Ukraine Investigates Democrat Election Interference

by

       Phillip Todd

      In September 2019, House Democrats launched a formal impeachment inquiry into President Trump over a whistleblower's accusation that he threatened to withhold aid to Ukraine as a pressure tactic to force the Ukrainian government to investigate allegations that Joe Biden's son Hunter benefited financially from the firing of that same Ukrainian prosecutor. That’s the story out in the public domain but the real reason the president wanted the investigation reopened was to uncover, discretely, what is known throughout Europe - Foreign election interference by Democratic operatives who were in Ukraine and Italy attempting to dig up dirt on Donald Trump in order to help Hillary Clinton win the election.

      Ukrainian law enforcement officials believe they have evidence of wrongdoing by American Democrats and their allies in Kiev, ranging from 2016 election interference to obstructing criminal probes. One focus of Ukrainian investigators, Kostiantyn Kulyk, deputy head of the Prosecutor General’s International Legal Cooperation Department said that money had been spirited unlawfully out of Ukraine and moved to the United States by businessmen friendly to the prior, pro‐Russia regime of Viktor Yanukovych. Ukrainian businessmen "authorized payments for lobbying efforts directed at the U.S. government," he stated. In addition, these payments were made from funds that were acquired during the money‐laundering operation. "We have information that a U.S. company was involved in these payments." That company is tied to one or more prominent Democrats, Ukrainian officials insist. Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko, stated that he has enough evidence particularly involving Biden, his family and money spirited out of Ukraine ‐ to warrant a meeting with U.S. Attorney General William Barr. "I'm looking forward to meeting with the attorney general of the United States in order to start and facilitate our joint investigation regarding the appropriation of another $7 billion in U.S. dollars with Ukrainian legal origin," Lutsenko said.

      In another instance, he said, Ukrainian authorities gathered evidence that money paid to an American Democrat allegedly was hidden by Ukraine's National Anti‐Corruption Bureau ﴾NABU﴿ during the 2016 election under pressure from U.S. officials. "In the course of this investigation, we found that there was a situation during which influence was exerted on the NABU, so that the name of [the American] would not be mentioned," he said. Ukrainian officials say they don't want to hand the evidence to FBI agents working in Ukraine because they believe the bureau has a close relationship with the NABU and the U.S. Embassy. "It is no secret in Ukrainian political circles that the NABU was created with American help and tried to exert influence during the U.S. presidential election," Kulyk stated. Any investigation into any Democrat (Joe and Hunter Biden) would surly expose this truth.

      The left leaning Politico reported in 2017 on evidence of Ukraine's U.S. embassy helping the Clinton campaign to discredit Trump. "A Ukrainian‐American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, top campaign aide Paul Manafort and Russia," the newspaper reported. Ukraine's evidence, if true, would mark the first documented allegation of Democrats receiving assistance from a foreign power in their efforts to help Clinton win the 2016 election.

      There is public‐source information, in Ukraine and in the United States, that gives credence to some of what Ukrainian prosecutors allege. A court in Ukraine formally concluded that law enforcement officials there illegally tried to intervene in the 2016 U.S. election by leaking documents of Manafort's business dealings after he was named Trump's campaign chairman. And a Ukrainian parliamentarian released a purported tape recording of a top Ukrainian law enforcement official bragging that he was responsible for the leak and was trying to help Clinton win. Lutsenko told Hill.TV in an interview aired last week that he has opened a criminal investigation into those allegations. Nellie Ohr, wife of a senior Justice official and a researcher for the Fusion GPS opposition research firm, testified to Congress last year that some of Fusion GPS's research on Trump-Russia ties came from a Ukrainian parliamentarian. The Democratic Party and the Clinton campaign paid Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Trump.

       Why isn’t this front page news? Because the investigator was terminated after refusing to drop the investigation into Burisma and Joe’s son, Hunter Biden. Financial records showing a Ukrainian natural gas company routed more than $3 million to American accounts tied to Hunter Biden, younger son of then‐Vice President Joe Biden, who managed U.S.‐Ukraine relations for the Obama administration. Biden's son served on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company, Burisma Holdings. Records shown that Vice President Biden pressured Ukrainian officials in March 2016 to fire the prosecutor who oversaw an investigation of Burisma Holdings and who planned to interview Hunter Biden about:

• The financial transfers

• Correspondence showing members of the State Department and U.S. Embassy in Kiev interfered or applied pressure in criminal cases on Ukrainian soil.

• Disbursements of as much as $7 billion in Ukrainian funds that prosecutors believe may have been misappropriated or taken out of the country, including to the United States.

• Sworn statements from two Ukrainian officials admitting that their agency tried to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election in favor of Hillary Clinton.

• Contacts between Democratic figures in Washington and Ukrainian officials that involved passing along dirt on Donald Trump.

      So bold were the Democrats that on January 18, 2018 bragged about his meeting with Ukrainian officials. Biden said, “I remember going over, convincing our team, our leaders to— convincing that we should be providing for loan guarantees. And I went over, I guess, the 12th, 13th time to Kiev. And I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. And I had gotten a commitment from Poroshenko and from Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor, and they didn’t. I said, ‘I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars,” Biden boasted of his threats to Ukraine’s leaders. “I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in’ — I think it was about six hours — I looked at them and said, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a bitch — he got fired.”

                                                 Quid Pro Quo

       Kostiantyn Kulyk, deputy head of the Prosecutor General’s International Legal Cooperation Department confirmed Ukraine is investigating that alleged incident: "We have evidence and witnesses stating that Joe Biden applied pressure on Ukrainian law enforcement to stop the investigation."

      The head of Burisma Holdings, Nikolai Zlochevsky, was reportedly indicted in Ukraine this week, and Ukrainian members of parliament are demanding that President Donald J. Trump and president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, investigate. The indictment claims that $7.4 billion was laundered by the “family” of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych through American investment fund Franklin Templeton Investments. They also allege that the investment fund has ties to the U.S. Democratic Party, according to Ukraine news agency. This is big news in Europe but almost non-existent in the U.S. media. We will keep you updated on future events.