An associate of Rudy Giuliani reportedly bragged about being on a “secret mission” to pressure Ukraine to launch investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden.
During the White House’s annual Hanukkah party last year, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman slipped out of a large reception room full of hundreds of Trump donors to have a private meeting with the president and Giuliani, his personal attorney, according to CNN. After the meeting, Parnas told two confidants that “the big guy,” meaning Trump, tasked him with running a “secret mission” to get Ukraine to investigate the Bidens.
According to the confidants, Parnas bragged that he was on a “James Bond mission,” believing he had been given a special assignment from Trump. The mission included Giuliani issuing the president’s directives while Parnas worked as an investigator with Fruman.
“Parnas viewed the assignment as a great crusade,” one of the people in whom he confided said. “He believed he was doing the right thing for Trump.”
The White House has not yet commented on the report, but Giuliani’s lawyer denied allegations of both the private meeting and the special assignment, saying Parnas is “no Sean Connery” and that he suffers from “delusions of grandeur.”
A lawyer for Parnas, however, told CNN, “Mr. Parnas at all times believed that he was acting only on behalf of the president, as directed by his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and never on behalf of any Ukrainian officials.”
The report comes after Parnas’s lawyer told the New York Times on Sunday that his client met with a representative of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s government in May and warned the country that the White House would freeze military aid unless it announced an investigation into 2020 Democratic front-runner Biden. Giuliani, however, disputed that claim as well.
Parnas, who was arrested with Fruman on campaign finance-related charges last month, has signaled that he is ready to cooperate with the impeachment proceedings into the president. The pair also reportedly pressured the previous president of Ukraine to investigate Biden.
House Democrats launched an impeachment process last month over Trump’s July 25 phone call with Zelensky, during which he urged the foreign leader to investigate the Bidens for corruption, as well as debunked allegations that the country interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Lawmakers are attempting to determine if the military aid or state meetings were conditioned on the investigations.
