The Wall Street Journal reported that in July, Trump asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at least 8 times to work with his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani to investigate Joe Biden’s son, Hunter.
According to people familiar with the matter:
“He told him that he should work with [Mr. Giuliani] on Biden, and that people in Washington wanted to know” whether allegations were true or not, one of the people said. Mr. Trump didn’t mention a provision of foreign aid to Ukraine on the call, said this person, who didn’t believe Mr. Trump offered the Ukrainian president any quid-pro-quo for his cooperation on any investigation.
Before WSJ published the article, Trump spent time on Twitter and during a joint press conference with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison downplaying the phone conversations.
During the press conference, he claimed his conversations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky were completely “appropriate” and defensively dstated, “It doesn’t matter what I discussed.” At one point, he even referred to them as “beautiful.”
Of course, during his exchange with reporters, Trump did what he does best: spin the conversation to focus on Joe Biden and how the press can “have a bigger downfall” running with Trump’s latest controversy.
According to The Washington Post, White House counsel Pat Cipollone has worked hard “to identify legal obstacles to the sharing of information that could be politically damaging to Trump.”
Former Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden issued a statement suggesting Trump release the transcripts of his phone conversations.
