Lindsey Graham appears to be worried about the dirt that Rudy Giuliani claims to have dug up on presidential candidate Joe Biden during his visit to Ukraine.
Giuliani has been following through on the conspiracy theories of his client, President Donald Trump, by traveling to Ukraine to seek information on the idea that Biden was engaged in corruption there. Though there had been no evidence to support Trump’s assertions against both Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, he has pressed forward in pressuring Ukraine to announce an investigation into the pair, actions that have now led to his impeachment.
But Giuliani had continued the mission, and Trump said at the start of December that the former New York mayor would be able to go before Congress, as well as the attorney general and Department of Justice. At the time, Senate Judiciary Chair Lindsey Graham appeared eager to hear from Giuliani, but now appears to have changed his tune.
Graham said in an interview with The Daily Beast that he advised Giuliani to first take any information he gathered to the intelligence community to have it vetted and be sure he hasn’t been taken by Russia.
“He has not shared any of that information with me,” Graham said.
“My advice to Giuliani would be to share what he got from Ukraine with the IC to make sure it’s not Russia propaganda. I’m very suspicious of what the Russians are up to all over the world.”
While Graham has been one of Trump’s most staunch defenders during the impeachment process, going so far as to saying he would not be an impartial juror and planned to work toward the president’s acquittal, he has frequently broken with Trump regarding Russia. Graham rejected Trump’s assertion that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 presidential election, saying it was only Russia.
Some of the Trump administration and experts who testified during the impeachment hearings warned that the theories Trump spread about Ukraine interfering in the election, hiding a DNC server, and the Bidens engaging in corruption, appeared to be talking points straight from the Kremlin .
There are reports that Russian President Vladimir Putin has been planting these ideas directly in Trump’s mind during their closed-door meetings over the last three years, after which Trump showed a sudden interest in the debunked idea that Ukraine interfered in the election.
Giuliani told The Daily Beast that the information he gathered is not Russian propaganda.
