Rudy Giuliani, President Donald Trump’s lawyer, right, is seated before President Donald Trump announces Judge Brett Kavanaugh as his nominee for the Supreme Court, in the East Room of the White House, Monday, July 9, 2018, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Yesterday, I posted that Rachel Maddow was teasing an interview with former Giuliani associate Lev Parnas, who is also currently under indictment for unrelated crimes and is desperately searching for a way out.

There was plenty of reason to be skeptical of what he was going to say before the interview. That hasn’t changed now that he’s said it. Here are some of the highlights before we get to the myriad of facts that contradict his accusations.

WATCH: @maddow tells @Lawrence she feels Parnas is coming forward because "he's worried" about going to jail and he wants to make it clear "that he wants to cooperate, he wants to testify with congressional investigators in the impeachment investigation." https://t.co/CKamsWtzqF

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) January 16, 2020

Well, sure. That’s exactly why he’s coming forward and it’s exactly why everything he says, especially the more salacious claims that he provides no evidence of, should be taken with a grain of salt. Instead, Maddow chose to ask leading, orchestrated questions to elicit wild claims while never asking Parnas to actually prove any of them.

Here are the five major things Parnas alleges.

1. Parnas claimed that the president threatened to withhold all aid from Ukraine if it did not publicly announce an investigation into the Bidens, and he delivered that "very harsh message" to Ukrainian officials on behalf of Giuliani and Trump.

— Mitch Kosterman (@MitchKosterman) January 16, 2020

We know that is not true because every single Ukrainian official, even those that would benefit from nailing Trump here, have said that didn’t happen. All the witnesses trotted out by Adam Schiff, who were hostile to the President, said that didn’t happen. The Ukrainian president himself says that didn’t happen. For his part, Parnas provided no evidence of the claim.

3. Parnas also directly connected Trump to the Ukraine pressure campaign to investigate the Bidens, saying the president "knew exactly what was going on."

— Mitch Kosterman (@MitchKosterman) January 16, 2020

It’s possible Giuliani contacted Barr about his “theories” involving Ukraine. So what? Barr obviously didn’t act on them and we know the DOJ dismissed them. Trying to connect Barr here is just playing into the Democrat pipe dream that they can nail the Attorney General in this and it’s completely transparent what Parnas is trying to do.

Parnas’ “direct connection” to Trump isn’t actually a direct connection at all. It’s a guy under indictment trying to get a cooperation deal making a baseless accusation. Like his previous claims, Parnas provides no evidence to back up what he’s saying.

5. … it was never about corruption," Parnas said. "It was never – it was strictly about Burisma, which included Hunter Biden and Joe Biden."

— Mitch Kosterman (@MitchKosterman) January 16, 2020

In regards to VP Pence, we know that’s not true because Jennifer Williams, who was an Adam Schiff witness and who trashed Trump’s Ukraine machinations, said it wasn’t true. It would make no sense for her to lie about Pence while simultaneously being a witness against Trump. Further, we also know that Zelensky never “refused” to announce an investigation into the Bidens at that time. In fact, the accusation to this point by Democrats has been that Sondland had successfully gotten a commitment from Zelensky. So which is it?

The last comment is just more baseless talk trying to connect Trump from Parnas, which he provides no actual evidence of.

In respect to what Parnas is doing, he’s attempting to blame all of his misdeeds and his wider, unrelated corruption on “helping the President.” Everything was now some grand strategy coming from the White House according to him. This is Michael Cohen all over again, but the problem for Parnas is that there’s ample evidence he’s making it up. Fore example, most of Parnas claims revolve around the ouster of Marie Yovanovitch, the former Ambassador to the Ukraine.

He claims his quest to remove her was at the behest of Trump, but that’s not what the facts say.

Maddow went through the entire Lev Parnas interview without asking him about his own case, or why he was so interested in getting rid of Yovanovitch well before Rudy came along. Remarkable journalism.

— Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) January 16, 2020

Here it is for you pic.twitter.com/R56E5O6iiC

— Dana Boos (@DanaBoos3) January 16, 2020

What that document involves t is a previously reported connection between Parnas and a Congressman (no it’s not Devin Nunes) over a fundraising scheme that had nothing to do with Trump. What Parnas wanted at the time, prior to any connections to the White House, was for Yovanavitch to be removed. In fact, it was Parnas who first planted that idea in Trump’s head, not the other way around.

WaPo has reported that Lev Parnas has claimed that in April 2018, he told Trump that Marie Yovanovitch was bad-mouthing him and should be fired. Doesn't square with Parnas' new claim that he did everything at Trump/Giuliani's behest. https://t.co/QtW6Nv3S9g pic.twitter.com/nMLk8t9rqz

— Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) January 16, 2020

Parnas was the mastermind here, pushing stories through Giuliani in order to do his own self-bidding, which was to fulfill his longtime plan of getting Yovanovitch fired. This probably had to do with other corruption Parnas was involved in (and which he’s no under indictment for). He was so concerned with getting this done that he told the President Yovanovitch was bad-mouthing him and undermining his authority, which would obviously give the President pause about her position. In other words, Parnas is now lying by claiming the President (via Giuliani) approached him about Yovanovitch. The exact opposite happened.

That’s further reinforced by the fact that it was Parnas and his partner who paid Giuliani to help them “investigate” things. Had Parnas just been a “bag man” doing the President’s bidding, he wouldn’t be paying people to do what is obviously his own bidding.

Parnas is portraying himself as a victim of Trump and Giuliani, but how to explain that Parnas and his partner paid $500k to Giuliani in 2018? https://t.co/G8hkssXKm5 pic.twitter.com/SnvKNa5lsZ

— Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) January 16, 2020

Yep. And it's why it's hard to believe Parnas when he claims he was doing this all at the behest of Giuliani/Trump. https://t.co/lvwxyJZmAd

— Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) January 16, 2020

Parnas is a conman. He’s going to jail because he’s a conman and it hasn’t nothing to do with Trump. Bad on Giuliani for ever getting involved with such a character, but that doesn’t mean his crazy spin should now be taken as truth. Parnas was pushing his own interests, not taking orders, and there’s plenty of evidence to support that. Meanwhile, he provides no real evidence to connect any of this to Trump, Pence, or Barr. Parnas was a ringleader now trying to pretend he was just a foot soldier.

Lastly, think critically about how this is going down. This a guy desperate to make a deal with the SDNY, yet they’ve refused to entertain his nonsense while he ends up going on Maddow. That should tell you a lot about how credible all of this is. But instead of reporting these things with skepticism, which is highly warranted, the media are now running with his accusations because they feel they’ve been given the green light. There’s a reason none of the legacy outlets did this initial interview and it’s not because Parnas didn’t go to them (we know he spoke to the NYTs). It’s because they know this is mostly bunk (or at least misleading) and needed a third party, Maddow in this case, to get all this out there for them to parrot.

Mission accomplished I guess.