokin, who then-Vice President Biden and other western officials accused of letting corruption slide. But Shokin had previously investigated Burisma, an energy company Hunter Biden worked for, leading Lutsenko to speculate Joe Biden's dislike of Shokin had something to do with that. Both Giuliani and Trump seemed to agree, and Giuliani had made investigating the Bidens his near-singular focus for the past year. Lutsenko told NBC News he was not in "regular contact" with Giuliani, but he did speak to him "maybe 10 times" about the Bidens and "other political issues."

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Yet even after Lutsenko reversed his Biden speculation in a May interview with Bloomberg, Trump still seemed to praise him in a July phone call with Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump did not mention the name of the "very good prosecutor" who was looking into Biden, so it could've been Lutsenko or Shokin. A whistleblower complaint about the call specifically said Trump was asking Zelensky to keep Lutsenko on as a prosecutor.

Like he said in the NBC News interview, "from the perspective of Ukrainian legislation," Hunter Biden "did not violate anything," Yutsenko told The Washington Post on Thursday.