by Dan Bongino
In other words, Mueller’s claim notwithstanding, the president has been completely exonerated.
1Politico Staff, “Full Text: James Comey Testimony Transcript on Trump and Russia,” Politico, June 8, 2017, https://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/08/full-text-james-comey-trump-russia-testimony-239295.
2Ibid.
3Ibid.
4Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 2, 73.
5Tim Hains, “President Trump’s Full Interview with Lester Holt: Firing of James Comey,” Real Clear Politics, May 11, 2017, https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/05/11/president_trumps_full_interview_with_lester_holt.html.
618 U.S.C. § 1512, https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1512.
7Will Chamberlain, “Checkmate. How President Trump’s legal team outfoxed Mueller,” Human Events, May 1, 2019, https://humanevents.com/2019/05/01/checkmate/.
8Sadie Gurman and Aruna Viswanatha, “Trump’s Attorney General Pick Criticized an Aspect of Mueller Probe in Memo to Justice Department,” The Wall Street Journal, December 20, 2018, https://www.wsj.com/articles/trumps-attorney-general-pick-criticized-an-aspect-of-mueller-probe-in-memo-to-justice-department-11545275973.
9Ibid.
10William Barr to Rosenstein and Steve Engel, memorandum, “Mueller’s ‘Obstruction Theory,’” https://int.nyt.com/data/documenthelper/549-june-2018-barr-memo-to-doj-mue/b4c05e39318dd2d136b3/optimized/full.pdf#page=.
11Ibid.
12Ibid.
13Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 1, 6–7.
14Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 2, 156–157.
15“Read Attorney General William Barr’s Summary of the Mueller Report,” The New York Times, March 24, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/03/24/us/politics/barr-letter-mueller-report.html.
16Ibid.
17Matthew Kahn, “Document: Robert Mueller’s Letter to Bill Barr,” Lawfare, March 27, 2019, https://www.lawfareblog.com/document-robert-muellers-letter-bill-barr.
18Gaslighting is a popular term for a psychological tactic that occurs when a person tries to achieve power over a victim by denying the victim’s reality. The phrase is based on the classic 1944 movie Gaslight (and the 1938 play it was adapted from). In the silver screen suspense-drama, Charles Boyer plays an abusive husband who tries to make his wife, played by Ingrid Bergman, feel as if she’s gone mad.
19Kimberly A. Strassel, “The Russians and the Dossier,” The Wall Street Journal, April 25, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-russians-and-the-dossier-11556232721.
20Ibid.
21Matthew Kahn, “Document: Robert Mueller’s Letter to Bill Barr,” Lawfare, March 27, 2019, https://www.lawfareblog.com/document-robert-muellers-letter-bill-barr.
22Rosenstein, “Order No. 3915-2017.”
23Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 2, 182.
24Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 2, 8.
25Ibid.
26Ibid.
27Rosenstein, “Order No. 3915-2017.”
28Papadopoulos, Deep State Target, 60.
29Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 1, 83.
30John Sweeney and Innes Bowen, “Joseph Mifsud: The Mystery Professor Behind Trump Russia Inquiry,” BBC, March 21, 2018, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43488581.
31Lee Smith, “The Maltese Phantom of Russiagate,” RealClear Investigations, May 30, 2018, https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2018/05/26/the_maltese_phantom_of_russiagate_.html.
32Andrew McCarthy, “The FBI’s Trump-Russia Investigation Was Formally Opened on False Pretenses,” The National Review, May 6, 2019, https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/05/fbi-trump-russia-investigation-george-papadopoulos.
33Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 1, 193.
34Ibid., 94.
35Paul Sperry (@paulsperry_), “Funny how Mueller cites numerous email exchanges Papadopoulos had in 2016 in the footnotes of his report, yet he cites not a single one of Papadopoulos’ emails with one ‘Azra Turk.’ Hmm. Wonder why. Another example of how Mueller’s probe was really designed to protect the FBI/DOJ,” Twitter, May 2, 2019, 2:29 p.m., https://twitter.com/paulsperry_/status/1124063293017075712.
36Kathleen Kavalec, “Kavalec Memo,” U.S. Department of State, October 11, 2016, https://www.scribd.com/document/409364009/Kavalec-Less-Redacted-Memo.
37Ibid.
38Ibid.
39Kavalec, “State Department Handwritten Notes of Meeting with Christopher,” U.S. Department of State, https://www.scribd.com/document/409363897/State-Department-handwritten-notes-of-meeting-with-Christopher-Steele.
40Ross, “Steele Identified Russian Dossier Sources, Notes Reveal,” The Daily Caller, May 16, 2019, https://dailycaller.com/2019/05/16/steele-dossier-sources-state-department.
41Charles Grassley and Ron Johnson “Letter to William Barr,” April 25, 2019, https://www.grassley.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2019-04-25%20CEG%20RJ%20to%20DOJ%20%28Surveillance%20of%20Trump%20Transition%20Team%29.pdf.
42Ibid.
43“Read the Emails on Donald Trump Jr.’s Russia Meeting,” The New York Times, July 11, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/11/us/politics/donald-trump-jr-email-text.html.
44Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol 1, 185.
45“Interview of Glenn Simpson,” Senate Judiciary Committee, 77, August 27, 2017. https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4345511-Sen-Judiciary-interview-with-Glenn-Simpson.html.
46“Interview of Rinat Akhmetshin,” Senate Judiciary Committee, November 14, 2017, https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Akhmetshin%20Transcript_redacted.pdf.
47Mueller, Vol. 2, 23.
48Erica Orden et al., “Michael Cohen Pleads Guilty, Says He Lied About Trump’s Knowledge of Moscow Project,” CNN, November 29, 2018, https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/29/politics/michael-cohen-guilty-plea-misleading-congress/index.html.
49Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 2, 139.
50Ibid.
51Ibid., 153.
52Ibid., 155.
53Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” vol. 1, 5.
54Congressman Matt Gaetz, “Gaetz Appears on ‘The Story’ with Martha MacCallum to Discuss the Mueller Report,” Youtube video, 4:18, April 22, 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8OA4Zizruw.
55Mueller, “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference,” Vol 1, 198.
56“Read Attorney General William Barr’s Summary of the Mueller Report,” The New York Times, March 24, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/03/24/us/politics/barr-letter-mueller-report.html.
57Ibid.
CHAPTER 8
The Deep State Sails to Ukraine
I want to return to Representative Matt Gaetz’s metaphor of two ships traveling in the same direction. So much of Russiagate involved investigators and Never Trumpers trying to force a connection between events when none truly existed. There was, as Gaetz says, “no meeting of the minds.”1 But let’s strip down that metaphor and use it to pose another question. What about tracking a ship—a giant yacht, really—that was traveling solo and picked up passengers who were al
l pals, who shared a common interest in self-dealing and keeping control of the power they had amassed? And what if, on that journey, they decided to stop at a specific destination where they could arrange deals that would help them arrive at their final destination: in power in Washington, D.C.—what would you call that?
A conspiracy?
The particular luxury yacht cruise I’m talking about concerns a vessel known as the Obama administration, and the stopover is Ukraine, a place awash in dirty money, political infighting, and the shadows of not just Russian influence but American influence as well.
And who was at the heart of this influence, the captain of this cash-happy cruise? It was Joseph Biden, the vice president of the United States and the former colleague of Trump’s election rival, Hillary Clinton.
Okay, let’s sink this ship metaphor and get down to the facts. Documented reporting shows that Joe Biden’s son Hunter had extensive professional and monetary ties to Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian energy company that was under investigation in Ukraine for improper foreign transfers of money. It also shows that U.S. officials pressured Ukrainian diplomats to change prosecutors looking into the case.2
When those entreaties proved fruitless, Daddy Biden stepped in—but not until Hunter’s clients got their money back.
This twisted tale also involves a Clinton Foundation payoff and efforts to set up Paul Manafort. More than anything, it highlights the moral bankruptcy of Joe Biden, a guy whose unctuous, oozing smile masks the identity of a profiteering swamp creature—a guy who engaged in two disgusting big-money arrangements that reek of quid pro quo.
The story starts in February 2014, when Ukraine president Viktor Yanukovych’s decision not to join the European Union detonated a popular uprising in Kiev. Yanukovych, who had long had the backing of Putin, was forced to flee to Russia. Moscow moved troops into the Crimea region of Ukraine, resulting in an immediate international outcry. As the Ukrainian crisis unfolded, Obama designated Biden as his point man in the area. On February 24, 2014, Obama revealed that his vice president had been dispatched to tell the Ukrainian prime minister that the U.S. fully supported the former Soviet nation’s sovereignty.
Three months later, on May 12, 2014, Burisma Holdings, Ukraine’s largest privately owned oil and gas company, issued a press release announcing that Hunter Biden, the vice president’s son, had been appointed to the company’s board of directors. The younger Biden would “be in charge of the Holdings legal unit and provide support for the company among international organizations.”3 Reuters reported that the New York law firm Boies Schiller Flexner LLP, where Hunter Biden worked, would be retained by Burisma. But he was branching out. He had started an investment company called Rosemont Seneca Partners with Christopher Heinz, the stepson of former Secretary of State John Kerry, and a deal was cut for Burisma to pay that company, too. According to John Solomon in The Hill, bank records show that Rosemont received “regular transfers into one of its accounts—usually more than $166,000 a month—from Burisma from spring 2014 through fall 2015, during a period when Vice President Biden was the main U.S. official dealing with Ukraine and its tense relations with Russia.”4
Burisma’s principal owner, and therefore Hunter Biden’s ostensible boss, was Mykola Zlochevsky, who had served as ecology minister under the deposed president Yanukovych. When the Russia-loving Yanukovych got the boot, Zlochevsky soon found himself in a legal hot seat at the center of investigations involving his business.
Now, maybe this is all a coincidence, right?
Maybe the fact that Hunter Biden got two big paydays—for his law firm and his own firm—had nothing to do with being the son of the vice president of the United States, who had just been appointed to oversee relations with Ukraine and protect it from Russian hostility.
And maybe I’m the king of England!
You want to discuss bad optics? You want to discuss suspicious circumstances? You want to discuss deplorable opportunism, favoritism, and the appearance of payoffs? It all played out in public view!
Hunter Biden’s Ukraine deals reek of quid pro quo influencing payments.
In fact, weeks before Biden joined the Burisma board, Britain’s Serious Fraud Office had frozen $23 million of Zlochevsky’s assets in a money-laundering investigation. Oliver Bullough, in his book Moneyland: The Inside Story of the Crooks and Kleptocrats Who Rule the World, confirms that Biden’s gig was widely regarded as being tied to his father’s power-broker position:
The White House insisted that the position was a private matter for Hunter Biden unrelated to his father’s job, but that is not how anyone I spoke to in Ukraine interpreted it. Hunter Biden is an undistinguished corporate lawyer with no previous Ukraine experience. Why then would a Ukrainian tycoon hire him?”5
There is no proof that Mykola Zlochevsky arranged for these deals with a tit-for-tat understanding that Daddy Biden would come to his rescue. But guess what? That’s exactly what Joe Biden did—and he even admitted, on video, to firing the prosecutor in charge of the investigation.
Before we get to Biden’s stunning confession—something he, astonishingly, bragged about—let’s spend a few moments on what was going on in corruption-crazed Ukraine with Zlochevsky, Burisma Holdings, and Kiev prosecutors.
On February 10, 2015, Viktor Shokin was appointed prosecutor general of Ukraine. He quickly came under fire for not targeting corruption, including in cases against former prosecutors who had been accused of corruption. He was also lambasted abroad by the Obama administration and other Western nations “for turning a blind eye to corrupt practices and for defending the interests of a venal and entrenched elite,” according to the New York Times.6
Not that Shokin could have prosecuted Burisma owner Zlochevsky, who had fled to Moscow.
Meanwhile, U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt called the prosecutor and Zlochevsky out in a 2015 speech:
For example, in the case of former Ecology Minister Mykola Zlochevsky, the U.K. authorities had seized 23 million dollars in illicit assets that belonged to the Ukrainian people. Officials at the Prosecutor General’s office were asked by the U.K to send documents supporting the seizure. Instead they sent letters to Zlochevsky’s attorneys attesting that there was no case against him. As a result, the money was freed by the U.K. court and shortly thereafter the money was moved to Cyprus.7
But the case against Shokin is not open and shut. John Solomon, writing for The Hill, contacted Shokin to talk about the case against Zlochevsky and Burisma. He reports:
The general prosecutor’s official file for the Burisma probe—shared with me by senior Ukrainian officials—shows prosecutors identified Hunter Biden, business partner Devon Archer and their firm, Rosemont Seneca, as potential recipients of money.
Shokin told me in written answers to questions that, before he was fired as general prosecutor, he had made “specific plans” for the investigation that “included interrogations and other crime-investigation procedures into all members of the executive board, including Hunter Biden.”
He added: “I would like to emphasize the fact that presumption of innocence is a principle in Ukraine” and that he couldn’t describe the evidence further.8
Shokin never got to finish that case because of—to hear Joe Biden tell it—well, Joe Biden.
On January 23, 2018, Biden appeared at a Council on Foreign Relations event. Asked about Ukraine, he began speaking about his concerns that the government there needed to address corruption. He recalled flying into Kiev for a meeting to discuss a $1 billion loan.
I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. And I had gotten a commitment from [then Ukraine president] Poroshenko and from [then prime minister] Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor. And they didn’t.…
I looked at them and said: I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Wel
l, son of a bitch. (Laughter.) He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.9
Biden conveniently made no mention of his son in his 2018 speech. But Solomon reports that both U.S. and Ukrainian authorities told him that “Biden and his office clearly had to know about the general prosecutor’s probe of Burisma and his son’s role.” These sources stressed that Hunter Biden’s Ukraine gig was widely reported in American media; the U.S. embassy in Kiev, which coordinated Biden’s Ukraine trip, publicly discussed the general prosecutor’s case against Burisma; and “Biden’s office was quoted, on the record, acknowledging Hunter Biden’s role in Burisma in a New York Times article about the general prosecutor’s Burisma case that appeared four months before Biden forced the firing of Shokin.”10