Could Rudy Giuliani Help Joe Biden Avoid Impeachment?

House Democrats are eyeing an unlikely witness to help them defend President Joe Biden against an impeachment inquiry: Rudy Giuliani, the embattled former lawyer for the embattled former president.

Giuliani last month was sued by Hunter Biden for allegedly tampering with data from his stolen laptop. Now Democrats think Giuliani, who faces felony charges for helping Donald Trump try to overturn the 2020 election results, could hold the ironic key to untwist the GOP’s main allegation against the current president of the United States.

Along with Giuliani, Democrats tasked with defending Biden against the prospect of impeachment are relying on information they've already received from a convicted felon who was once affiliated with the former New York mayor.

At the center of the House Republican investigation is an allegation that Biden, as vice president, participated in a bribery scheme in Ukraine, where his son served on the board of Burisma, an energy company.

The allegation holds that Biden took a bribe to advocate for the firing of Viktor Shokin, a Ukrainian prosecutor who was said to be investigating Burisma. No evidence has surfaced that Biden participated in bribery, and the Trump Justice Department declined to investigate the claims further.

But House Democrats say testimony from Giuliani — who was indicted in Georgia for election interference — and one of his former associates, Lev Parnas — a convicted felon — can be used to contradict those claims. As they see it, Giuliani and Parnas were the central players drumming up a false conspiracy that Biden engaged in misconduct in Ukraine.

“They made the argument that when Joe Biden was vice president, he worked with governments around the world to demand the ouster of the prosecutor general of Ukraine, Mr. Shokin,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., told The Messenger, "who was a notoriously corrupt prosecutor.”

In fact, Giuliani was at one point under federal investigation for lobbying the Ukrainian government to investigate Hunter Biden’s business dealings during the Trump administration. Federal prosecutors said last year that Giuliani would not face charges in the probe.

The Trump 2020 campaign tried to dig up political dirt on Biden, who was then running in a crowded Democratic field. The Trump operatives' work in Ukraine formed the basis of the first impeachment against Trump, with Democrats arguing Trump improperly sought help from Ukraine to damage Biden and boost his reelection chances.

“They concocted a whole story about how that international anti-corruption campaign, supported by all the NGOs and governments around the world, was actually just a ruse so they could force out a prosecutor who was going after Burisma,” Raskin said.

And Giuliani has doubled down on the Burisma conspiracy in the last four months. In an interview with Newsmax in June, Giuliani referenced the bribery allegations, boasting he was the one who brought the claims to the forefront years ago.

“The Bidens took a $10 million bribe from a Ukrainian, Mykola Zlochevsky, which I could’ve told you, and did tell them, three years ago,” Giuliani said in the interview, name dropping Zlochevsky, one of the founders of Burisma. “They followed up on none of the evidence I gave them.”

Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, has elevated the allegation to the front of his party’s impeachment investigation. At least 12 Republican members at the first impeachment hearing focused on Ukraine, Burisma and what they say was a quid-pro-quo.

While Giuliani is unlikely to willingly provide helpful testimony for the Democrats, Parnas — having long since turned on the former New York mayor — seems eager for the spotlight.

Parnas, a Ukrainian-born American businessman who was an associate of Giuliani, wrote to the Oversight Committee in July, telling the panel he wanted to “lay to rest the conspiracy theories about Biden’s supposed corruption in Ukraine once and for all.”

In his 10-page letter, Parnas describes himself as a “key participant” in the Trump camp’s opposition research against Biden in Ukraine. His letter undercuts the GOP's narrative around a Biden bribery conspiracy in Ukraine. Parnas argues he and Giuliani “could find no evidence at all” that Biden was implicated in a bribery scheme in the country.

“With all due respect, Chairman Comer, the narrative you are seeking for this investigation has been proven false many times over, by a wide array of respected sources,” Parnas said in the letter. “There is simply no merit to investigating this matter any further.”

Parnas was convicted of campaign finance charges for his role in eliciting support from Ukrainian leaders during the 2020 election, and sentenced to 20 months in prison.

Democrats at the first official impeachment hearing last week tried to force the House Oversight Committee to subpoena Giuliani and Parnas. Republicans twice voted the subpoena attempt down. But the focus on Giuliani was one of the main bars of Democratic questioning at the hearing, with Rep. Kweisi Mfume, D-Md., holding a “Where is Rudy?” sign.

“We would like to have him come testify to show us, tell us what the derivation was of this conspiracy theory,” Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., a prominent member of the Oversight panel, told The Messenger. 

When asked if he knows why Democrats want Giuliani and Parnas to testify in the impeachment proceedings, Comer told The Messenger, “I have no idea. Why did they pull a fire alarm?” — referencing Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., who pulled a fire alarm during contentious and confusing debate over avoiding a government shutdown.

“I think that what we’ve seen out of the Democrats in the last week … is a lot of stall tactics,” Comer said. “That’s the complaint that I’ve had with this investigation from the beginning. We’ve had an administration that has obstructed and intimidated from day one.”

A Comer spokesperson told The Messenger that GOP impeachment inquiry investigators are focused on “bank records, and bank records don’t lie.”

“Rudy Giuliani is not part of the Committee’s investigation, and Lev Parnas is a convicted felon who lied to federal authorities and is currently in federal custody,” the spokesperson said. “As Democrats continue their amateur stunts, Oversight Republicans will continue to follow the facts and money trail.”

Parnas was released from prison earlier this month, according to federal records, and is under supervised release.