Trump Allegedly Wanted Ukraine’s President to Announce Biden Investigation on CNN

President Donald Trump reportedly wanted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to talk about investigating 2020 Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden, and his son Hunter Biden, on CNN– a proposal Zelensky almost went through with.

According to a report from the New York Times, which cited testimony from William B. Taylor Jr., “the top American diplomat in Ukraine,” President Trump “wanted the Ukrainian president to speak on CNN.”

“But aides to Mr. Zelensky, on high alert to avoid any move that might irritate Mr. Trump, wondered if that was such a good idea, in that Mr. Trump habitually called CNN ‘fake news’ in his Twitter posts,” the Times reported, adding that, “Nearly all Mr. Zelensky’s top advisers” allegedly “favored his making the public statement.”

“United States military aid, they agreed, as well as diplomatic backing for impending peace talks to end the war outweighed the risks of appearing to take sides in American politics,” the New York Times further reported, noting, “Finally bending to the White House request, Mr. Zelensky’s staff planned for him to make an announcement in an interview on Sept. 13 with Fareed Zakaria, the host of a weekly news show on CNN.”

This interview would have gone ahead if it weren’t for “events in Washington” which “saved the Ukrainian government from any final decision and eliminated the need to make the statement,” the Times explained: “Word of the freeze in military aid had leaked out, and Congress was in an uproar. Two days before the scheduled interview, the Trump administration released the assistance and Mr. Zelensky’s office quickly canceled the interview.”