“It was all about Joe Biden, Hunter Biden,” Parnas told Maddow in the interview. “It was never about corruption. It was never — it was strictly about Burisma, which included Hunter Biden and Joe Biden.”
Giuliani and another of the president’s attorneys, Jay Sekulow, did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Wednesday night. The White House and a lawyer for Pence also did not respond. At the end of her program, Maddow said Giuliani had reached out to deny that Parnas ever spoke on behalf of the president, calling him a “sad situation.”
A Justice Department spokeswoman said Parnas’ allegation that Barr was “on the team” pressing for the Biden investigation was “100% false.”
The spokeswoman, Kerri Kupec, included in an email her statement from last September explaining that Barr first learned of Trump’s July conversation with Ukraine’s president several weeks after the call took place and that Trump hadn’t spoken with Barr about anything related to having Ukraine investigate the Bidens.
“The President has not asked the Attorney General to contact Ukraine — on this or any other matter,” Kupec said at the time. “The Attorney General has not communicated with Ukraine — on this or any other subject. Nor has the Attorney General discussed this matter, or anything relating to Ukraine, with Rudy Giuliani.”