This was most certainly not a good idea.
Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor turned lawyer to President Trump turned linchpin of this whole impeachment situation, is back in Ukraine while the House debates the impeachment of his boss. And not only that, but he's there to talk to multiple former Ukrainian prosecutors who sparked a lot of his problems in the first place, people familiar with his efforts tell The New York Times.
As the House continues its investigation of Trump, Giuliani, and their dealings with Ukraine, Giuliani has been overseas in an effort to "shift the focus to purported wrongdoing by President Trump’s political rivals," the Times writes. On Tuesday, he reportedly met with former Ukrainian prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko in Budapest. Lutsenko is one of the prosecutors accused of ignoring corruption in Ukraine's government and had once been skeptical of the Bidens' dealings in Ukraine before recanting his suspicions. Trump seemed to praise Lutsenko as a "very good prosecutor" during his July 25 call with Ukraine's president, who had dismissed Lutsenko.
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Then on Wednesday, as the House Judiciary Committee began its impeachment hearings with legal experts, Giuliani reportedly headed to Kyiv in Ukraine to meet other ex-prosecutors who targeted the Bidens. They included Viktor Shokin, who was pushed out of his position amid criticism from then-Vice President Joe Biden, and Kostiantyn Kulyk, who led the investigation into Burisma.
All of the information Giuliani gathers is apparently going into "episodes of a documentary series for a conservative television outlet promoting his pro-Trump, anti-impeachment narrative," the Times continues. Read more about Giuliani's inconveniently timed trip at The New York Times.
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