Vox: Rudy Giuliani's fixer, Lev Parnas, turned over documents. They're very ugly.

https://www.vox.com/2020/1/14/21066219/impeachment-lev-parnas-evidence-ambassador

The House Intelligence Committee quietly released a new batch of impeachment inquiry evidence Tuesday evening: documents provided by Rudy Giuliani’s fixer for Ukraine, Lev Parnas.

And boy, are they ugly.

The documents, which include Parnas’s handwritten notes, copies of text messages, and other correspondence, reveal some new information — including that Giuliani claimed to be acting with President Trump’s “knowledge and consent” in his communications with the Ukrainian government.

One handwritten note of Parnas’s, scribbled on Ritz-Carlton hotel stationery, clearly states his main objective in his dealings with Ukraine: to get Ukraine’s president to announce “the Biden case will be investigated.”

The documents also provide the strongest evidence yet that there was a corrupt understanding involving prosecutor general Yuriy Lutsenko (a Ukrainian official in the previous regime). Lutsenko offered to investigate Burisma and the Bidens — and, in exchange, he insisted that US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, whom he had clashed with, be fired. He made this quid pro quo clear in his messages to Parnas.

But most disturbing of all is a set of messages Parnas received from a person named Robert F. Hyde, a Republican congressional candidate. Hyde texted Parnas that he had people tracking Yovanovitch’s movements closely in Ukraine. He claimed he could tell whether her phone and computer were off. And he wrote: “If you want her out they need to make contact with security forces.” (It is not yet clear whether these claims by Hyde were true.)



The note reads: “get Zalensky to Annonce that the Biden case will be Investigated.” That is, get Ukraine’s new president to announce an investigation of the Bidens.

This is significant because several Trump administration officials, such as Ambassador to the EU Gordon Sondland, have long claimed they only discussed the possibility of investigating Burisma, the natural gas company whose board Hunter Biden sat on.

But here is Parnas openly referring wanting Ukraine to investigate “the Biden case,” just as Trump said he wanted on his infamous July 25 phone call with Zelensky. The circumstances in which the note was written — notably, the date and who Parnas may have been talking to while he scribbled the note — are unclear.

An understanding tying Yovanovitch’s firing to Biden dirt
Another batch of the evidence pertains to communications Parnas had with Yuriy Lutsenko, who served as Ukraine’s prosecutor general under Zelensky’s predecessor.

To recap: A prologue, of sorts, to the impeachment saga occurred in March 2019 when Giuliani, Parnas, and various corrupt Ukrainians launched a smear campaign against the US ambassador in Kyiv, Marie Yovanovitch.

These (translated) messages suggest that Lutsenko was demanding Yovanovitch’s firing — and that he communicated to Parnas that, in return, he would make allegations about “B.”



Above, Lutsenko tells Parnas that “if you don’t make a decision about Madam— you are bringing into question all my allegations. Including about B.” (“Madam” clearly means Yovanovitch, and “B” is shorthand for either Burisma or Biden, as later messages make clear.)

Lutsenko soon writes about “testimony about transfers to B,” and then about “copies of payments from Burisma to Seneca.” (Rosemont Seneca Partners is the consulting firm Hunter Biden co-founded.) He also complains how Parnas can’t get rid of someone female, to which Parnas responds, “She’s not getting away.”



A Parnas associate claimed to be surveilling Yovanovitch — and asked if he wanted “her out”
Finally, and most disturbingly, is a set of messages Parnas exchanged with a person named Robert F. Hyde, a controversial Republican congressional candidate in Connecticut who has spent time at Mar-a-Lago and Trump’s DC hotel.

Parnas sent Hyde tweets and articles from prominent conservative media personalities — such as Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity, and Dan Bongino — disparaging Yovanovitch and suggesting she was disloyal. “Can’t believe Trumo [Trump] hasn’t fired this bitch,” Hyde responded. “I’ll get right in that.”