They’ve Got Tapes. They’ve Always Got Tapes

It looks like indicted Giuliani associate Lev Parnas has tapes of both Rudolph Giuliani’s and Donald Trump’s efforts to extract an investigation of Hunter Biden from Kiev, and he has turned them over to the House Intelligence Committee for the impeachment investigation:

The House Intelligence Committee is in possession of audio and video recordings and photographs provided to the committee by Lev Parnas, an associate of President Donald Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who reportedly played a key role in assisting him in his efforts to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and Ukraine, multiple sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News.

The material submitted to the committee includes audio, video and photos that include Giuliani and Trump. It was unclear what the content depicts and the committees only began accessing the material last week.

“We have subpoenaed Mr. Parnas and Mr. [Igor] Fruman for their records. We would like them to fully comply with those subpoenas,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff told CNN Sunday, with a committee spokesperson adding they would not elaborate beyond the chairman’s comments.

An attorney for Parnas, Joseph A. Bondy, also declined to comment, directing ABC News to a statement released earlier in the day Sunday reading in part, “Mr. Parnas has vociferously and publicly asserted his wish to comply with his previously issued subpoena and to provide the House Intelligence Committee with truthful and important information that is in furtherance of justice, not to obstruct it.”

………

However, some of the material sought by congressional investigators is already in possession of federal investigators within the Southern District of New York and thus held up from being turned over, according to sources familiar with the matter.

………

Giuliani’s relationship with Parnas and Fruman is the subject of a criminal investigation in the Southern District of New York, according to sources. That case will have its next court date early next month.

I rather imagine whatever the SDNY has in their grubby mitts will not be getting to the impeachment inquiry in the near term, since Barr has made it clear that his first, and perhaps only, priority, is to obstruct the Congressional investigation.

Still, the mention of tapes does create a sense of nostalgia in this political child of the Watergate era.

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