Tornado Alley (PROG)

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Trump Twists Facts on Biden and Ukraine

"Trump's "killer line." From Murdoch's News Corp. Australia. "

There is no evidence that Hunter Biden was EVER under investigation by Ukraine
for corruption, yet Trump still makes public claim that Joe illegally pressed
Ukraine to fire the prosecutor who wasn't ever investigating Hunter.

Trump gives no evidence to support any of his claims against the Bidens.

By Eugene Kiely

Posted on September 24, 2019 | Corrected on September 26, 2019

[...]

With links

Michael McFaul, a former U.S. ambassador to Russia under President Barack Obama, on Sept. 20 tweeted that the “Obama administration policy (not just ‘Biden policy’) to push for this Ukrainian general prosecutor to go” was “a shared view in many capitals, multilateral lending institutions, and pro-democratic Ukrainian civil society.”

At the time, however, news organizations were also reporting that Biden’s anti-corruption message in Kyiv was being undermined by an appearance of a conflict of interest.

In May 2014, Hunter Biden became a board member for the Burisma Group, one of the biggest private gas companies in Ukraine. In a June 2014 article, the Associated Press called Biden’s hiring “politically awkward.”

“Hunter Biden’s employment means he will be working as a director and top lawyer for a Ukrainian energy company during the period when his father and others in the Obama administration attempt to influence the policies of Ukraine’s new government, especially on energy issues,” the AP wrote.

In December 2015, the Wall Street Journal reported that Mykola Zlochevsky, who ran Burisma, was under investigation by Ukrainian and British authorities for “alleged criminal wrongdoing,” and it quoted anti-corruption advocates in Ukraine who were concerned that Zlochevsky would be protected from prosecution because of Hunter Biden’s role with Burisma.

“If an investigator sees the son of the vice president of the United States is part of the management of a company … that investigator will be uncomfortable pushing the case forward,” Daria Kaleniuk, executive director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, or AntAC, told the Wall Street Journal.

However, there is no evidence that Hunter Biden was ever under investigation or that his father pressured Ukraine to fire Shokin on his behalf.

In May, Lutsenko, then-Ukraine’s prosecutor general, told Bloomberg News: “Hunter Biden did not violate any Ukrainian laws — at least as of now, we do not see any wrongdoing.”

Lutsenko told Bloomberg that the prosecutor general’s office in 2014 — before Shokin took office — opened a corruption investigation against Zlochevsky and numerous others. He said the probe’s focus was Serghi Kurchenko, who owned a number of gas companies, and a transaction that occurred in November 2013, months before Biden joined Burisma.

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Bloomberg News, May 16: As part of the 5-year-old inquiry, the prosecutor general’s office has been looking at whether Kurchenko’s purchase of an oil storage terminal in southern Ukraine from Zlochevksy in November 2013 helped Kurchenko launder money. Lutsenko said the transaction under scrutiny came months before Hunter Biden joined the Burisma board.

“Biden was definitely not involved,” Lutsenko said. “We do not have any grounds to think that there was any wrongdoing starting from 2014.”
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On Jan. 13, 2017, Burisma announced that “all legal proceedings and pending criminal allegations against its President Mykola Zlochevsky and operating companies of Burisma Group have been closed.” Hunter Biden told the New York Times that he left Burisma’s board earlier this year when his term expired.

On “Fox News Sunday,” host John Roberts challenged Giuliani, Trump’s private attorney, on the facts of the case in a Sept. 22 interview. Roberts noted that “other countries in the West were saying [Shokin] needs to go as well,” not just Joe Biden. Giuliani responded, “What does it matter, if the — if the son is under investigation? He didn’t disclose that.”

But there was no evidence at the time that Hunter Biden was under investigation, and there still isn’t.

Correction, Sept. 26: An earlier version of this story said that Biden’s threat to withhold a $1 billion loan guarantee to Ukraine occurred in March 2016. We could not verify the date when Biden issued his ultimatum, except to say it occurred prior to the prosecutor’s removal. We have updated to reflect that change.

https://www.factcheck.org/2019/09/trump-twists-facts-on-biden-and-ukraine/