美国国家公共电台 NPR Rudy Giuliani Subpoenaed By House Intel Committee In Impeachment Inquiry（在线收听）

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

House Democrats have subpoenaed President Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani. And we are also learning tonight that the president may have asked foreign governments to help a Justice Department investigation into the origins of the Russia investigation.

NPR justice reporter Ryan Lucas is in the studio with us, and I hope you're going to shed more light on both these developments. Hey, Ryan.

RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Hello there.

KELLY: Start with Giuliani. Why has he been subpoenaed? What do House Democrats want to know?

LUCAS: So the House Intelligence Committee issued this subpoena. The committee says it's looking into credible allegations that Giuliani acted as an agent of the president in a scheme to advance the president's own personal political interests by abusing the power of the office of the president. The subpoena is not for testimony at this point. This is for records.

What lawmakers want is all documents related to Giuliani's contacts with Ukrainians, so basically anything related to his efforts to dig up information tied to the allegations that he's made against Joe Biden and Biden's son Hunter. And it's, of course, those allegations that President Trump himself raised in his phone call with the Ukrainian president when Trump urged Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. And it's that call and those actions that, of course, are the subject of the House Democrats' impeachment inquiry.

KELLY: OK. And you said, Ryan, they are looking into whether Giuliani was involved in some scheme to advance his own...

LUCAS: Right.

KELLY: ...Personal political interests. What does Giuliani say?

LUCAS: Well, Giuliani has been the public face pushing these allegations against Biden and his son for some months. I've spoken with Giuliani a number of times recently, including today. Giuliani says he first got word of the allegations against Biden about a year ago. He's met with former Ukrainian prosecutors and others since then to follow up with his own investigative efforts.

One big meeting in that took place in early August in Spain. That's where Giuliani met with Andriy Yermak, a senior adviser to Ukraine's president. Giuliani gave Yermak information about the Bidens' alleged improprieties and said that it should be fully investigated. Now, we have to say that Giuliani's allegations against the Bidens are unproven.

KELLY: Right.

LUCAS: Public evidence actually rebuts it.

Giuliani says that this meeting in Spain was facilitated by Kurt Volker. At that time, Volker was the U.S. special representative to Ukraine under the State Department. Volker resigned on Friday. He's going to sit down for an interview with investigators on the Hill later this week.

KELLY: OK, a lot of names to keep track of here, but let me pause you on that last one, Kurt Volker, who you said worked for the State Department, at least until Friday. Why would he have been involved in helping set up a meeting between the president's personal lawyer, Giuliani, and the Ukrainian government?

LUCAS: Right. Volker's role at the State Department was to help support Ukraine and its development, its democratic reforms. There's been a lot of negative news about Ukraine over the past year-plus - its corruption, its general struggles. The conservative media here in the United States has picked up on that, and Giuliani has certainly picked up on that.

The Ukrainian government reached out to Volker and asked him to put them in touch with Giuliani. It's my understanding that Volker did so in part because that would give the Ukrainians a chance to show Giuliani on their own that the new Ukrainian government had the right priorities, that they were the good guys, so to speak - so, in a sense, giving Ukraine a chance to kind of correct the record with somebody who has the ear of the president.

KELLY: And that meeting you mentioned was at the initiative of the Ukrainian government, just to...

LUCAS: Right.

KELLY: OK. So to this other story today that has to do with Australia and reports that President Trump pushed the prime minister of Australia to help William Barr - U.S. Attorney General William Barr - in the Justice Department's review of the origins of the Russia investigation. Just walk us through what's happening here.

LUCAS: Right. It's a complicated story, but we've known for a long time that the U.S. attorney John Durham is looking into the beginnings of this Russia investigation. The New York Times first reported today that Trump pressed Australia's prime minister to help Barr with that probe. The Justice Department now says in a statement that it was Barr who asked the president to contact foreign countries to put Barr and Durham in touch with the appropriate officials.

Now, this is unusual. There are lots of other channels through which such requests can be made, say, the director of national intelligence or the State Department. Having the president make the request takes it up a level. But, of course, it also raises questions about the president's motivations because he has a personal political interest in the outcome.

KELLY: Yes, he does.

That's NPR's Ryan Lucas. Thanks very much.

LUCAS: Thank you.