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Let's talk about Joe Biden getting Viktor Shokin fired

Are we clear on the Shokin firig

  • Yes

    Votes: 5 35.7%
  • Yep

    Votes: 3 21.4%
  • Uh huh

    Votes: 1 7.1%
  • Si Senor

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Da Tovarisch

    Votes: 4 28.6%
  • I think we need to discuss this further.

    Votes: 1 7.1%

  • Total voters
    14
  • Poll closed .

Ana the Ist

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Because the fired guy was not investigating corruption.

Sure sure....I bet Biden had inside knowledge of his investigation into corruption from his talks with Burisma. That's probably what's on the secret tapes that the paid informant claimed to have, right? The odd thing is that the new regime in the Ukraine seemed to want to keep him on the job.....

I guess the simple question is what else did the US do to stamp out corruption in Ukraine other than get the guy who was investigating Burisma for corruption fired?

I expect there had better be a laundry list of efforts after they removed the guy investigating corruption. Do you think perhaps that's why Hunter was writing off prostitutes as a work expense? Do you think he was deep undercover, pumping them for information on corruption in the Ukraine?

Thus isn't just a bad cover story that the Democrats slapped together last minute to cover Biden's corruption....it's also extremely dumb.

"We wanted to end corruption in the Ukraine so we sent Biden over there to have them fire the guy investigating corruption."

Do you know what we typically do when we suspect that the government or corporations of a nation are deeply corrupt and therefore a liability for aid and investment? We send a UN delegation to investigate corruption with the authority to make arrests and put people on trial. We've removed 3 of the last 4 Guatemalan Presidents that way. That's just one of those little facts I know that allow me to see through this sorry excuse for a cover story....but even if I didn't know it, I thankfully still have some common sense.
 
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NxNW

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I guess the simple question is what else did the US do to stamp out corruption in Ukraine other than get the guy who was investigating Burisma for corruption fired?
Try to keep up here: As pointed out earlier, The truth, Kaleniuk said, is that Shokin was forced from office at Biden’s urging because he had failed to conduct thorough investigations of corruption, and had stifled efforts to investigate embezzlement and misconduct by public officials following the 2014 uprising.
I expect there had better be a laundry list of efforts after they removed the guy investigating corruption. Do you think perhaps that's why Hunter was writing off prostitutes as a work expense? Do you think he was deep undercover, pumping them for information on corruption in the Ukraine?
I have to admit, that double entendre was pretty funny, considering Trump was creating shell corporations and commiting fraud to pay his prostitutes and is now under indictment for it.
"We wanted to end corruption in the Ukraine so we sent Biden over there to have them fire the guy investigating corruption."
As pointed out earlier, time and time again: The truth, Kaleniuk said, is that Shokin was forced from office at Biden’s urging because he had failed to conduct thorough investigations of corruption, and had stifled efforts to investigate embezzlement and misconduct by public officials following the 2014 uprising.
Do you know what we typically do when we suspect that the government or corporations of a nation are deeply corrupt and therefore a liability for aid and investment? We send a UN delegation to investigate corruption with the authority to make arrests and put people on trial. We've removed 3 of the last 4 Guatemalan Presidents that way. That's just one of those little facts I know that allow me to see through this sorry excuse for a cover story....but even if I didn't know it, I thankfully still have some common sense.
I eagerly await proof of the bolded claim, since the above discussion refers to an individual and not the entire government.
 
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USincognito

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In case some readers are unsure about the facts, all the entities discussed throughout this thread wanted Shokin gone because he WASN'T investigating anyone.

European and US officials pressed Ukraine to sack Viktor Shokin, the country’s former prosecutor-general, months before Joe Biden, the former US vice-president, personally intervened to force his removal, people involved in the talks said. Mr Biden did not act unilaterally nor did he instigate the push against Mr Shokin, despite suggestions to the contrary by supporters of US president Donald Trump, people familiar with the matter said.

EU diplomats working on Ukraine at the time have, however, told the FT that they were looking for ways to persuade Kiev to remove Mr Shokin well before Mr Biden entered the picture. The push for Mr Shokin’s removal was part of an international effort to bolster Ukraine’s institutions following Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the armed conflict in the eastern part of the country. “

All of us were really pushing [former Ukrainian president Petro] Poroshenko that he needs to do something, because the prosecutor was not following any of the corruption issues. He was really bad news,” said an EU diplomat involved in the discussions. “It was Biden who finally came in [and triggered it]. Biden was the most vocal, as the US usually is. But we were all literally complaining about the prosecutor.”
 
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Truth7t7

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Try to keep up here: As pointed out earlier, The truth, Kaleniuk said, is that Shokin was forced from office at Biden’s urging because he had failed to conduct thorough investigations of corruption, and had stifled efforts to investigate embezzlement and misconduct by public officials following the 2014 uprising.

I have to admit, that double entendre was pretty funny, considering Trump was creating shell corporations and commiting fraud to pay his prostitutes and is now under indictment for it.

As pointed out earlier, time and time again: The truth, Kaleniuk said, is that Shokin was forced from office at Biden’s urging because he had failed to conduct thorough investigations of corruption, and had stifled efforts to investigate embezzlement and misconduct by public officials following the 2014 uprising.

I eagerly await proof of the bolded claim, since the above discussion refers to an individual and not the entire government.
Shokin was investigating "Burisma" for criminal corruption and Hunter Biden was on the board of directors, congressional investigators have the transcript of the call between Joe and Hunter where Hunter asked his dad Joe to stop Shokin and the investigation of "Burisma" pay to play, quid pro quo
 
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USincognito

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Shokin was investigating "Burisma" for criminal corruption and Hunter Biden was on the board of directors,
I can debunk of this all day.

>> President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer is raising the specter that Joe Biden intervened in Ukrainian politics to help his son’s business. But if that was Biden’s aim, he was more than a year late, based on a timeline laid out by a former Ukrainian official and in Ukrainian documents.

>> But what has received less attention is that at the time Biden made his ultimatum, the probe into the company -- Burisma Holdings, owned by Mykola Zlochevsky -- had been long dormant, according to the former official, Vitaliy Kasko. “There was no pressure from anyone from the U.S. to close cases against Zlochevsky,” Kasko said in an interview last week. “It was shelved by Ukrainian prosecutors in 2014 and through 2015.”

>> The case against Zlochevsky and his Burisma Holdings was assigned to Shokin, then a deputy prosecutor. But Shokin and others weren’t pursuing it, according to the internal reports from the Ukrainian prosecutor’s office reviewed by Bloomberg.

>> Shokin became prosecutor general in February 2015. Over the next year, the U.S. and the International Monetary Fund criticized officials for not doing enough to fight corruption in Ukraine. Shokin took no action to pursue cases against Zlochevsky throughout 2015, said Kasko, who was Shokin’s deputy overseeing international cooperation and helping in asset-recovery investigations. Kasko said he had urged Shokin to pursue the investigations.

congressional investigators have the transcript of the call between Joe and Hunter where Hunter asked his dad Joe to stop Shokin and the investigation of "Burisma" pay to play, quid pro quo
No such transcript exists. Stop with the mendacity and why are you putting Burisma in scare quotes?
 
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Truth7t7

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I can debunk of this all day.

>> President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer is raising the specter that Joe Biden intervened in Ukrainian politics to help his son’s business. But if that was Biden’s aim, he was more than a year late, based on a timeline laid out by a former Ukrainian official and in Ukrainian documents.

>> But what has received less attention is that at the time Biden made his ultimatum, the probe into the company -- Burisma Holdings, owned by Mykola Zlochevsky -- had been long dormant, according to the former official, Vitaliy Kasko. “There was no pressure from anyone from the U.S. to close cases against Zlochevsky,” Kasko said in an interview last week. “It was shelved by Ukrainian prosecutors in 2014 and through 2015.”

>> The case against Zlochevsky and his Burisma Holdings was assigned to Shokin, then a deputy prosecutor. But Shokin and others weren’t pursuing it, according to the internal reports from the Ukrainian prosecutor’s office reviewed by Bloomberg.

>> Shokin became prosecutor general in February 2015. Over the next year, the U.S. and the International Monetary Fund criticized officials for not doing enough to fight corruption in Ukraine. Shokin took no action to pursue cases against Zlochevsky throughout 2015, said Kasko, who was Shokin’s deputy overseeing international cooperation and helping in asset-recovery investigations. Kasko said he had urged Shokin to pursue the investigations.


No such transcript exists. Stop with the mendacity and why are you putting Burisma in scare quotes?

America Insider​

Here Are The Phone Calls that Joe Biden Made With Hunter and Devon Archer​

Story by Taylor Gold • 3d

Hunter Biden’s longtime friend and business partner, Devon Archer, arrived with a grin for his much-anticipated testimony as one of the star witnesses to the alleged corruption.

Archer confirmed that Hunter put his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, on speakerphone while meeting with business partners at least 20 times. “Archer described how Joe Biden was put on the phone to sell ‘the brand,'” Archer explained in his damning testimony.

Who were these calls with? The phone calls allegedly occurred with associates in China, Ukraine, and Russia. Archer testified that Hunter was required to get help from then-Vice President Joe Biden “regarding the Ukrainina prosecutor Viktor Shokin.”

Shokin was investigating Burisma on corruption charges. Biden later bragged about having the prosecutor fired. An FBI informant says Burisma CEO Zlochevsky paid off the Bidens with $10,000,000 for this service. Despite having no personal or business ties to Ukraine, and no experience in the energy sector, Hunter and Archer were placed on the board of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma. They received millions in this position.
 
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USincognito

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America Insider​

Here Are The Phone Calls that Joe Biden Made With Hunter and Devon Archer​

Story by Taylor Gold • 3d

Hunter Biden’s longtime friend and business partner, Devon Archer, arrived with a grin for his much-anticipated testimony as one of the star witnesses to the alleged corruption.

Archer confirmed that Hunter put his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, on speakerphone while meeting with business partners at least 20 times. “Archer described how Joe Biden was put on the phone to sell ‘the brand,'” Archer explained in his damning testimony.
This isn't a transcript. You claimed there was a transcript of the call.
Who were these calls with? The phone calls allegedly occurred with associates in China, Ukraine, and Russia. Archer testified that Hunter was required to get help from then-Vice President Joe Biden “regarding the Ukrainina prosecutor Viktor Shokin.”
If there's a supposed transcript of the call, why is the author of this opinion piece asking rhetorical questions?
From the transcript of Archer's testimony:

Q And the same minority report noted that State Department officials interviewed in this investigation explained that Shokin did not pursue corruption investigations against Burisma's owner, effectively shielding the owner from prosecution, and that removing Shokin made an investigation into Burisma more, not less, likely. It sounds like that's in accordance with --
A Uh-huh.
Q -- your general understanding of what was going on at the time.
A But quickly after, where all of his assets were seized, Zlochevsky, and he had to leave Ukraine.
Q But so do you have any basis to believe that Vice President Biden's call for Shokin's removal was driven by anything other than the U.S. Government's anticorruption policy in Ukraine?
A Yeah, I have no -- I have no other -- I have no proof or thought that that -- that he fired him for that reason.
Q You have no reason to believe otherwise.
A I have no reason to believe.
Shokin was investigating Burisma on corruption charges. Biden later bragged about having the prosecutor fired.
I can keep debunking this all day.
>> It's true that Joe Biden leveraged $1 billion in aid to persuade Ukraine to oust its top prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, in March 2016. But it wasn't because Shokin was investigating Burisma. It was because Shokin wasn't pursuing corruption among the country's politicians.

Mike Carpenter, who served as a foreign policy adviser to the then-vice president, told USA TODAY that Shokin "never went after any corrupt individuals at all" and "never prosecuted any high-profile cases of corruption." <<
 
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Ana the Ist

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Try to keep up here: As pointed out earlier, The truth, Kaleniuk said, is that Shokin was forced from office at Biden’s urging because he had failed to conduct thorough investigations of corruption, and had stifled efforts to investigate embezzlement and misconduct by public officials following the 2014 uprising.


Public officials take bribes so common citizens can access public services....like natural gas.

Shokin wasn't investigating corruption? Then why did he try to arrest members of Burisma's board and seize their assets? You know....amongst the many people he was investigating for corruption for the 1 year he was prosecutor? Why did the new regime want to keep him if he wasn't investigating corruption?

Here's Biden telling Poroshenko to remove Shokin, and Poroshenko saying that Shokin had done nothing wrong.


We've all seen the clip where Biden brags about getting rid of Shokin....and what's the evidence Shokin was failing to prosecute corruption? There is none...Shokin was ready to make arrests, charge individuals, and seize assets. Amazing how fast some of these prosecutors can move when they aren't politically motivated, huh?


I have to admit, that double entendre was pretty funny, considering Trump was creating shell corporations and commiting fraud to pay his prostitutes and is now under indictment for it.

This is a thread about Biden.

Did you watch the whole first clip where corruption is still rampant in the Ukraine as of 2022? It's as if the Democratic Party just lied right to your face about "fighting corruption". All they did was protect it.



As pointed out earlier, time and time again: The truth, Kaleniuk said, is that Shokin was forced from office at Biden’s urging because he had failed to conduct thorough investigations of corruption, and had stifled efforts to investigate embezzlement and misconduct by public officials following the 2014 uprising.

We get it...you're an echo chamber for the party narrative. Who needs truth when the big guy just tells you what to believe?

Not doing enough to fight corruption you say?


Shokin’s office won a court order to seize Zlochevsky’s property on Feb. 2, 2016, the Kyiv Post reported at the time. Shokin was fired on March 29, purportedly due to his own corruption.


I eagerly await proof of the bolded claim, since the above discussion refers to an individual and not the entire government.

Oh I see...they wanted to remove Shokin for not fighting corruption...not because they cared about corruption....they just didn't like Shokin? Is that the story?

Or Joe didn't want him fighting corruption? Because there's clear evidence that Shokin was investigating Burisma....he won court orders to seize property and assets....and in less than a year lol. Perhaps Bragg can hire him and get his case moving again.

Let's be clear, both the Obama Administration and Biden have done zip to fight corruption of any sort in the Ukraine. They simply removed a prosecutor who was fighting corruption....at the place where Hunter "worked" and got paid millions for being able to call his father.
 
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KCfromNC

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You presented facts....I'll give you that.

I don't see what they have to do with whether or not Joe Biden took a bribe.

Maybe you can just point it out though...what do officials in the UK wanting Shokin gone have to do with Biden taking a bribe? What does the IMF wanting Shokin gone have to do Biden taking a bribe?

Given there's no evidence of a bribe in this case, I'd have to say the answer is nothing - as in things in reality don't really influence the imagination displayed in false right wing talking points on the subject.

The only connection I see is perhaps all these powerful nations and international interests wanting Shokin gone is exactly why the FBI and former CIA officials have helped Biden get elected by squashing the laptop story and they're also the reason why the FBI and DOJ in general is protecting him from investigation.

I can't really comment on what you do or don't see.

Inaccurate?

What's inaccurate?
Implying Hunter Biden was sent to Ukraine to address corruption there, for one thing.
 
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Truth7t7

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It's true that Joe Biden leveraged $1 billion in aid to persuade Ukraine to oust its top prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, in March 2016. But it wasn't because Shokin was investigating Burisma. It was because Shokin wasn't pursuing corruption among the country's politicians.

Mike Carpenter, who served as a foreign policy adviser to the then-vice president, told USA TODAY that Shokin "never went after any corrupt individuals at all" and "never prosecuted any high-profile cases of corruption." <<
"Your response is a complete fairy tale in denial of factual truth"

Shokin seized assets of "Burisma's" oligarch owner (Nikolai Zlochevsky) who fled Ukraine directly related to Shokin's investigation and actions


1.) Was Hunter Biden on the board of directors for "Burisma" (Yes)

2.) Was Shokin actively investigating "Burisma" for criminal corruption (Yes)

NewYorkPost​

Ukraine prosecutor whose ouster Biden pushed was ‘threat,’ says Devon Archer​

August 4, 2023

WASHINGTON — Ukrainian prosecutor-general Viktor Shokin, who was fired after then-Vice President Joe Biden threatened to pull $1 billion in US aid, was “a threat” to natural gas company Burisma Holdings, which paid Hunter Biden up to $1 million per year, the first son’s former business partner Devon Archer confirmed in an interview released Friday.

“He was a threat. He ended up seizing assets of [Burisma owner] Nikolai [Zlochevsky] — a house, some cars, a couple properties. And Nikolai actually never went back to Ukraine after Shokin seized all of his assets,” Archer told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson.

The Hill​

Solomon: These once-secret memos cast doubt on Joe Biden’s Ukraine story​

9/26/2019

Biden has faced scrutiny since December 2015, when the New York Times published a story noting that Burisma hired Hunter Biden just weeks after the vice president was asked by President Obama to oversee U.S.-Ukraine relations. That story also alerted Biden’s office that Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin had an active investigation of Burisma and its founder.
 
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essentialsaltes

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3. Did The Hill subsequently add a lengthy Editor's Note to Solomon's opinion piece? (Yes)

4. Did it note that some of Solomon's facts are disputed? (Yes)

5. Did it note that Solomon neglected to mention his personal ties to some of the sources? (Yes)

6. Did it note that the US, the EU and "Ukrainian anti-corruption activists pushed for the ouster of Shokin"? (Yes)

7. Did it note that Shokin's successor declared "the Bidens did not violate Ukrainian laws."? (Yes)
That story also alerted Biden’s office that Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin had an active investigation of Burisma and its founder.
Not, I point out, Hunter Biden.
 
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Truth7t7

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3. Did The Hill subsequently add a lengthy Editor's Note to Solomon's opinion piece? (Yes)

4. Did it note that some of Solomon's facts are disputed? (Yes)

5. Did it note that Solomon neglected to mention his personal ties to some of the sources? (Yes)

6. Did it note that the US, the EU and "Ukrainian anti-corruption activists pushed for the ouster of Shokin"? (Yes)

7. Did it note that Shokin's successor declared "the Bidens did not violate Ukrainian laws."? (Yes)

Not, I point out, Hunter Biden.
You confidently gave complete disregard to the reporting of the New York Post "Why"?

Shokin seized assets of "Burisma's" oligarch owner (Nikolai Zlochevsky) who fled Ukraine directly related to Shokin's investigation and actions


1.) Was Hunter Biden on the board of directors for "Burisma" (Yes)

2.) Was Shokin actively investigating "Burisma" for criminal corruption (Yes)

WashingtonExaminer​

Hunter Biden business associates close with replacement Ukrainian prosecutor​

by Sarah Bedford, Investigative Reporter |
August 08, 2023 05:33 AM

After then-Vice President Joe Biden succeeded in pressuring Ukraine to remove its prosecutor general Viktor Shokin, the next person to hold the job had ties to Hunter Biden.

Yuri Lutsenko, the prosecutor general who took over for Shokin after his ouster in 2016, had relied on the same lobbyists representing Ukrainian energy company Burisma and its chief executive for years, State Department emails suggest. Hunter Biden personally brought those lobbyists into the Burisma deal in 2015 for the purpose of shutting down investigations of Burisma’s chief executive, according to his own emails.
 
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essentialsaltes

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You confidently gave complete disregard to the reporting of the New York Post "Why"?
Because you edited that into your post. Regardless, Shokin was not a threat to Hunter Biden.
Shokin seized assets of "Burisma's" oligarch owner (Nikolai Zlochevsky) who fled Ukraine directly related to Shokin's investigation and actions

1.) Was Hunter Biden on the board of directors for "Burisma" (Yes)

2.) Was Shokin actively investigating "Burisma" for criminal corruption (Yes)
The first fact is not in dispute. The second remains arguable how 'active' the investigation was. But even if it was active, it did not personally involve Hunter Biden.
 
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USincognito

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You confidently gave complete disregard to the reporting of the New York Post "Why"?
Primarily due to the actual facts of the situation vs. Solomon's editorial that was filled with falsehoods that The Hill walked back.

Well, that and the fact that the Post is tabloid trash.
 
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USincognito

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Hunter Biden personally brought those lobbyists into the Burisma deal in 2015 for the purpose of shutting down investigations of Burisma’s chief executive, according to his own emails.
Please cite those supposed emails?
 
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Truth7t7

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RocksInMyHead

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False, Showing in his own words states he was investigating Hunter Biden and criminal money laundering, he was later fired as the Opinion clearly shows in the clip
Sure, he says that he was doing his job, but the evidence suggests otherwise. Put another way, the only people I've seen saying that Viktor Shokin was unjustly fired are Viktor Shokin himself and those looking to smear the Biden family. It should be obvious that Shokin is incapable of being objective about his own firing, and those looking to smear the Bidens provide no evidence for their belief aside from Shokin's words.

Everyone else - other Ukrainians, the entire international community, the US government - says that he had shelved all of his investigations into Burisma and was corrupt. There are multiple accounts from other Ukrainian government officials, junior prosecutors from his office, the IMF, etc that all support this.
 
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I’ve done a chronological search for the threads that dealt with this very situation as they happened but these forums were rather focused on the issue that a former “game show host” was running for President and getting some attention; consequently there are no threads that speak of this either in American Politics or in N&CE (AR).

So why did it “become important” in 2020?
 
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FreeinChrist

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I’ve done a chronological search for the threads that dealt with this very situation as they happened but these forums were rather focused on the issue that a former “game show host” was running for President and getting some attention; consequently there are no threads that speak of this either in American Politics or in N&CE (AR).

So why did it “become important” in 2020?
There were threads because I remember them writing in them on this topic.

Found:

Yes I have been reading the claims, the summary of the call, and looked into reports of Biden's actions with Ukraine.


Trump and allies are gaslighting the whistleblower and trying hard to distract from Trump's illegal request for foreign help regarding a political opponent.

Suggest you read this:
Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

Shokin became prosecutor general in February 2015. Over the next year, the U.S. and the International Monetary Fund criticized officials for not doing enough to fight corruption in Ukraine.

Shokin took no action to pursue cases against Zlochevsky throughout 2015, said Kasko, who was Shokin’s deputy overseeing international cooperation and helping in asset-recovery investigations. Kasko said he had urged Shokin to pursue the investigations.

The U.S. stepped up its criticism in September 2015, when its ambassador to Ukraine, during a speech, accused officials working under Shokin of “subverting” the U.K. investigation.

Kasko resigned in February 2016, citing corruption and lawlessness in the prosecutor general’s office.

The U.S. plan to push for Shokin’s dismissal didn’t initially come from Biden, but rather filtered up from officials at the U.S. Embassy in Kiev, according to a person with direct knowledge of the situation. Embassy personnel had called for U.S. loan guarantees to Ukraine to be tied to broader anti-corruption efforts, including Shokin’s dismissal, this person said.

Biden’s threat to withhold $1 billion if Ukraine didn’t crack down on corruption reportedly came in March. That same month, hundreds of Ukrainians demonstrated outside President Petro Poroshenko’s office demanding Shokin’s resignation, and he was dismissed.
Fact - Biden was not acting on his own. He represented the US and the Obama administration. It was not just the US that felt Shokin was not really investigating Bursima Holdings. The whole G-7, the IMF, the EBRD wanted Shokin out as well as the Ukraine people. Biden was a spokesperson.


And all of that does not change the fact that Trump violated law when first withheld military funding and when it came up in a conversation with Zelensky, said, "I would like you to do us a favor, though..."
Then his adminstration tried to hide the conversation in a secure server separate from the main servers.
Now the gaslighting and deflection..... and obstruction by Pompeo.



Meh, Hunter Biden was clearly getting paid off in exchange for political favors from his daddy ... to the tune of a billion dollars in aid. Trump had every right to ask for that to be investigated.

It's not even arguable otherwise. Joe Biden was caught on tape demanding a QUID PRO QUO.
No, that is flat out not true. That is just a desperate right wing line.
Fact - Joe Biden was representing the Obama administration view and it was a bipartisan view at the time. It also was the view of the IMF and EU and more. Joe threaten to withhold money to Ukraine if they did not fire a prosecutor who was slow-walking investigations, and was not really investigating Burisma. Hunter was hired to do a job.

But I understand some are stuck in the right wing line for all this.
Here is an article for those who are not:
What Joe Biden Actually Did in Ukraine

Within months, though, the State Department began suspecting that the office of Mr. Poroshenko’s first prosecutor general was accepting bribes to protect Mykola Zlochevsky, the oligarch owner of Burisma Holdings, the gas company where Hunter Biden was a board member. In a February 2015 meeting in Kiev with a deputy prosecutor, a State Department official named George P. Kent demanded to know “who took the bribe and how much was it?”

The prosecutor general was fired soon after. But it wasn’t long before the new prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, was drawing allegations of corruption, including from State Department officials who suspected he was shaking down targets and intentionally slow-walking investigations to protect allies.

Mr. Giuliani has claimed, without evidence, that Mr. Biden’s push to oust Mr. Shokin was an attempt to block scrutiny of his son’s actions. In fact, Mr. Biden was just one of many officials calling for Mr. Shokin to go. Good-government activists were protesting his actions in the streets, as were eurozone power players like Christine Lagarde, then the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, along with Ms. Nuland and Senate Republicans.

“The position regarding getting rid of Shokin was not Vice President Biden’s position; it was the position of the U.S. government, as well as the European Union and international financial institutions,” said Amos J. Hochstein, former coordinator for international energy affairs at the State Department and one of the few administration officials who directly confronted Mr. Biden at the time about his son.......

By late 2015, American officials had grown so frustrated with Mr. Poroshenko’s sluggish response on all fronts that Mr. Biden was dispatched to make the case publicly for reforms to the Ukrainian Parliament.

That December, in a speech that he later described as one of the most important he had ever delivered, the vice president told legislators they had “to remove all conflicts between their business interest and their government responsibilities.” He also singled out the natural gas industry, saying, “The energy sector needs to be competitive, ruled by market principles — not sweetheart deals.”....

Mr. Shokin was eventually fired, but only months later, after I.M.F. officials threatened to withdraw funding.....


Bob Bauer, former Obama White House counsel and Biden adviser, said that even pressuring Hunter Biden to quit the board would have constituted a breach of that firewall, and suggested that was one of the reasons the vice president chose not to do it. “The independent activities of an adult child simply don’t create a ‘conflict of interest’ for the parent who is a public official,” he said. “And as a matter of sound ethical practice, it is important for officials in this position to maintain that distance: to be able to show that, in doing their jobs, they could not have been affected by discussions or involvement with their adult children relating to private business matters. Their posture has to be, ‘Whatever you decide to do, I am going to do what I have to do.’”

Mr. Biden has said he first learned of his son’s activities in Ukraine when the story broke in 2014. He told his son, “I hope you know what you are doing,” according to Hunter Biden’s account of their discussion in The New Yorker earlier this year.
It is a good article. It has a firewall but you can get a certain number of free articles a month.​
 
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FreeinChrist

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And I found this:


Regarding Biden/Ukraine:​
In early 2016, Deputy General Prosecutor Vitaliy Kasko resigned in protest of corruption within Shokin’s office. In a televised statement, Kasko said: “Today, the General Prosecutor’s office is a brake on the reform of criminal justice, a hotbed of corruption, an instrument of political pressure, one of the key obstacles to the arrival of foreign investment in Ukraine.”

In reporting on Kasko’s resignation, Reuters noted that Ukraine’s “failure to tackle endemic corruption” threatened the IMF’s $40 billion aid program for Ukraine. At the time, the IMF put a hold on $1.7 billion in aid that had been due to be released to Ukraine four months earlier.

“After President Poroshenko complained that Shokin was taking too long to clean up corruption even within the PGO itself, he asked for Shokin’s resignation,” the CRS report said. Shokin submitted his resignation in February 2016 and was removed a month later.

Michael McFaul, a former U.S. ambassador to Russia under President Barack Obama, on Sept. 20 tweeted that the “Obama administration policy (not just ‘Biden policy’) to push for this Ukrainian general prosecutor to go” was “a shared view in many capitals, multilateral lending institutions, and pro-democratic Ukrainian civil society.”
However, I think the topic of this thread is corruption/cover up in the White House. The only reason to try and hide the transcripts of the call was because it was so questionable. Other people in the administration had to participate in trying to cover it up. I think this is going to be a mess.​
 
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