Myroslava Gongadze in Washington and Celia Mendoza in New York contributed to this report.
NEW YORK/CAPITOL HILL — U.S. President Donald Trump asked Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate if Democratic presidential contender and former Vice President Joe Biden shut down a probe into a Ukrainian company that employed his son, according to a summary of a transcript of a July telephone call between the two leaders.
Democrats have accused Trump, who is seeking re-election next year, of seeking Zelenskiy’s help to dampen Biden’s chances of winning the Democratic presidential nomination.
“There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that, so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great,” Trump said, according to the summary released Wednesday by White House.
“Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it … It sounds horrible to me,” the transcript summary said.
Impeachment inquiry
The summary’s disclosure comes one day after Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced a formal impeachment inquiry into Trump and allegations that he sought a foreign government’s help with his 2020 reelection bid.
Pelosi accused Trump of betraying his oath of office, U.S. national security and the security of U.S. elections.
The whistleblower contacted the intelligence inspector general, who called the complaint “serious” and “urgent.”
After initially refusing to hand over the whistleblower’s complaint to Congress as required by law, a senior Trump official said late Tuesday the White House will make it available to Congress by the end of the week.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff said Tuesday that the whistleblower’s lawyer informed him that he or she wants to meet with the committee as soon as this week.
The Senate, by unanimous consent, agreed on a nonbinding resolution that the whistleblower’s complaint be immediately handed over to the House and Senate Intelligence committees. The House is expected to consider the resolution Wednesday.
In 2016 as vice president, Biden went to Ukraine and threatened to withhold billions of dollars in U.S. loan guarantees unless the government cracked down on corruption. Biden also demanded that Ukraine’s chief prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, be fired.
Shokin had previously investigated the gas company in which Hunter Biden served on the board. But the probe had been inactive for a year before former Vice President Biden’s visit. Hunter has said he was not the target of any investigation, and no evidence of any wrongdoing by the Bidens has surfaced.
VOA asked Zelenskiy about the current controversy. He declined to comment other than saying, “We have an independent country. We’re ready for everything.”
He said he believes his talks with Trump will be “very warm.”