Trump Doubles Down on Call to Investigate Biden After Whistleblower Complaint

President Donald Trump on Sunday doubled down on his call for former Vice President Joe Biden's dealings with Ukraine to be investigated amid reports of a whistleblower who is said to have raised concerns about the US president's interaction with a foreign leader who may have been Ukraine's president.

News ID: 447252

Date: 24 September 2019 - 20:54

RNA - "Now the Fake News Media says I 'pressured the Ukrainian President at least 8 times during my telephone call with him'. This supposedly comes from a so-called 'whistleblower' who they say doesn’t even have a first hand account of what was said," the American president tweeted Sunday evening, The Hill reported.

"Breaking News: The Ukrainian Government just said they weren’t pressured at all during the 'nice' call. Sleepy Joe Biden, on the other hand, forced a tough prosecutor out from investigating his son’s company by threat of not giving big dollars to Ukraine. That’s the real story!" he added.

The Washington Post reported last week that a whistleblower in the intelligence community filed a complaint about Trump's interaction with a foreign leader.

On Friday, multiple outlets reported that Trump had pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Biden's son Hunter Biden during a July call.

Trump has not denied that he urged Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden. Earlier Sunday, speaking to reporters outside the White House, Trump insisted there was no quid pro quo involved in the talks with the Ukrainian president, calling it a "perfect conversation".

Instead, Trump has questioned why the media is not paying more attention to the Democratic front-runner's actions.

He also criticized the whistleblower, saying the official had caused a "false alarm".

Hunter Biden worked with a natural gas company owned by a Ukrainian oligarch. His father pushed in 2016 for the dismissal of a Ukrainian prosecutor who had been accused of overlooking corruption in his own office.

There's no evidence that Joe Biden was acting with his son’s interests in mind.

Trump told reporters on Sunday that he would consider releasing a transcript of his call with Zelensky.

“We’ll make a determination about how to release it, releasing it, saying what we said,” Trump said in Houston, defending his conversation with Zelensky as “perfect”.

“The problem is, when you’re speaking to foreign leaders, you don’t want foreign leaders to feel that they shouldn’t be speaking openly,” Trump added, stating, “And the same thing with an American president. You want them to be able to express themselves without knowing that every single word was going to be going out and going out all over the world.”

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