Rudy Giuliani on Wednesday slammed the Republicans’ staff counsel during the
impeachment inquiry — charging him with parroting “Democrat lies.”
“Republican lawyer doesn’t do his own research and preparation, and is instead picking up Democrat lies, shame. Allow me to inform him: I have NO financial interests in Ukraine, NONE! I would appreciate his apology,”
he tweeted, referring to Steve Castor.
It was not immediately clear what the former mayor was referring to, though Castor at one point asked EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland if he knew about Giuliani’s previous business dealings in Ukraine.
Giuliani also responded to Sondland’s testimony that the former mayor worked to make sure Ukraine launched probes that would benefit President Trump politically in exchange for a White house meeting by pointing the finger at another witness.
“I came into this at Volker’s request,” Giuliani said in a tweet, referring to former Ukraine envoy Kurt Volker, who had testified the day before.
“Sondland is speculating based on VERY little contact. I never met him and had very few calls with him, mostly with Volker. Volker testified I answered their questions and described them as my opinions, NOT demands. I.E., no quid pro quo!“ he continued in a tweet that he soon deleted and later
reposted.
In a second tweet, he refers to the July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, though he appears to get the date wrong.
“During the July 24 conversation @realDonaldTrump agrees to a meeting with Pres. Zelensky without requiring an investigation, any discussion of military aid or any condition whatsoever. This record shows definitively no quid pro quo, which is the same as no bribery. END OF CASE!” he asserted.
The White House released a rough transcript of the July 25 call, in which Trump asks Zelensky to “do us a favor” after Zelensky brings up military aid, which the president was withholding at the time.
Sondland said in his opening statement to House impeachment investigators that he raised
concerns about a quid pro quo that tied a White House visit for Ukraine’s president to investigations Trump wanted into Joe Biden and his son and the 2016 election.
Sondland also said he came to understand that $391 million in military aid was also linked to the probes into the Bidens and the 2016 election that the president had requested, according to his statement, which was obtained by The Post.
Sondland said the actions he took were on orders from Giuliani, who was following the commander-in-chief’s direction.
White House pushes back on Sondland's 'quid pro quo' claim
“Mr. Giuliani’s requests were a quid pro quo for arranging a White House visit for President Zelensky. Mr. Giuliani demanded that Ukraine make a public statement announcing investigations of the 2016 election/DNC server and Burisma. Mr. Giuliani was expressing the desires of the President of the United States, and we knew that these investigations were important to the President,” he said in the statement, referring to the energy giant that hired Hunter Biden.
“In July and August 2019, we learned that the White House had also suspended security aid to Ukraine. I was adamantly opposed to any suspension of aid, as the Ukrainians needed those funds to fight against Russian aggression,” he said.
Volker testified Wednesday that he thought it was wrong to link the military aid to political investigations.
“I don’t think that raising 2016 elections or Vice President Biden or these things I consider to be conspiracy theories that have been circulated by the Ukrainians” were “things that we should be pursuing as part of our national security strategy with Ukraine,” Volker said.
