Meanwhile, Colludy had other angles he had to work if he were to sway Zelensk to go along with the plot — Rudy had to put enough pressure on enough other Ukrainian Officials, who might not be so compliant as Nazar.
Enter the dynamic conman-duel of Parnas and Fruman … Even Trump’s “bagman” needs his own shady “bagmen” on occasion ...
The Iceberg’s Tip: Ukraine Phone Call and the Months-Long Conspiracy to Violate Federal Campaign Finance Laws
The absurdity of the Justice Department’s refusal to investigate
by Paul Seamus Ryan, justsecurity.org — September 27, 2019
[...]
Parnas and Fruman reportedly “helped arrange meetings in New York between the [Ukraine’s top prosecutor Lutsenko] and Giuliani in January” and in “February, Giuliani and Parnas met privately again with Lutsenko” on the sidelines of a meeting “that included US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Russian President Vladimir Putin.” Then in May, Parnas and Fruman “flew to Paris, where they joined Giuliani in talks with” another Ukrainian prosecutor, Nazar Kholodnytsky.
In April, within hours of President Zelensky’s election, President Trump called him and, according to several sources, urged him to coordinate with Giuliani and “pursue investigations of ‘corruption,’” as revealed this week by the New York Times.
Days after President Trump’s July 25 call with President Zelensky, on or about August 2 according to the whistleblower complaint, Giuliani “met with an aide to the Ukrainian president in Madrid and spelled out two specific cases he believed Ukraine should pursue,” an investigation of Joe Biden and his son, and an investigation of whether Democrats colluded with Ukraine to release information on Paul Manafort during the 2016 election. The complaint notes that Giuliani had “privately reached out to a variety of other Zelenskyy advisers” and that some of these advisors “intended to travel to Washington in mid-August.” The whistleblower complaint goes on to note many of these meetings.
Rudy Giuliani is referenced five times in the rough transcript of the July 25 call, with President Zelensky first bringing up Giuliani and mentioning that one of his assistants “spoke with Mr. Giuliani recently” and that he hoped “very much that Mr. Giuliani will be able to travel to Ukraine and we will meet once he comes to Ukraine.” President Trump then noted three times that he would have Giuliani call President Zelensky, saying: “If you could speak to him, that would be great.”
WHAT in the world was that “sidelines meeting” with Pompeo and Putin about? The mind reels, at the elbow-rubbing taking place there. Probably an Oligarch’s “bagmen” meetup going on in the background somewhere. With Parnas making the introductions.
With all this offline “diplomacy” going on overseas, no wonder a dedicated career Government Official in the US (or two), had their spidey-sense alarm bells go off. Something was not right here.
From the Whistle-blower Compliant: [ justsecurity.org ]
[pg 4]
I also learned from multiple U.S. officials that, on or about 2 August, Mr. Giuliani reportedly traveled to Madrid to meet with one of President Zelenskyy' s advisers, Andriy Yermak. The U.S. officials characterized this meeting, which was not reported publicly at the time, as a "direct follow-up" to the President's call with Mr. Zelenskyy about the "cases" they had discussed.
• Separately, multiple U.S. officials told me that Mr. Giuliani had reportedly privately reached out to a variety of other Zelenskyy advisers, including Chief of Staff Andriy Bohdan and Acting Chairman of the Security Service of Ukraine Ivan Bakanov.[4]
• I do not know whether those officials met or spoke with Mr. Giuliani, but I was told separately — by multiple U.S. officials that Mr. Yermak and lvlr. Bakanov intended to travel to Washington in mid-August.
On 9 August, the President told reporters: "I think [President Zelenskyy] is going to make a deal with President Putin, and he will be invited to the White House. And we look forward to seeing him. He's already been invited to the White House, and he wants to come. And I think he will. He's a very reasonable guy. He wants to see peace in Ukraine, and I think he will be coming very soon, actually."
And there’s this other guy, the head honcho, you know Parnas and Fruman’s Oligarch-employer. And by proxy, most likely Rudy Collludy’s gravy-train ticket too …
This deep-pockets Oligarch is just aching to make some court proceeding in the US — just disappear (the Quo part of the story):
[...]
Firtash has been fighting a U.S. extradition request for five years, calling it politically motivated, and has begun to boost allegations against the Bidens as part of that campaign, hitching himself to the Trump train. He’s spent years wrapped up in his legal battles while stuck in the Austrian capital of Vienna, where he was located at the time the indictment dropped.
Bloomberg reported on Friday that Firtash had paid around $1 million for a dirt-digging project on the Bidens. American lawyers he hired with ties to Trumpworld reportedly hoped to transfer the information to Giuliani in exchange for the Justice Department dropping the case.
Firtash’s activities would appear to add another element to Trump’s pressure campaign on Ukraine: an indicted oligarch bankrolled at least part of the efforts to manufacture dirt on the Bidens, as Trump himself urged Ukraine’s president to investigate the same allegations.
And surprise, surprise:
It looks like Rudy is trying to get the case against Firtash dropped with the DOJ, apparently in exchange for the fake Documents he (his Lawyers) provided Rudy, on one of his “special envoy” ventures.
Can anyone spell Quid pro Quo, yet ...
Allison Quinn, News Editor, DailyBeast — Oct 18, 2019
Rudy Giuliani met with top Justice Department officials recently on behalf of a client in a foreign bribery case that the Trump attorney called “very, very sensitive,” The New York Times reports. The meeting was reportedly held just days before Giuliani himself came under scrutiny by federal prosecutors for possible lobbying violations.
[...]
Like I said, Firtash team delivered fake Documents (Quid) to “close allies of Trump” — presumably to “Bagman” Giuiliani — since he was in the neighborhood.
Exclusive: How a Ukrainian Oligarch Wanted by U.S. Authorities Helped Giuliani Attack Biden
by Simon Shuster, Time — Oct 15, 2019
[...]
In their effort to discredit President Donald Trump’s perceived enemies, close allies of the President have received key documents and information from a Ukrainian oligarch wanted in the U.S. on corruption charges, according to five people directly involved in this effort and two other people familiar with it.
The information came from the legal team of Dmitry Firtash, a wealthy industrialist with assets across Europe, who has spent the last five years in Vienna fighting extradition to the U.S. on bribery and racketeering charges. The U.S. Department of Justice said in 2017 he was among the “upper echelon associates of Russian organized crime”—something Firtash vigorously denies, along with all charges against him.
And of course, there’s this small matter of Giuliani’s Half Million dollar pay-day from Parnas and Fruman — the same dual, that Firtash had just paid 1 Million dollars, to dig up dirt on the Bidens.
These wiseguys afterall, are not doing all this illegal stuff, “out of the goodness of their hearts” ...
Exclusive: Trump lawyer Giuliani was paid $500,000 to consult on indicted associate's firm
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, was paid $500,000 for work he did for a company co-founded by the Ukrainian-American businessman arrested last week on campaign finance charges, Giuliani told Reuters on Monday.
[...]
Giuliani said Parnas’ company, Boca Raton-based Fraud Guarantee, whose website says it aims to help clients “reduce and mitigate fraud”, engaged Giuliani Partners, a management and security consulting firm, around August 2018. Giuliani said he was hired to consult on Fraud Guarantee’s technologies and provide legal advice on regulatory issues.
[...]
So when all is said and done, in this sad Rudy Colludy’s story — Rudy will probably be ‘singing like a bird’ — that is if he doesn’t want to be ‘sleeping with the fishes’.
THAT — or rotting away in Rikers doing a 10-20 stint. At his age, he may want to seriously re-consider his options.
That’s some seriously hard time for a former prosecutor, Rudy. Cut a deal, before some else cuts one for you (against you) Dude.
Trump just isn’t worth it. Just ask Cohen (on your next trip to visit Manafort).
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