Lieu accuses Trump of asking Ukraine to ‘manufacture dirt’ on Biden

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) on Wednesday accused President Trump of asking Ukraine to “manufacture dirt” on a political opponent, Joe Biden.

Lieu, a frequent critic of Trump, emphasized during an appearance on Hill.TV that Ukrainian officials already looked into accusations surrounding former Vice President Joe Biden’s son over Hunter Biden’s alleged business dealings in the country and did find  any evidence of corruption.

“What evidence actually shows is the Ukrainians actually looked into this, terminated the investigation and found nothing there,” Lieu said on “Rising.”

“So this is just made up, which is also very troubling because you have the American president essentially asking the Ukrainians to manufacture dirt on political opponent because there really was not evidence of corruption,” he added.

After months of resisting impeachment calls, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) late Tuesday announced that the House would begin a formal impeachment inquiry into the president, following a growing scandal over a call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Pelosi said her decision was sparked by Trump’s own admission that he had spoken with Zelensky about looking into Biden, the frontrunner in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary race.

“This week, the president has admitted to asking the President of Ukraine to take actions which would benefit him politically,” Pelosi said during her announcement. “The actions of the Trump presidency revealed the dishonorable fact of the President’s betrayal of his oath of office, betrayal of our national security and betrayal of the integrity of our elections.”

A day after Pelosi made the announcement, the White House released a five-page partial transcript of Trump’s July 25 call with the Ukrainian president that shows Trump urging Zelensky to speak with his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and to “look into” his allegations against Biden.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing, dismissing the exchange as a “nothing call.”

Senate Republicans, meanwhile, have made it clear that they would kill any articles of impeachment that pass in the House, and warned that Democrats could face a political backlash in 2020 if they move forward with impeachment. 

—Tess Bonn