Donald Trump consults with his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani (Seth Wenig/AP)


On the eve of Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, more evidence surfaces of the extent of the 10-month campaign by Trump and his lawyer Rudy Giuliani for Ukraine’s investigation to tarnish Presidential candidate Joe Biden and to cover up Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election.

Dozens of pages of notes, text messages, and other records set out the effort of Giuliani and his now-indicted business associate Lev Parnas, launcheed in November 2018, working for Trump.

On Wednesday, the House will vote to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate for Trump’s trial.

Senate Majority Mitch McConnell is refusing to allow witnesses and documents in the trial. The Senate is likely to vote on the issue, possibly next Tuesday, as it adopts the rules for the proceedings.

The documents set out some of the information which McConnell is trying to suppress, having declared that he will not observe the Constitutional obligation to be an “impartial juror” and that he will work closely with the White House.

The material details exchanges between Parnas, indicted in October 2019 over campaign finance violations, and Ukraine Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko about information and disinformation to damage Biden and his son Hunter, then a board member of Ukraine’s largest private gas company Burisma.

The Trump-Giuliani effort spread disinformation to undermine US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, who had pursued anti-corruption initiatives. In March, two months after meetings with Giuliani, Lutsenko complained to Parnas via WhatsApp that Yovanovitch was still in post, threatening the effort against Biden.

“It’s just that if you don’t make a decision about Madam — you are bringing into question all my allegations. Including about B,” Lutsenko wrote.

“Here you can’t even get rid of one [female] fool,” he continued, driving home his discontent with a frowning emoji.

“She’s not a simple fool. Tust me,” Parnas responded. “But she’s not getting away.”

Trump ordered the recall of the Ambassador in late April, just after the election of the new Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

In May, Giuliani sent a letter to Zelenskiy, saying Trump had “knowledge and consent” of his operations.

Two months later, Trump called Zelenskiy seeking the investigations — a conversation that would lead to a formal complaint, by the CIA liasion with the White House over Ukraine, and the House impeachment hearings.

Witnesses?

Democrats leading the impeachment inquiry said the new documents “demonstrate that there is more evidence relevant to the president’s scheme, but they have been concealed by the president himself.”

The emphasized, “There cannot be a full and fair trial in the Senate without the documents that President Trump is refusing to provide to Congress.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is seeking testimony from four witnesses with first-hand knowledge of the Trump-Giuliani campaign, including Trump’s freezing of security assistance to Ukraine until investigations were announced. They are former National Security Advisor John Bolton, White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, Mulvaney’s chief aide Robert Blair, and Michael Duffey, the top political appointee in the Office of Management and Budget.

Bolton said last week that he will testify if summoned. On White House orders, the other three officials refused to comply with House subpoenas, leading to the charge of obstruction of justice against Trump.

McConnell held the White House line on Tuesday, insisting, “All 53 of us [GOP senators] have reached an understanding.”

However, he runs that risk that four of the 53 will defy him, producing a majority insisting on the witnesses. So on Tuesday, the Majority Leader signaled that he might back a proposal by GOP Sen. Ted Cruz in which Republicans could call witnesses sough by Trump, including Hunter Biden.

“When you get to that issue, I cannot imagine that only the witnesses that our Democratic colleagues would want to call would be called,” McConnell told reporters after a lunch meeting with Senate colleagues.

House Spaaker Nancy Pelosi maintained the call yesterday: “The American people will fully understand the Senate’s move to begin the trial without witnesses and documents as a pure political cover-up. Leader McConnell and the President are afraid of more facts coming to light.”