The White House on Wednesday (September 25th) released the transcript of a telephone call between President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, in which the American billionaire asked his interlocutor to investigate the former vice president. President Joe Biden.
The Democrats on Tuesday launched an investigation into how the president would have taken advantage of his position to try to harm his main rival, well placed to face it in the presidential election of 2020.
"If you could inquire ..."
According to this declassified summary - and not verbatim - of the conversation, Donald Trump asked Volodymyr Zelensky to determine whether former Vice President Barack Obama had ended a Ukrainian investigation into a company where his son worked.
"There's a lot of talk about Biden's son, the fact that Biden stopped the proceedings, and many people want to know, so it would be great if you could do something with the Attorney General," said the US president according to this declassified summary of the conversation.
"Biden boasted of having arrested the prosecution, so if you could inquire ... it all sounds horrible to me," he added during the exchange that took place on 25 last July.
Donald Trump also offers his Ukrainian counterpart to work in cooperation with his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, and with US Attorney General Bill Barr.
Perfectly "irreproachable" exchanges, according to Trump
Accused by the Democratic Party of putting pressure on Kiev to obtain information that could harm Joe Biden, Donald Trump is targeted by impeachment proceedings.
The Democratic Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, accuses her of abuse of power and endangering the national security of the United States.
For his part, Donald Trump has repeatedly denounced a "hunt for witches gutter" and to say that his exchanges with his Ukrainian counterpart were perfectly "irreproachable".
"Will the Democrats apologize after seeing what was said during this call with the Ukrainian president?" He said tweeted. "They should, it was a perfect call, we took them by surprise!"
With AFP