Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko and Deputy Head of the Prosecutor General’s International Legal Cooperation Department Kostiantyn Kulyk must feel like invisible men.
They believe they have solid evidence that ties American Democrats and officials in the Ukrainian government to 2016 election interference and the obstruction of criminal probes, yet no one will pay attention to them.
The Hill’s John Solomon has followed this story closely. He has numerous connections both in Washington and in Kiev and has written frequently on this story, yet it rarely receives mention. No one seems to care about this story. I find that astonishing. (I have posted about this story here, here, here and they have been among my least read posts.)
Solomon says that Lutsenko and Kulyk have been trying for a year to present their evidence to officials at the Sessions/Rosenstein led DOJ, however, not a single official they’ve contacted has shone any interest in pursuing the claims.
The men then decided to travel to the U.S. to speak with new Attorney General William Barr directly about their findings.
However, their attempts to obtain visas have been thwarted repeatedly by U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, a highly partisan Democrat. Kulyk told Solomon, “We were supposed to share this information during a working trip to the United States. However, the [U.S.] ambassador blocked us from obtaining a visa. She didn’t explicitly deny our visa, but also didn’t give it to us.”
A State Department spokesperson refused to comment about what was holding up the visa process saying only that, “Visa records are confidential under U.S. law; therefore, we cannot discuss the details of individual visa cases.”
Solomon explains that the Ukrainian government is well known for their corruption and disinformation campaigns which is one reason why perhaps this has not been taken seriously. But Lusenko and Kulyk have actual evidence to support their allegations which includes the following.
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Sworn statements from two Ukrainian officials admitting that their agency tried to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election in favor of Hillary Clinton. The effort included leaking an alleged ledger showing payments to then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort;
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Contacts between Democratic figures in Washington and Ukrainian officials that involved passing along dirt on Donald Trump;
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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;
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Records 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;
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Correspondence showing members of the State Department and U.S. Embassy in Kiev interfered or applied pressure in criminal cases on Ukrainian soil;
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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.
Kulyk told Solomon they do not want to give their 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.”
Lutsenko told Solomon 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.”
Last week, I posted that Biden boasted that he had threatened to withhold U.S. aid to Ukraine unless they fired prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who was investigating Burma. Shokin was about to question Biden’s son, Hunter, whose company had been receiving large monthly payments from Burisma, a Ukrainian natural gas company. Kulyk said, “We have evidence and witnesses stating that Joe Biden applied pressure on Ukrainian law enforcement to stop the investigation.”
Nellie Ohr, the wife of DOJ official Bruce Ohr, worked on the Steele dossier for Fusion GPS. In her testimony before House lawmakers last summer, she said that “some of Fusion GPS’s research on Trump-Russia ties came from a Ukrainian parliamentarian”.
She needs to be requestioned and pressed for the identity of this parliamentarian.
Several weeks ago, I discussed the activities of long-time DNC consultant, Ukrainian American Alexandra Chalupa, who worked tirelessly to promote the Trump/Russia collusion story. A 2017 Politico article (here) corroborates what Lutsenko and Kulyk are alleging.
According to Solomon, a former top intelligence official who now advises the Trump administration on intelligence policy said, “It looks like there is some evidence emerging that there could have been a proxy war between Russia and Ukraine to secure their preferred American president during the 2016 race.”
Solomon reports that “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.” And he also said there is public-source information, in Ukraine and in the United States, to corroborate Lutsenko and Kulyk’s allegations.
If these allegations can be proven, it would be the first evidence that Democrats colluded with a foreign power to help sway the 2016 election.
It’s not a surprise Marie Yovanovitch, the Democratic ambassador at the helm of the US Embassy in Kiev, would impede Lutsenko and Kulyk’s efforts to obtain visas when she knew what they intended to do once they received them. Nor is it shocking that a Jeff Sessions/Rod Rosenstein DOJ would ignore their accusations.
Hopefully, William Barr will offer them the opportunity to share their information and most importantly, will act on it.
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