All language subtitles for From_Russia_with_Lev_2024_1080p_WEB-DL_H264_AAC-AC3_SNAKE

[intriguing music]

♪ ♪♪

- I was a nursing student
and going to Cal State LA,

and, you know,
hanging out and doing

what most 20, 21-year-olds do.

And I was dragged to this club,
and there was Lev Parnas.

Gold chain and
his Cartier glasses

and his Christian Audigier
gold-foiled hoodie.

He said he was in LA
to produce a movie.

The evening went by.
We were talking.

We were relating.

Me and Lev are both
immigrants from Ukraine.

Similar background,
similar upbringing.

The foundation,
it's still the Soviet Union.

The next day,
he shows up in

a stretch limo in front of my
house to pick me up for lunch.

It's just a certain way
that they produce people

out of Russia and Ukraine

that's different
than anywhere else.

He proposed four days later,

and we were married
within six months.

All of our friends
and family thought

we were completely
off our rockers.

It was like, nobody matters.

Nothing you say can stop us.
Like, that's it.

It's like Beyoncé and Jay-Z,
Bonnie and Clyde.

Like, let's do this.

We're going to
conquer the world.

I don't think you could have
convinced me with anything

that this is where
we would be in 2024.

- Lev Parnas.
- Lev Parnas.

- Lev Parnas.
- Lev Parnas.

- Lev Parnas.
- Parnas.

- The shady and indicted
Ukrainian businessman

Lev Parnas.

- That he would be involved in
one of the biggest scandals.

- President Trump pressured
the head of Ukraine

to pursue an investigation
into Joe Biden.

- My call was perfect.

- Having to do with
our birth country,

Ukraine, having to deal
with presidents of Ukraine

and of the United States.

- Parnas is a
recently indicted goon

who worked with Giuliani to
help Trump blackmail Ukraine

into investigating Joe Biden.

- The impeachment of President
Donald Trump is here.

- Lev Parnas,
he is now talking

and he has documents
to back up his words.

Parnas implicated several top
Trump administration officials

including
the president himself.

- Were you relying
on Lev Parnas

to get rid of your ambassador?
- No.

- I mean, who does that?
- What happened?

- What happened?
Lev happened.

- Democrats are really scraping
the bottom of the barrel

if they think that Lev Parnas
is their star witness.

- Lev Parnas,
he is a creepy, sleazy,

self-serving super snitch.

He will do and say
anything he can.

- Think I'm crazy,
but I really thought

I'm going to get
the Medal of Honor.

Boy, was I wrong.

[laughs]

[whimsical music]

♪ ♪♪

So I was born in Odessa,
Ukraine, February 6, 1972.

My father used to own
underground factories.

During Communism,
you weren't allowed

to have your own business.

People that were caught
running these types

of factories would get
the death sentence.

We emigrate to the
United States in 1976

when I was four years old.

We had friends and family
that were all

immigrating to a little town
right by Coney Island.

It was Brighton Beach,
and we called it Little Odessa.

[upbeat music]

It was kind of like
one big family.

We all came from
the same persecution.

And we all wanted
the same thing,

which was the American dream.

Certain individuals
started leading

and taking control
of the neighborhood.

People like my father
that were businessmen

in the Soviet Union,

what you now call
Russian organized crime.

When my father passed away,
and I was 11 years old,

I had to get more involved
into that world.

While other kids
were going to school,

I was on the streets hustling,
and the girl I was dating,

her uncle happened
to be one of the leaders

in that organized crime group.

And I ended up working for him
as a runner collecting money.

So one day I'm in South New
Jersey, and I'm collecting.

I had somewhere around
$2 and 1/2, $3 million

in cash and checks
sitting in the back

of my Lincoln Town Car.

And an 18-wheeler hits me and
drives over the back of my car.

[chuckles] So I remember
calling my uncle

and telling him I'm stuck and
the cops are on their way.

What do I do?

They're like, whatever you do,
don't open the trunk.

We're on our way.

At the end of the night,
it was a bunch of fun

and laughs at
Atlantic City Casino

discussing how
I almost got arrested

with $2 and 1/2 million
in cash.

Then around 1989,

there was a big boom
in the Russian community--

the Cold War might be over

and there might be
a lot of opportunity.

So now fast forward...
[tape whirs]

I made some really good money

over the next several years
in Russia.

Import, export.

I probably had
every most powerful

Russian, Ukrainian,
ex-Soviet Union businessman,

mobster there to do business.

At some point,
it became too crazy.

People were dying
left and right

and I saw it was
my time to exit.

One day, I decided to give
my cousin Oleg a call.

Come on by,
let's grab some sushi.

I wanted to impress him.

So here Oleg is, pulling up
in this red Ferrari.

Gets out in a pinstripe suit,

looking like, you know,
a million bucks.

And I look at him, I said,
who did you kill?

He goes, no,
it's called Wall Street.

If anybody's seen the movie
"The Wolf of Wall Street,"

that didn't do it justice.

My first day in the office,

I see guys doing lines
on the table.

You got guys smoking weed
in the corner.

It's just a bunch of
young guys running around

with headphones and
screaming crazy numbers.

That was my initiation
into Wall Street.

- These were largely
boiler rooms.

They were low-level brokerage
houses, not very well known.

And Lev was on the hustle.

Three of the brokerage houses
that he worked for

had been expelled
for violations of fraud.

- All of a sudden, everybody
started getting arrested,

and the news started coming up
with the mob on Wall Street.

My friends were
going to prison,

and I decided, you know,
it's time to exit.

My cousin Oleg was
opening another office

in Boca Raton, Florida,

and he was looking for people
to work there.

Boca Raton, Florida,
here we come.

[upbeat music]

The palm trees, the oceans,
the warm sunny weather--

it was a paradise.

But there was also
an opportunity

for every fraudster
in the world

because you had
a lot of retirees.

I ended up working for
the same mobbed-up

penny stock mobsters

doing the same shit
we were doing in New York.

[laughs]

- In Boca Raton,
he had multiple cases of

non-payment of debts

and being evicted from
various places where he lived.

He had been the target of
at least nine court cases.

- 2008,
the Great Recession hits,

and my life goes upside down.

I lose my wife, I lose my cars,
I lose my business.

I kind of started looking
for a new path in life.

I got approached by one
of my friends that said,

would you be willing
to open up some

poker rooms in Beverly Hills?

The next thing you know,
here I am,

running illegal poker games
on top of Rodeo Drive.

Our clientele was
the who's who.

If you ever seen
"Molly's Game"--

- The movie stars, directors,
and business titans--

they were going all in
all the time.

- Thank you, Molly.
- This is for you.

- That's it.
And that was us.

At the same time,
I was introduced

to this Hollywood producer,
Rudy Durand.

He discovered Brooke Shields.

He was Jack Nicholson's
good friend.

And he had this script
that he was dying to do.

The main characters
were supposed to be

Jack Nicholson
and Mark Wahlberg.

Now here I am,
running at night poker games

and during the day running
around with some of the most

powerful people in Hollywood,
trying to put together

a movie called
"Memory of an Assassin."

I had no idea about
the movie business,

but I was a salesman.

And I ended up going out there
and finding investors.

- He's always been
someone that is

doing a lot at the same time.

- Serial entrepreneur.

- Yeah. For sure.

Serial father, too.
[laughs]

- Lev is a super likable guy.

- You know what I mean?

He makes a joke,
and I'm like, ah.

[laughs]

Oh, Lev. You're so crazy.

[laughs]

- Lev is kind of
a lovable character.

He is charismatic.

He's full of energy,
full of piss and vinegar.

- You can't forget Lev.

I've never met anyone that
has not recalled meeting Lev.

- While living
the life of Adam,

I met a very special person.

Little did I know that
this person would end up

being the love of my life.

[coughs] Excuse me.
I'm a little bit hoarse.

Four days later,
I dropped to one knee

at 4 o'clock in the morning,

and I proposed to her
with a jar of pickles.

And she said yes.

I was going to be wife number
3, but baby mama number 4.

It was like, OK, enough.
You have kids.

All of the kids
are in Florida.

So for me, it was immediately,
I have to move.

I became an instant mom.

I was a young woman.

But then once you
have three kids,

instantly, you get really
old really quickly.

- The movie deal fell apart
back then in 2010.

It would eventually be
made later on without me,

with Liam Neeson,
called "Memory."

- We all have to die.
- That's important.

That's what you do
before you go.

- I got retained
December of 2017

to go after a character named
Lev Parnas about a judgment.

- Tony Andre.
[laughs]

Tony Andre is a Miami lawyer.

A great guy.

But he was the root
of all my problems.

He was retained by a
gentleman called Michael Pues.

Pues was an investor
in the movie deal

that I was doing
with Rudy Durand.

- Mr. Pues lent money
from the trust

that took care of
his elderly mother.

Seven years later,
he's still out his 350 grand,

which is now $500,000, if you
count post-judgment interest.

- He was like a real pit bull.

Once he got subpoena power
through the judgment,

my life turned
into a living hell.

- On paper, Lev looked like
a terrible collection,

all the earmarks of a bum case.

I think to call him
a typical Miami hustler

would do the game
a disservice.

[laughter]

♪ ♪♪

- Now to the race
for the White House.

And after decades of
very publicly flirting

with the idea,
billionaire Donald Trump

says he really is running for
president this time around.

- Watching him come out, going
down those golden escalator.

- They're bringing drugs.

They're bringing crime.

They're rapists.

- I mean, I've never voted.

Had nothing to do
with politics.

I was never registered.

But he wasn't a politician.

He was a New York hustler.
And we could relate.

♪ ♪♪

I'm working with a big
real estate company.

We're out in a restaurant.

Robert Pereira, I met for
the first time that evening,

he was a very, very
wealthy businessman

and also a powerful person
in the Republican Party.

And they had ties
close to Trump.

At first,
I was extremely excited

to meet this guy because of
my real estate project.

So that night, we come up
with this crazy idea,

is we're going to hold
a huge fundraiser

at Robert's house.

This is the La Palas.

I mean,
it's $140 million house

with golden chandeliers,
golden doors.

So while Robert is
basically figuring out

how we're going to raise
this money for Donald Trump,

I'm more excited about how
I'm going to have

20 Robert Pereiras
in the same room,

where I could pitch
my real estate deal to.

Until all of a sudden,
it's breaking news.

- Trump tape bombshell--

Donald Trump caught
on a hot mic

months after marrying Melania,

making vulgar comments
about groping women, saying,

when you're a star,
they let you do it.

- It's a shit show.

People are canceling
left or right.

We were able to salvage it.

And that was my
very first donation,

$50,000 to the
Donald Trump campaign.

But something happened
that night.

- We were like two seats
away from Trump,

and Lev piped in
and said something.

And instantly, it was like,
no one else was in the room.

And the two of them
were just talking.

- The moment that really got me
is when I asked him, I said,

why are you doing this?

And he looked out
into the ocean,

and then stared back at us
and said, you know what?

I don't need to be doing this.

I'm doing this for the regular
folk, for the common people.

I'm trying to stop them
from destroying our country.

And at that moment,
it was something that hit me.

At that moment,
I was mesmerized,

cult-anized, hypnotized--
I was Trumponized.

- For the month leading up
to the 2016 election,

we were a Trump family.

It was a whirlwind.

We were flying around
all over the place

following Donald Trump.

It was a small group.

- A tough time for any
Republican right now

to be standing up alongside
their party's standard bearer.

- Nobody believed he could win.

Even we didn't believe
he could win.

There was rallies
and dinners,

and then finally,
the debate in Vegas.

- Putin, from everything I see,
has no respect for this person.

- Well,
that's because he'd rather

have a puppet as president
of the United States.

- No puppet.
No puppet.

- And it's pretty clear--
- You're the puppet.

- After that, Trump said,
I want you guys with me

on Election Night
at the Hilton in New York.

[energetic music]

- It was such a
roller coaster of a night.

All, like,
sitting there nervous,

trying to pray our way
to having Trump win.

- For Hillary Clinton, one of
the most stunning defeats

in American political history.

- Donald Trump will be

the 45th president
of the United States.

- It was like,
our guy made it.

Finally, we're going
to get back on track.

Back to that, you know,
make America great again.

- And the crazy part, I didn't
vote, but we still won.

[laughs]

- I love this country.

- Shortly after that,
we found out that

we were invited
to the inauguration.

It didn't take long
for word to spread.

Lev was just like
the Trump guy.

- During this wild ride,

I started documenting,
taking pictures of everything

and posting them
on social media.

All of a sudden, I started
getting phone calls

from everybody
I knew or didn't know

in the Russian-Ukrainian
community

wanting to be my friend.

Everybody wanted to go
to the inauguration.

- They do a great job for the
people in this country, so--

- Whoo.
- Whoo.

- It's hilarious to see
all these characters

from my previous life--

Mafia kingpins, oligarchs--
hugging, sitting VIP,

and interacting with all of
these Republican congressmen

and senators.

- It was very interesting
for me always,

not only watching the way
Lev was interacting,

but the way everyone
kind of accepted Lev.

You wouldn't really come up to
Trump and say, hey, my brother.

How you doing?
Lev did.

- In a year and a half,
I went from not knowing

anything about what politics
is to now being in

the inner circle
of the president.

♪ ♪♪

- Lev was just in
a state of shock

that he was at this level.

This is a guy
who is an immigrant

and who is living large.

Larger than he ever dreamed.

- I, Donald John Trump,
do solemnly swear.

[trumpets playing]

♪ ♪♪

- There are also plenty
of congratulations

being extended
to the President-elect,

including those
of Vladimir Putin.

- [speaking Russian]

- Putin said today,
he's ready to open

a new chapter with the US.

- I would have a very,
very good relationship

with Putin and with Russia.

- Washington Post is reporting
that President Trump revealed

highly-classified information

to the Russian Foreign
Minister and Ambassador

during a meeting in
the Oval Office last week.

- The White House
blindsided tonight

as the Department of Justice
reveals that they will appoint

a special counsel
to now oversee

the FBI investigation
into Russian meddling

and any possible collusion.

- And then they launched the
Robert Mueller investigation.

- The man now leading
the investigation,

former FBI director
Robert Mueller.

- They're weaponizing the
DOJ to go after Donald Trump

because they can't
stand that he won.

- US officials believe Russia
not only tried to influence

the election,
but also worked to help

Donald Trump defeat
Hillary Clinton.

- Over a month
before the election,

US intelligence agencies
accused the Russian government

of hacking emails from the
Democratic National Committee

and Hillary Clinton's
campaign.

- My people, they said,
they think it's Russia.

President Putin,
he just said it's not Russia.

I don't see any reason
why it would be.

- President Trump and
those working with him

had scores of contacts with
Russians and WikiLeaks,

including attempts at
setting up back channels

with the Kremlin.

- I have nothing to do
with Russia, folks, OK?

- The Russia cloud over
the Trump White House

seems to be darkening.

- Paul Manafort and a deputy
campaign official, Rick Gates,

will turn themselves in
to face charges.

- 12 counts, conspiracy
against the United States,

unregistered agent of
a foreign principal.

- Paul Manafort was
working for free

as Trump's campaign manager.

But in reality,
he used to get paid

by Russian and
Ukrainian oligarchs.

- Paul Manafort,
he was doing work in Ukraine

that was very definitely
pro-Russian.

- The entire thing
has been a witch hunt.

- This investigation is
nothing more than a witch hunt.

Five defendants
have pleaded guilty.

- It's only a witch hunt if
you don't find any witches.

- There's a great effort
on the part

of the Trump administration
to turn the tide.

- On collusion,
they have nothing.

They have nothing.

It's somebody's version of
the truth, not the truth.

Truth isn't truth.

- Giuliani takes this narrative
and turns it into Ukraine.

- It wasn't Trump
and the Russians that

meddled in the 2016 election.

It was actually Hillary
and the Ukrainians.

- It's Ukrainian collusion,
which was large, significant,

and proven,
with Hillary Clinton,

with the Democratic
National Committee.

- The real collusion scandal,

as we've said
several times before,

has everything to do
with the Clinton campaign.

- So that's where I think
the Mueller team should

be investigating,
which is the real crime,

which is the
Clinton collusion.

- All of a sudden,
my old friend,

somebody that I haven't seen
for a while, Igor Fruman,

comes back into my life.

Igor Fruman was a
Ukrainian-American citizen

that had lots of businesses
overseas, primarily in Ukraine.

He had restaurants,
he had nightclubs.

One of them was called
the Mafia Rave Club.

[laughs]

[electronic music]

In Ukraine,
Igor knew everybody,

from the low-level
street hustlers

to the high-level
mobsters and politicians.

They all came to his clubs.

- He made their
dreams come true.

I didn't think he was
the right person for Lev

to be as close as they became.

But, you know, they were.
They were friends.

- Igor was a little bit
more mysterious than Lev,

known particularly
for connections

in organized crime.

And he came to America with a
significant amount of money.

- Igor didn't fit
into Trump world

until he started
paying for their bills.

Igor became everybody's best
friend with that

American Express Black Card.

So when Igor comes
back in my life,

at first I didn't understand.

But then I realized
that Igor has

been looking through my social
media, like everybody else.

And that's when he
made his proposal.

There was a company in
Ukraine, an energy company

that was up for sale,
but they wanted to be

bought out by
an American company.

All of the people that really
controlled oil and gas industry

were Republican mega-donors.

So we started a company called
Global Energy Producers.

- They had not spent a lot of
time in that energy sector,

so I don't think they
knew a lot about it.

But look, they were salesmen.

- Between the
connections he had

in Ukraine and the
Republican Party,

it's silly not to put
these two together.

- Instead of going,
getting fancy offices

and investing money
into advertising,

we were going to
become mega-donors.

To be able to have
VIP access to everything

that goes on
in the Republican Party.

- He was donating money
left and right.

And I'm like,
what are you doing?

- We were donating to everybody
who would take our money.

We donated $100,000
to Kevin McCarthy

and Vice President Mike Pence
for Protect the House.

We donated thousands of
dollars to Pete Sessions.

We donated to Rick Scott's
senator campaign.

We've donated $50,000
to the Ron DeSantis'

campaign for Florida Governor.

I'm the one that got him
the governorship.

[laughs]

I was the matchmaker between
Governor DeSantis and Trump.

I mean, it was like
"Fiddler On The Roof."

Matchmaker, matchmaker,
make me a match.

[laughs]

The night he won,

the first person
he gave a hug to was me.

And then we made our commitment
for a million dollars

to the pro-Trump super PAC
America First Action PAC.

And we wired $325,000
for a first installment.

It was Igor's money.

- And the money's going
to various shell companies

that they formed, LLCs.

It's going to other
business partners.

And then it's coming
back to them again.

This was a real exercise
in following the money.

♪ ♪♪

[register dings]

- So we're invited to
our first intimate dinner

with Donald Trump to the
America First Super PAC.

And it was being held at the
Trump International Hotel.

I was sitting face-to-face
with Donald Trump.

[applause]

[classical music]

When Trump saw us,
he greeted us

like he always greeted us
by saying, my guys,

to me and Igor.

Igor secretly recorded
the whole thing.

And all of a sudden,
the topic changes to Ukraine.

Me being me,
I got into the conversation.

[laughter]

I realize that Trump has
no idea about Ukraine.

He has no idea they have oil.

- Yes.
- Yes.

- So prior to us
coming to the event,

I heard all these stories
about what was going on

with the Ukrainian ambassador
and how she was, you know,

a Soros plant and how she was
part of the Clinton regime.

The first thing that came
out of my mouth is I said--

- I'm repeating gossip.
I have no idea.

I have no facts, no vetting.

He got angry all of a sudden,

turned around to one of
his aides and said--

- It was silence.
The table looked at each other.

Nobody knew what to do.

- So we all started clapping.

[applause]

- Lev shared a piece
of silly gossip,

probably from somebody
that was corrupt.

And because of that, she
should be immediately fired.

Just like, why?

It's punitive.
It was terrible.

It was Trump.

- I get some voicemail,
you know,

from a reporter saying,
Lev Parnas,

through this entity named
Global Energy Producers,

there was this, you know,
LLC that was started in April,

and in May, they gave 325,000
to America's First Action.

And I was like,
that doesn't make any sense.

This guy doesn't have
two nickels to rub together.

You know, he's in
the room with Trump.

- Tony Andre comes in
as a civil lawyer,

but through
the subpoena power,

is able to get a lot
of the transfers

and how the money
bounced around

to the various banks, which
gets Lev in big trouble later.

- It was like a freight train
going off the tracks,

and I could see that
it's going off the tracks.

And I was trying to explain to
him, he's going off the tracks.

But he was like,
if I go off the tracks,

then I go off the tracks,
whatever.

You know, eff it.

♪ ♪♪

- My world changed.

I started associating myself
and hanging out with

hardcore right-wing
MAGA Republicans.

Trump International Hotel, it
was like home away from home.

[mysterious music]

Everybody knew my name.

Everybody knew my association
with the Trump family.

And it was kind of like

feeling like
I was at my own hotel.

The managers,
the hotel employees,

everybody knew to report
back to Donald Trump.

He knew who the
high rollers were.

If you wanted any favor
from Donald Trump,

you'd better stay
at his hotel.

- At least $7.8 million

he received from
20 foreign governments.

It's about Trump Tower
and Trump hotels.

Almost entirely,
that's where this money went.

- Waking up at the
Trump Hotel would

be like waking up
in the war zone

with congressmen, senators,
conspiracy theories,

Fox TV all over the place.

You're basically hotboxing
right-wing Fox News

Russian propaganda
all day long.

Everybody believed
in the same bullshit.

Everybody wanted to
please Donald Trump.

But what nobody could
understand at the time

was how close Rudy Giuliani
really was with Donald Trump.

Their relationship
goes way back.

- You know,
you're really beautiful.

- Oh. You dirty boy.
Oh. Oh.

Donald, I thought
you were a gentleman.

- Can't say I didn't try.

- When I met Giuliani, he
was going through a divorce.

He was having
financial difficulties.

- I can certainly tell you,
the person that you see now

is not the man that I married.

- Giuliani's last hurrah was
when he ran for president

during that debate
when Joe Biden

basically embarrassed Rudy in
front of the world by saying--

- There's only three things
he mentioned in a sentence--

a noun and a verb and 9/11.

I mean, there's nothing else.

- Rudy could never forget that.

Yes, he was still Rudy
Giuliani, America's mayor,

but he wasn't in the limelight.

And that's what
he really missed.

Rudy was hustling, being
the unofficial lobbyist,

the unofficial ambassador.

People started giving him jets
and private airplanes

and paying for dinners.

People starting
finding out that

he was the key to Trump's ear.

Rudy was basically working
with anybody that was

willing to give him a dollar.

That's where I came in.

We sat down to discuss Rudy
being my partner in my company

called Fraud Guarantee,

pleading for him to do for us
what he did to LifeLock.

- Identity thieves
steal from everyone.

You have to protect yourself.

I protect myself with LifeLock.

- I take full credit.
It was me.

- Who better to start a company
like that than Lev Parnas?

- Looking back, you could see
where the irony is that now,

you know, especially
I get convicted

of fraud for Fraud Guarantee.

So yeah.

- Fraud Guarantee becomes
a guaranteed fraud.

- Rudy was supposed to use
his contacts to promote

the company, and instead,
he took half a million dollars

and accomplished nothing.

But in the beginning,
I really looked up to him,

and I really cared
for Rudy Giuliani.

- I'm here with my friends
Lev and Igor.

- It was like a
bromance made in heaven.

[whimsical music]

- At some point,
almost overnight,

Rudy became Lev's--

I don't know,
work wife or something

because they spent
so much time together.

And they had such an
intimate relationship.

They were almost
like father and son.

- Four to five days
out of the week,

four or five,
six times a day with

phone calls and text messages.

And he was the godfather
to my son, Nathan.

- There's a picture of him
wiping his mouth.

I don't think Lev has ever
offered me that service.

Maybe not even all of our kids.

After that, I was like, yeah.

We're not getting him back,
people, like...

- This is an
ABC News Special Report.

The death of President
George Herbert Walker Bush.

[choir singing]

- It was the hottest ticket
in Washington.

Dignitaries, billionaires
from all over the world

were trying to get a ticket.

Rudy says, you guys
want to go with me?

I was like, hell, yeah,
we're going to go.

♪ ♪♪

But Rudy wasn't just
taking me and Igor.

Rudy was also taking a date.

But not only the date,
but her mother also.

[laughs]

At the time, Rudy was
drinking non-stop.

Right after,
he'd be going right on TV

and representing the President
of the United States.

- If I did 1/10 of what Hillary
Clinton did, I'd be in jail.

She paid people to create
violence at his rallies.

She sold 20% of our
uranium to Russia.

Poor little Hillary,
we got to be nice to her.

- There's something off
about Rudy Giuliani.

- How many of the former
president's terrible ideas

came from an inebriated
Rudy Giuliani?

- But the funniest part
is having

to hear the conversations
through the speakerphone

of Trump ripping Rudy
after going on TV drunk.

- I think--

- Rudy always wanted to
be Secretary of State,

but Trump didn't give him the
opportunity because he thought

he was low energy, because
he fell asleep in a meeting,

and then on the plane ride.

So at a certain point in time,
you had the official

Secretary of State who was
Secretary Pompeo,

and then you had the shadow
Secretary of State,

who was Rudy Giuliani.

- This wasn't a
normal presidency.

It was turning American
foreign policy basically

into an episode of
"The Apprentice."

- You're fired.

- The Mueller investigation,
it's winding down Giuliani,

it's no longer looking back
at the 2016 campaign.

Joe Biden,
former vice president

for eight years now
emerging as

the number one
potential candidate now

to run against Trump.

- You are the Democrats'
top choice to run against

President Trump in 2020.
- This is so early.

- President Trump says that
you're his dream candidate.

Would be his dream
to run against you.

- He was the point man

for the Obama administration
in Ukraine.

His son, Hunter,
takes a job with Burisma,

a large energy company
in Ukraine.

- Trump's biggest
nightmare was Joe Biden,

and he did not want him to
run and be his opponent.

- Let's go after Joe.

Let's go after Hunter.

And let's find that way
through Ukraine.

- Rudy was amazed to see
how Igor and I were

aware about these intricacies
that were going on in Ukraine

between all of these
corrupt politicians

and oligarchs and criminals.

So Rudy says he has an idea.

You guys are going
to go Ukraine.

And when we said yes,
he called Trump up.

The plan was hatched.

We were to go on our first
reconnaissance mission

on behalf of Donald Trump
and Rudy Giuliani.

- It was almost like Lev and
Igor landed in Trump's lap.

They were Ukrainian,
they were citizens,

they were businessmen, and
they were willing to do it

on Trump's and
Giuliani's terms.

120%.

- Rudy says that this
has to be all secretive.

This is very confidential.

The two look at Igor,
said, you have a $20 bill?

Rudy took it and said, I'm
officially your lawyer now.

Rudy's tool of choice was
the lawyer-client privilege.

That would enable him, Trump,
and ourselves to communicate.

- They get people that
can work in the shadows.

Not a Henry Kissinger,

not a Phil Habib,
not any of those folks.

Lev and Igor, no guardrails.

No oversight.
Nothing.

- And that is how
I was recruited

to start this secret
mission to dig up dirt

on Joe and Hunter Biden.

- This is where really the
backchannel campaign begins.

And could that get
them in trouble

with various laws in place
that warned against that?

Of course.

But they didn't
worry about that.

They had protection.
They had the president.

They had Rudy Giuliani.

- For the life of me,
I can't understand

why they got recruited
to do anything

sensitive with Rudy Giuliani.

It makes no sense to me,

unless maybe you're looking
for a fall guy.

- I don't think Hillary Clinton
or any other sane person

would be entrusting Lev and
Igor with top secret

government kind of information,

and then having them
run around Ukraine.

He's not qualified.
I mean, it's just ridiculous.

- With Trump,
it was never about competency.

It was never about
the Constitution.

It was always about loyalty.

It was always about
protecting him.

It was always about
doing things for him.

- Like "Fear and Loathing"
in Washington, DC--

- As your attorney,
I advise you to rent

a very fast car with no top.

- There's this the president
talking to this crazy cat,

his lawyer, who's got these two
people that should not even be

in the room that are
now participating

in a really high level.

But comedic as it was,
it was also gravely serious.

- Wait.
We can't stop here.

This is bat country.

- This was the beginning
of the BLT team.

We would meet at
BLT Steakhouse Restaurant

at the
Trump International Hotel.

They had a private room there
that I was told by Don Jr.

it was swept once a week to
make sure that there was

no listening devices there.

The BLT team was compiled
of Rudy Giuliani,

who was the head,
and it was me and Igor.

And then you had
John Solomon,

who was The Hill reporter
at the time.

Then you had Joe diGenova
and Victoria Toensing,

who were
two right-wing lawyers

that used to work for Trump.

They were a key part
in getting Bill Barr

to become attorney general.

Victoria told them,
don't worry about it.

Bill Barr is going to wipe
away the Mueller report.

And that was it.

- Bill Barr, one of the
most respected jurists

in the country,
highly respected lawyer,

a terrific man,
a terrific person,

he will be nominated for

the United States
Attorney General.

- So the BLT team had this
big round table with windows.

People could see in,
the way you were sitting down.

And Rudy was like Don Corleone.

- Rudolph Giuliani,
the US attorney

for the Southern District
of New York.

- New York City is affected
by organized crime,

moreso probably than any other
city in the United States.

- I'd be right by his
side as his soldier.

- He's part of a
criminal family.

You know, he's the Tom Hagen.
- [laughs]

- I have a special practice.
I handle one client.

- He is fascinated by the mob,

and constantly talking about
"The Godfather."

- Sounds like a poor imitation
of "The Godfather."

Almost like, you know,
"The Godfather."

This is business.

- You could see his love
for that mob lifestyle.

Everybody knew that I was
so close to the president

than Rudy Giuliani,
that I was a gatekeeper.

To be able to walk into
a room and have

all of these powerful people--
congressmen, senators--

bow down, run up to you,
kiss your ass.

It was amazing.
The power, the rush.

December 2018,
we were invited to

the White House
Hanukkah Party.

- Yeah.
- Yeah.

- Baruch atah Adonai,
Eloheinu melech ha-olam.

- Trump comes straight up
to me, shakes my hand,

looks me in the eye and says,
Rudy tells me great things.

Thank you for what you do.

And then his--
keep up the good work.

[laughs]

The President of
the United States

is sending me on a mission to
be able to save our democracy.

A week later,
we were in Ukraine.

- I knew he was
out of his league

right from the beginning.

I told him, listen, you entered
a Good Ol' Boys Club.

You don't belong there.

You do not have membership
to this club at all.

You think you might,
but all you have is access.

And access is going
to get denied

the second they are done
with you.

- When he started
traveling to Ukraine

and being on this mission,

I knew almost everything
he was doing was a bad idea.

- I'd get home and tell her,

you can't believe
what just happened.

You can't believe
who I was with.

- She'd be like,
what are you doing?

- Every chance I had to tell
him that he's out of his mind

and instead of a medal,
he's going to get handcuffs

because he's going
to be the fall guy.

This was a mission impossible.

A mission stupid.

I don't know which one,
but maybe both.

- I'll see you in Ukraine soon.
- Yeah.

- We're in Ukraine.

There was a convoy of cars
with a bunch of people in there

with guns.

We were driven first to one
house, where we switched cars.

I mean, this is right
out of a spy thriller.

It was in the middle of
nowhere, like a log cabin.

There was a Viktor Shokin.

He was an elderly gentleman.

But this guy is not your
typical grandfather.

This guy is hardcore.

- Viktor Shokin was a very
disreputable former prosecutor.

There are various
allegations of corruption.

For this country to get
the kind of help and aid

that it needed, various funding
agencies wanted them out.

Then Vice President
Biden went over there

to get rid of this guy.

- As I'm leaving in six hours,
if the prosecutor's not fired,

you're not getting the money.

- That happened.

Shokin was let go.

- Well, son of a bitch.
[laughter]

Got fired.

- Ukraine's
embattled prosecutor,

General Viktor Shokin,
is no longer in office.

Viktor Shokin's departure
comes after

the country's president,
Poroshenko,

publicly urged the
general prosecutor to resign.

- By the time Lev Parnas gets
to Shokin, he has a vendetta.

- Shokin told us Joe Biden
was involved in the firing

to protect his son
Hunter Biden,

who was a board member
of Burisma,

a corrupt
Ukrainian energy company.

It's a huge bombshell.

It would cost Biden
the nomination.

We fly down to New York.

We meet up with
Rudy in Park Avenue.

He was very excited
because Victor Shokin

is willing to play ball.

So Viktor Shokin now
needs to get a visa.

He then goes to
the US embassy,

then he gets rejected.

Rudy looks at me and says,
don't worry about that.

I'll take care of that.

He calls me on
later that evening,

says he just met with Pompeo.

Everything is good.

Shokin goes back, and they
take away his passport.

[laughs]

- And Shokin is
obviously irate,

screaming to the media
and everything that

the US ambassador, Marie
Yovanovitch, blocked his visa.

I said, Rudy,
it's Marie Yovanovitch again.

She's back at it.

Rudy loses it.

She's going to get involved
in my investigation.

I'll show her.

He texts me,
I'm calling number 1.

That was Donald Trump.

Calls me back and
tells me in two days,

everything's going
to be all right.

It's Shokin gets called
into the embassy,

where he gets a strict letter
saying that he is put on

a do-not-fly list now.

So the more pressure
we were putting on

to give him the visa,
the more they were

destroying Shokin over there.

And he was flipping losing it.
[laughs]

The president of
the United States

can't even get
a visa for somebody.

It was like The Bad News Bears
of politics.

- One thing about
Marie Yovanovitch,

she's not going to do the back
room, you know, diplomacy.

She was a very disciplined
and respected civil servant.

They needed to get her out.

- And we can't get
a visa for Shokin.

So we arranged a Skype call.
It was Rudy, myself, and Igor.

We're joined by an
ex-FBI agent that

Rudy had there to take notes.

And on the other side
was Viktor Shokin.

- How long had he been
conducting that investigation

that involved Biden's son?

- And Rudy said was
there anything illegal

that Hunter Biden
or Joe Biden did?

- Do they get a kickback?
Do they get a bribe?

- And there's a two-second
pause and then you hear--

- No.
He was basically saying--

- No. But if I would be able
to investigate it,

I'm convinced that we would
have found something there.

- Shokin had previously
investigated Burisma.

There was no credible evidence
at that time to charge

Burisma or Hunter Biden.

So for Shokin to then
bring it up again

just seemed ludicrous.

[gritty music]

- Tonight,
we have more evidence

of Ukraine gas company Burisma
leveraging Hunter Biden

for political access
and more lies from Joe Biden,

as he tries to cover up
this story.

- The bullshit pipeline
worked like this.

Between 5:00 and 7:00 in the
evenings, Rudy would text you.

Do we have anything for the
president or John Solomon?

And get some information
from Ukraine.

I'd send it over
to John Solomon,

and literally,
within an hour or two,

it'd be all over Fox News.

- Joe, remember,
you heard it here first.

Credible evidence
about your son

peddling your influence
as vice president

in exchange for
millions in one case

and billions in another case.

- If some Ukrainian called me
up with some crazy theory like

the sky is yellow, Solomon
would turn around and say,

yep, my sources confirmed
the sky is yellow,

and it'd be on Hannity.

- I can confirm to you tonight
that the US government

had open source intelligence
and was aware

as early as February of 2019
that the Ukrainian government

was planning to reopen
the Burisma investigation.

- Part of my job
was to make sure

that the information
we were getting

was coming from
credible sources.

People that were in power
in office and had authority.

But there was lots
of other characters

like oligarchs,
street guys,

businessmen that were all
trying to get into the mix.

Most of those were actually
GRU and Russian agents.

They were just babbling all
this Russian disinformation.

Nobody would listen to it
until Rudy Giuliani.

I mean, Rudy did not care, as
long as it fit his narrative.

And the narrative was
Joe Biden is bad.

- Having his son, who had just
been tossed out of the military

for drug problems,
put on the board

of the most corrupt company
in Ukraine.

- They needed to help
feed the beast.

Get it out there
on The Hill,

get it out there on Fox News.

- Well, Joe Biden
has spent weeks

deflecting the
flood of questions

about his son's shady business
deals in Ukraine and China.

- And then all of a sudden,

Hunter Biden resigns
from the board.

Lev and Igor,
they got a victory.

They're riding high.

[whimsical music]

- That was good.
But we needed more.

We didn't have
the smoking gun.

Two days later,
here comes a call,

and it's current General
Prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko.

Come on down.
You're the next contestant.

[laughs]

- Yuriy Lutsenko didn't
have a great reputation.

Like a lot of
prosecutors,

these are largely
political hacks.

They feed a certain
faction that's in power.

- He came in with a
pile of paperwork

that had to do with Burisma,

but he's not showing
any hardcore facts.

- He never left any records
nor was very specific as to,

OK, where did
the money come in?

How was it delivered?

How did Vice President
Biden benefit?

- Giuliani said, we need you
to announce an investigation

into the Bidens.

Lutsenko was willing to get
this investigation announced,

but he needed
something in return.

Yovanovitch had to go,
and that wasn't a problem

because Rudy wanted
Yovanovitch gone.

The problem is,
Trump already fired her.

Remember, when we
had our dinner,

he said get rid of her,
and she's still there.

But he couldn't understand it.

He would just scream, she's
fired and expect that's it.

She's gone.

Trump told Pompeo to fire her.

Pompeo refused.

He even screamed so loud
at his secretary, Madeline,

to fire her and she told him,
Mr. President,

I don't have the authority
to do it.

A man that's known for
firing people on TV,

and here, he can't fire
his own ambassador.

I mean, it was hilarious.

- I don't know if I'm more
offended as a Ukrainian

or as an American
to see the extents

and lengths that President
Trump was willing to go.

It didn't make sense to me.

And I think the only person
it made sense to was Trump.

It was just astonishing to see

such high levels of government
acting like children.

[intriguing music]

- One of the things that
I was fascinated to find

was that when global
energy producers

did get bank accounts, I see
charges of Lev's in Ukraine.

You know,
he's living it up in Kyiv.

- While Lev is being chased
by creditors all through

South Florida,
he is now orchestrating

a stream of money with Igor

that goes through
a foreign bank to the US.

The money is flowing.

And he is spending it with
Igor with reckless abandon.

They flew first class, they
stayed at top-level hotels,

they ate $1,000 dinners.

We're talking
$600 at Tootsies,

a strip club in Kyiv.

They were not only
moving around Ukraine,

they were jet setting
around the globe--

Paris, Warsaw, London.

They were globe-trotting
diplomats, if you will.

And I use that term loosely.

♪ ♪♪

- Here I am,
a kid out of Brooklyn

going to meet
the president of Ukraine,

the country that
I was born in,

relaying a message

from the most powerful man
in the world.

It's time.
Game time.

- I was scared every time
he went to Ukraine

that he wouldn't come back.

- Petro Poroshenko battling
to hold on to his presidency

against Zelenskyy.

- Elections were
going on in Ukraine.

I told Poroshenko that
he would give Lutsenko

the go ahead to open the
investigation into the Bidens,

and Poroshenko himself
would come out and discuss

the involvement
and the meddling

of US ambassador
Marie Yovanovitch

into Ukrainian politics.

In return, Donald Trump would
then not only have Poroshenko

visit him at the White House,

but he would also
come visit him in Ukraine

and support him
in his elections.

I made the very, very
first quid pro quo

to the President Poroshenko
of Ukraine

from President Donald Trump.

After I'm done talking,
Poroshenko sits back,

starts laughing,
and said, hold on a second.

He goes, we're not
going to do this again.

- Thank you very much.

It's a great honor to be
with President Poroshenko.

- He got screwed by Trump
on some shady coal deal,

and now he can't even
get a phone call back.

So at this point, he didn't
trust that Trump would

hold up his end of the deal.

John Solomon, Rudy,
everybody starts going crazy.

And it becomes an
all-out war between

Yuriy Lutsenko
and Rudy Giuliani.

Finally, after Rudy
getting on the phone

and literally screaming
at Lutsenko and cursing,

Lutsenko, he's going
to do the interview.

And he's going to
give us a bombshell

that we're not even ready for.

- This isn't a normal
political exercise.

This is subterfuge on
an entirely nother level.

You just don't see that.
Nowhere in American history.

- You gotta understand.
I mean, I was at the studios.

I was at the control room...

[laughs]
Overseeing this interview.

Old Soviet style,
you know, propaganda,

state TV-type of shit.

- Today, we'll launch
a criminal investigation

about this fact and we'll
give a legal assessment

of this information.

- Lutsenko tells The Hill,
we're doing an investigation.

And boom, that was another
victory for the team.

How real was
the investigation?

No more real than a lot
of the investigations

that happened there.

- So let's be perfectly clear.

Trump or Rudy
never cared if there

was an actual investigation.

Trump, even himself
said that several times

to announce it and
leave the rest to me.

- How do you gauge the
relationship between Ukraine

and specifically our
US ambassador Yovanovitch?

- That's when Lutsenko
hits us with the bomb.

- Unfortunately,
from the first meeting

with the US ambassador
in Kyiv,

Ms. Ambassador gave me
a list of people

whom we should not prosecute.

- And all hell broke loose.

- There is no proof of that,

and the State Department
flatly denied that

and said it was a fabrication.

But, you know, at the end of
the day, the damage was done.

- We were on cloud nine,
high fives,

and having dinner and drinks
and thinking, we did it.

We got it.
Mission accomplished.

- Breaking news.

In the Russia investigation,
a summary of the Mueller report

has been delivered to Congress.

- Attorney General
William Barr reported

that the special counsel
found no evidence

that the Trump campaign or
anyone associated with it

conspired or coordinated
with Russia to influence

the 2016 presidential
election.

- This was all bullshit.

- Worries among
Mueller's investigators

that Barr may have shaped
the entire narrative

about the Russia investigation.

- But it was party time at
the Trump International.

Music was going.

Congressmen, senators
were all over the place.

Finally, this Russian
collusion is going to bed.

We knew Bill Barr was
going to take care of it.

- After Mueller,
you would think at that point,

the administration
would be breathing

a collective sigh of relief.

No.

There wasn't any effort
to kind of OK,

let's play this straight.

Let's do it right.

No.
They're right back in the hunt.

Now, let's target
an ambassador.

- It's been a dramatic day.

President Trump fired US
ambassador Marie Yovanovitch.

- That morning, I wake up from
a phone call from Lutsenko,

and he's like, congratulations.

Finally, you guys
did something right.

- Yovanovitch said
she was never told why

she was removed.

- I texted Victoria Toensing
and she said,

the Wicked Witch is gone.

Like, you know,
from "The Wizard of Oz."

- The wicked old witch
at last is dead.

[cheers and applause]

- She is the
anti-corruption fighter.

And we were celebrating
that we got her out.

all: ♪ Ding, dong,
the witch is dead ♪

- What they were doing was

this dangerous form
of diplomacy.

They had the wherewithal
and the means

to get recalled an
American ambassador.

They did that.
And there was no turning back.

- And so as the Ukrainian
presidential elections start

heating up in April,
all of a sudden,

here comes Volodymyr Zelenskyy
out of nowhere.

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪♪

Here was a guy
that was a comedian

that had no chance whatsoever.

Every day,
he got bigger and bigger

until eventually he just took
over and won in a landslide.

- Having played the role
of president in a TV show,

Volodymyr Zelenskyy
is now on course

to make that role a reality.

Zelenskyy and his team
can celebrate

this election victory,
but defeating corruption

and ending the war with Russia
is going to prove far harder.

- All of a sudden, it's a
whole new cast of characters

and our mission changes.

We need to open up
a back door channel

between Zelenskyy and Giuliani
on behalf of Trump.

- The inauguration date

of President-elect Volodymyr
Zelenskyy is being discussed.

- The inauguration
is going to be big.

And it's going to
be this huge event

to show a strength for Russia.

It was very important
for Trump to be there.

And Trump said,
I don't think I can make it,

but I will send
the next best thing.

I'll send Pence.
So they were all set.

Rudy realized that the
inauguration was going

to be their pressure point.

And he will use it
to our advantage.

- We have runaway diplomats

operating in another country
under nobody's watch,

nobody's aegis, nothing.

If we lose sight of that,
we have problems.

And if we lose sight
of what happened,

we're in serious trouble
as a country.

- Lev started to slip away.

Reminds me of the
"Titanic" scene.

- Jack.

There's a boat.

Jack.

- That's pretty much
where we were

during the four years
of the presidency of Trump.

[dramatic music]

[record scratches]

I'd never know when
he was coming or going.

He could buy a ticket
in the morning,

and then cancel it by night,
and then be somewhere else

by the next morning.

When he was home,
he was unbearable.

It was Trump, Trump, Trump.
MAGA, MAGA, MAGA.

Ukraine scandal.
Joe Biden.

There was nothing else
to talk to Lev about.

- It was hardcore control
over my family.

- Are you kidding me?

You're going to watch MSNBC?

You don't know that that's full
of lies and they hate Trump?

- That was part of
the MAGA cult movement.

Once they got you in and they
told you what you could watch,

who you could speak to,
and what you could believe.

- Now I have to eat
and pretend like

it's not a big deal that Trump

is making fun of
disabled people.

- I don't know what I said.
Uh, I don't remember!

- Being derogatory
towards women.

- She's shocked
that I picked her.

- I'm not thinking,
Mr. President.

- That's OK.
I know you're not thinking.

You never do.
- I'm sorry?

- My husband is now

turning into the same
orange person on TV.

Thank God,
he didn't go spray tanning.

Eventually, that might have
gotten there, you know?

I mean, eventually him
and Rudy would have been

going together
to get spray tanned.

- They were in this
sort of like,

Republican political
industrial complex.

They were in it.

He seemed like he thought
he was untouchable.

My client had
gotten a phone call.

Hey, you know, our guy, Lev,

has connections
straight to the top.

Why are you busting our chops
about this 500 grand?

It was a thinly-veiled threat.

My client is a real
tough-minded guy.

He wasn't going to be
deterred by any threat,

thinly veiled or otherwise.

That inspired me to
be just as tenacious.

- The mission was now
to schedule a meeting

between Rudy Giuliani
and President-elect

Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

- Trump wanted
the new president

to announce an
investigation into

Joe Biden and Hunter Biden.

- The announcement would
legitimize the story

that we've been pushing
in the media.

- He wanted Rudy
to close the deal.

- We're in Ukraine,
we're pounding the pavement.

We're meeting with
every kind of character,

from your foreign ministers,
your oligarchs, your criminal.

Anybody in there,
from rabbis to popes.

My dear brother,
we are here in Ukraine.

We're here with
the Rabbi Moshe.

- God bless you, Mr. Giuliani.

- There wasn't a rock
that we didn't overturn.

I mean, from bartenders to
waitresses, we went everywhere.

It was like Groundhog Day.

We would get promises.

Everybody would tell us, yeah.
Great.

Absolutely. We'll set it up.

And then two hours later,
they disappear.

It started getting
really creepy

because some forces
out there

are stopping this
from happening.

We didn't know at the time
the US embassy was following

everything we were doing.

After every meeting,
somebody from the embassy

would come right in
afterwards and tell them,

don't meet with Rudy,
this is illegitimate.

There's proper channels.
This needs to stop.

It was us versus the deep
state and the embassy,

and we represent Donald Trump.

Kiss our ass.

So after several
people ghosting us,

I finally set up a meeting
with Minister Avakov.

He said, well,
I need an official letter.

I said, no problem.
Gave Rudy a call.

Within a couple of minutes,
there was an official letter

emailed over to me.

Avakov's eyes changed.

He understood that
this was real now.

We had an agreement on May 10.

Rudy was supposed
to fly in,

and there was supposed
to be a meeting

between Zelenskyy and Rudy.

So it's 5 o'clock
in the morning.

I hear my phone going crazy.

[phone buzzing]

It's Rudy.

I thought maybe he was
drunk or something.

Pick up the phone,
and he's screaming.

They're all against us.
This was all a set up.

The Ukrainians were going
to come out after Giuliani

and align me with Zelenskyy,
and claimed that Giuliani

was trying to shake them down.

And Giuliani said, that's it.
Get out of there.

We're not going back
to Ukraine.

Fuck them.
They're all liars.

You know, we're done.

About an hour later, my phone
starts blowing up again.

Now it's the Ukrainians.

All the Ukrainian officials
and oligarchs

calling me up saying,
what the fuck is going on?

Rudy went on Fox and
basically went on a rampage.

- I'm not going to go
because I think

I'm walking into
a group of people

that are enemies
of the president.

- Calling out names.

- A gentleman by the name
of Lutsenko.

- He even told the whole world

that Ukraine is corrupt
and fuck you.

- So no trip on Sunday.
No trips to Ukraine.

- No trips.
- My ass is on the line.

Any one of these guys out there
that I was dealing with

could have just said, he's not
leaving and I'm not leaving.

It was a terrible morning.

All of US and Ukrainian
relations are now on the line.

So I set up a meeting
with Lutsenko.

And I started going strong
and saying,

this could all be resolved.

President Zelenskyy
needs to announce

a fucking investigation.

This will stop.

Lutsenko said,
give me an hour.

And within an hour,
I got a call from Shefir.

Serhiy Shefir was the
interim Chief of Staff

to President-elect Zelenskyy.

He was his partner in his
entertainment business.

So I called Rudy.

I'll never forget
that conversation.

He was very loud, so I had
to hold the phone over here.

And he was very--
I mean, he was like,

you make sure
you tell them like,

we're not messing around.

Make him understand that if
Zelenskyy does not announce

an investigation into
the Bidens by Monday,

there will be no relationship.

There will be no military aid.
There will be no medical aid.

And Vice President Pence
will not show up

at your inauguration.

I was like, holy shit.

Pence canceling it was
a message to Vladimir Putin

that we are no longer
supporting Ukraine.

Like, how am I going
to say this?

So I start practicing
with Igor.

I see Igor is
turning pale white.

He's like,
you're not going to say this.

You do understand, this is
the president of Ukraine.

We have to think
about our safety.

We have to get out of here.

We get downstairs,
there's a whole entourage

of bodyguards and cars.

Igor kept trying to explain
to me, yeah, Lev,

they're protecting us.

But if tomorrow they
decide not to protect us...

[laughs]

We're off to see
Serhiy Shefir.

The meeting was at
a restaurant called Prague.

The whole restaurant
was closed.

Probably 40 or 50
bodyguards between

mine and Serhiy Shefir's.

And then there was
the three of us

and a little table outside.

This was literally like
a scene out of a spy movie.

I mean, James Bond
has nothing on us.

- Bond.

James Bond.

- Igor sitting next to me
taking shots

because he was
nervous as hell.

I hit Shefir hard.

I understand this meeting
might not be pleasant,

but it's very serious.

This is what needs to happen.

We've been trying to get
a meeting with

President-elect Zelenskyy.

For some reason,
we're having difficulty.

We need your help to be able
to arrange this meeting.

Looking back at,
it was just incredible

how I was explaining to him
that we were trying

to root out corruption
while at that moment

corrupting him
to the fullest extreme.

It was a simple meeting.

There was not that much to
discuss, and that was it.

That night, they ghosted me.

I remember Rudy saying,
well, now they're going

to see the wrath of Trump.

Next morning,
the Ukrainians got a phone call

from the United States
telling him

that Mike Pence is not going to
be coming to the inauguration.

Boy, was that a problem.

- Like, this is the way
he's going to go out?

Running around for Trump?
Is this really worth his life?

- Ukrainian officials
wanted Vice President Pence

to attend the inauguration
for the new president

Zelenskyy in Kyiv.

What are you learning
about that trip?

It was canceled, right?

- Pence canceling was almost
like a death sentence for us.

- [speaking Ukrainian]

- Oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskyi

owned television
broadcast network

where Zelenskyy
made his bones.

Zelenskyy and Kolomoyskyi
were essentially friends

and supporters of one another.

- This guy is as bad
as they come.

I mean, this guy has an army
of 10,000 people of his own.

So this is not
a regular oligarch.

- The first statement
he makes on television

as he gets back is--

- Basically threatening
our lives.

- I'm pretty sure I probably
broke down after that.

And I was just like,
what if he doesn't come back?

- Giuliani started tweeting,
hitting all media,

basically telling
Volodymyr Zelenskyy

that if he does not arrest
Igor Kolomoyskyi immediately,

and if something happens
to either me or Igor

while we're in Ukraine, that
he will be to blame for it.

Now, we're getting a call from
the interior minister saying,

you're out of here now.

Within moments, we were
fitted with bulletproof vests,

thrown on into
a convoy of cars

and whisked off into a plane.

No immigration,
no passport control.

Next thing you know,
we were gone.

We were out of Ukraine
and off to Paris.

And that was the last time
I ever was in Ukraine.

- That's when Trump
has to enter the fray.

- A troubling
private conversation

between President Trump
and a foreign leader

has rung such an alarm bell
that the intelligence

community's internal watchdog
calls it an urgent concern.

- This was a July 25 call
between the president

and Ukrainian President
Zelenskyy.

- And what's jumping off
the page to me

is that the president
of Ukraine says,

where are the Javelins?

Where is the defense support
you're giving us?

And the very next sentence
by the president is,

I would like you
to do us a favor.

- During the call,
Mr. Trump pressured

the Ukrainian President
eight times

to investigate
former Vice President

Joe Biden's son, Hunter.

- It was a very easy
connect the dots

to what Lev had started to do

and what President Trump
had eventually

tried to do himself.

- That the president was
saying, I need this favor.

And by the way,
I've got your money.

- This conversation
was about a trade.

- It clearly was
a quid pro quo.

- There was no quid pro quo.

No quid pro quo!

There was no quid pro quo.

- This is a very dangerous
situation for our country

right now.

And it is amazing that
we continue to let this man

be in charge of
nuclear weapons.

- Question, sir, was,
what did you want

President Zelenskyy to do
about Vice President Biden

and his son Hunter?

- Are you talking to me?

- The irony is that
it comes shortly after

he had just been investigated
for using a foreign power

to meddle in
a presidential election.

And it's happening
all over again.

- That call was perfect.
It couldn't have been nicer.

- Even if you don't believe the
whole Russia, Russia, Russia,

that Trump colluded
with the Russians--

I want to make it very clear--

that he colluded
with the Ukrainians

to meddle in
the 2020 election.

And I know it,
because I was there.

- That's really where things
started to accelerate

downward quickly.

- Mr. Trump did order a hold
on military aid to Ukraine.

- President Trump ordered his
acting Chief of Staff,

Mick Mulvaney, to delay
that military aid to Ukraine

just days before a call
with the Ukrainian President.

- We found out that Trump
actually withheld military aid.

That was a very, very
serious moment in my life.

The message I gave them,
Trump actually acted on it.

I was horrified.

- It was like, holy cow.

Now we're in it.

We're talking about
not releasing aid to Ukraine.

- Officials at the Office
of Management and Budget

relayed Mr. Trump's order to
withhold hundreds of millions

of dollars in military aid.

- One career diplomat sounding
the alarm very directly

by noting in writing
in this text,

"I think it's crazy to
withhold security assistance

for help with
a political campaign."

- Never in a million years

I'd think we would
get to that point.

I never thought
that we would not

get a meeting with Zelenskyy.

- Zelenskyy really stood up to
Lev and to Rudy and to Trump,

and he just wouldn't budge.

- Ukrainians weren't as corrupt
as he thought they were.

They weren't as corrupt
as him or Rudy.

- I really hope that
you and President Putin

get together and can
solve your problem.

That would be
a tremendous achievement.

- I thought Trump's a hero
saving our democracy

and Zelenskyy is
a corrupt leader.

And it was all the opposite.

At the end of the day,
it turned out that

Trump was the actual criminal

and Zelenskyy was
a stand-up guy.

- We were all waiting for
Trump to get presidential.

And instead,
he just became a monster.

He's a bully, and he really
needs to focus on himself.

Like, please stop focusing
on the United States.

Go sit down.
It's time.

[whimsical music]

- The serial entrepreneur-type
judgment debtors,

they're going to find
themselves into something.

And Lev found himself into
the biggest something

I've ever seen a debtor
ever get into.

We were able to find a account
that Lev controlled

through an entity called
Aaron Investments I, LLC

that the $325,000
actually came from.

They gave 325,000
to America's First Action.

- The money got
flagged by a bank.

They saw the hallmarks of
money laundering and fraud.

That got the attention
of the Feds.

- The Campaign Legal Center
filed a complaint

with the FEC.

They're basically alleging
a straw man donation

by Global Energy Producers.

And then we were
off to the races.

That was the smoking gun
we needed.

- And then a tweet
came out that listed

the top five donors
for Trump

and him and Igor
were on that list.

People started to dig in
into trying to figure out

where Lev is from,
what he's doing.

At that point, I started to
feel more kind of unsafe.

I felt like things were
destabilizing a bit.

- This is an
NBC News special report.

- Breaking this evening,
House Democrats tonight

are taking the
first formal step

that could potentially
lead to the impeachment

of President Trump.

- The impeachment inquiry
is centered on

President Trump's phone call
with the leader of Ukraine.

Now, the question,
did the president

pressure him to investigate
political rival Joe Biden?

- They testified that
President Trump froze

military aid to Ukraine
in order to force

a public announcement
of investigation

into his political rivals.

- Forced out.

The former American
ambassador to Ukraine

tells lawmakers
that President Trump

pressed to have her fired.

- Yovanovitch was recalled
from her post in May

amidst charges
from Rudy Giuliani

and in conservative media

that she had spoken out
against the president.

- Getting rid of
Ambassador Yovanovitch

helped set the stage for
an irregular channel

that could pursue the two
investigations that mattered

so much to the president--
the 2016 conspiracy theory,

and most important,
an investigation into

the 2020 political opponent

he apparently feared most,
Joe Biden.

- I get a letter from Congress
basically requesting

all of the information
that I have gathered

in Ukraine while
I was doing work

for President Trump and Rudy.

I called Rudy
right away and told him.

He said, oh.
Don't worry about it.

Let me call Trump.
We'll take care of this.

We're going to
get you a lawyer.

And it was John Dowd.

He represented President Trump
in a matter prior to that.

For John Dowd to
officially represent me,

the president had
to sign a letter

to waive a conflict
of interest.

And I have that letter.

So I fly in directly to
John Dowd's house in Cape Cod.

The first thing he does is gets
all the president's lawyers,

all the president's men
on the phone and says,

you know, it's game time.

On the call was Jay Sekulow,
Rudy Giuliani,

Victoria Toensing,
and Joe diGenova.

All the president's putzes.
[laughs]

John Dowd sent
a letter of response,

basically a fuck you letter.

There was a big joke about it.

Everybody couldn't believe
that's the way

he responded to
Congress and colleagues.

- For him to not speak
to the government,

not attempt to cooperate,

one could say that Lev's
first lawyers

were concerned about interests
other than Lev Parnas.

- I mean, I'm a little
confused at the time.

I thought they wanted me to
testify on behalf of Trump,

to tell the truth of everything
I uncovered about the Bidens.

It was the opposite.
We're going to go dark.

Nobody on our side was
scared of Congress.

There was no repercussions.

Trump and Rudy thought,
and still think,

that they are above the law.

The message in Trump world was,

don't worry about
accountability.

There won't be any.

You do what you need to do
to protect Trump.

- All right, as we have
mentioned in our monologue,

we obtain new Ukrainian
documents from Rudy Giuliani.

You interviewed Shokin.

We know why he was fired.

He was told why he was fired.

He's now said it
five separate times.

Said he was fired
because he was

interviewing and investigating
Biden's corrupt son.

- Rudy Giuliani goes on TV
with this Viktor Shokin letter.

The letter basically said,
for the first time ever,

that he officially got
fired by Joe Biden,

because he was looking into
Burisma and Hunter Biden.

Now, Hannity wants to do

an exclusive interview
with Shokin.

Rudy asked me
to help Fox to set up

this exclusive interview.

So the interview was
arranged in Vienna.

We had the studios ready.

Shokin was there, and we
were flying out there.

In the morning, we met up with
Rudy at the BLT breakfast area

and went over our game plan.

- Lev and I spoke during
that day just fine.

He was telling me
he's just hanging out

at the Trump Hotel with Rudy
waiting for his plane.

- Rudy said he got a call
from President Trump,

and he needed to see him
at the White House.

Rudy was going to meet us
a couple of days later.

So I didn't think
anything of it.

He told me, go ahead.
Set everything up.

And I'll see you
there Saturday.

- And then he left
for the airport.

- It's boarding time.

A couple of men
jumped out and said,

can we see your passports?

Me and Igor gave him
our passports.

And they turned around
and said, this is them.

You are under arrest.
They started handcuffing us.

And one of the FBI agents
says, you know,

I don't want to be
the bearer of bad news,

but your house is
being raided right now.

- They busted through the
back door as if, I don't know,

they're coming to
Osama bin Laden's house.

One lingering thought was in
my head like, what did you do?

- The arrests of two associates
of Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani

on campaign finance violations.

- The two arrested at Dulles
Airport after buying

a one-way ticket
out of the country.

- They're associates of the
president's personal lawyer,

Rudy Giuliani.

- These are the first
criminal charges

emerging from
the Trump administration's

controversial relationship
with Ukraine.

- Government documents show
that the men helped Giuliani

set up a meeting with
high-level Ukrainians

who Giuliani was lobbying
to investigate

Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

- One of the agents
said to me,

I could try and get your wife
on the phone.

And I told her I loved her.
I told her not to worry.

Called Rudy.

- That was the last
I spoke to him

for the next, like, 10 days.

- Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas
were picked up

at Dulles on Wednesday night,
just hours after

"The Wall Street Journal"
reports they had lunch

with Rudy Giuliani at
the Trump International Hotel.

- And I think Rudy knew and was
told not to be on that plane.

- I didn't get from Rudy

that he knew
this was going to happen.

But I also got from Rudy that

he wasn't very surprised
that it happened.

Rudy was saying that,
you know, don't worry.

Everything's going to be fine.

It's the Democrats
or the deep state.

It started to feel more and
more and more of everybody

kind of just disappearing
into the background.

- I guess I met him one time
and he came to an event

and took a picture with me.

- That was hard to go through,
having people just turn away.

- I don't know Lev Parnas.

- How well do you know Parnas?
- It was funny.

I didn't even realize
he was Ukrainian.

I thought he was Israeli.

- When Trump came on TV--

- Were you relying
on Lev Parnas

to get rid of your ambassador?
- No.

- And he was like, no.
I don't know him.

- Well, I don't know him.

I don't know Parnas
other than, I guess,

I had pictures taken,
which I do with

thousands of people,
including people today

that I didn't meet.

- I don't know who he is.

- I don't know what he's about.

I don't know where
he comes from.

Know nothing about him.

- He might be a fine gentleman.

- Perhaps he's a fine man.

Perhaps he's not.
I know nothing about him.

- I mean, that was,
like, so low.

It was just a lie.

Of course you know him.

- Trump says he doesn't know
these guys,

but there he is with Igor--
[laughter]

Looking like they just won
Best RV Dealership

in Gary, Indiana.

- When I told him that Trump
said he doesn't know him,

he didn't believe me.

He's like, no way.

What's Rudy doing?
Where is diGenova?

Where are they?

He had no idea that
they weren't

all running to get him out.

- I was waiting
for the cavalry.

The cavalry never came.
- Lev was expendable.

He was a good front person.

He was someone you could
ultimately disavow

or maybe arrest and shut up.

- The federal government
took notice of our case.

Someone was absolutely looking
at what we were doing,

and it was aiding them
in their investigation.

Obviously, our intent was
not to have Mr. Parnas

indicted and put in jail.

People who are in jail
can't pay debts.

- In the middle of the night,
I see a piece of paper

being slipped under
my jail cell.

It's a postcard
from Rudy Giuliani.

"Dear Lev and Igor,
the lunch was good

"and I enjoyed sharing
a table with you.

"Trump's hotel is nice,
don't you think?

"I'm sorry what happened
at Dulles Airport,

"and I guess we won't be
meeting in Vienna after all.

"Don't worry,
Paul's lawyers are good.

"He only got 8 to 10 years,
so maybe things will work out.

Rudy G."

I felt extremely abandoned.

He was like a father figure.
I really trusted him.

This is where
the first time I--

it was the beginning of me
getting out of the cold.

- I didn't want to believe
that he could hurt us

after how much Lev put
into that relationship.

Maybe more than our
marriage at the time.

- I stopped
trusting everything

they were telling me
and wanted to get somebody

to represent me
that I could trust.

- When I entered the case,
Lev and I decided

remaining silent was not
in his best interest,

that it would be
far better for Lev

if he appeared to be
a credible person,

willing to tell
important truths

at great risk to himself.

- I basically was going to
tell the world the truth.

I'm not going to
hide from anybody.

[energetic music playing]

- I look forward to defending
myself vigorously in court.

And I'm certain
that in the time,

truth will be revealed,
and I will be vindicated.

- Thank you both for
agreeing to do this.

I know that this is
a leap of trust

to speak publicly in this way
for the first time.

- Thank you for having us here.

- You gave the message
of a quid pro quo

to Ukrainian officials.

- The first quid pro quo
we gave them was

when we met with
President Poroshenko.

I wanted to talk to the FBI,
the DOJ, the Southern District.

Well, nobody wanted
to talk to me.

- Are you afraid, Mr. Mayor,
that you could be indicted?

- Oh, wow.

- What's really interesting
is Rudy Giuliani

has never been charged
for operating

as an unregistered
foreign agent.

- They helped me find people.

And as I've said,
they did a good job.

- The marquee count
in the first indictment

was Lev somehow
exerting suasion

on the president on behalf
of some Ukrainian officials

to remove the US ambassador
to Ukraine.

With this superseding
indictment,

the government very
quietly excised

their marquee allegation and
glommed into that indictment

a garden variety fraud case.

- The best thing that happened

to President Trump
and Rudy Giuliani is that

Igor and Lev get charged

with campaign
finance violations.

- Oh, poor Lev. I don't know
what he's doing to himself.

- And you can now paint them
as fraudsters.

- How did these two guys--

and I don't think
it's a stretch to say thugs--

how are they meeting with
our political leaders?

None of this raises red flags?

- Criminals with
no credibility.

- Call Giuliani & Associates.

Lev Parnas.
- Hey.

- And Igor Fruman.

- Hey, you guys.

[laughter]

- And therefore,
their testimony

and what they have to say
doesn't count.

- I don't know those gentlemen.

Now, it's possible
I have a picture with them,

because I have a picture
with everybody.

I don't know them.

- I welcome him to
say that even more.

Every time he says that,
I'll show 'em another picture.

- He's lying?
- He's lying.

- Ooh.

- What people probably
didn't expect is that

Lev photo-documented
everything.

He literally had the receipts.

Over 750 pages
of those materials

formed the basis for the vote
on the first impeachment.

- On this vote,
the yeas are 229,

the nays are 198.

Present is one.

Article 2 is adopted.

- So out of the 300-page
impeachment articles,

100 of pages of those
are my direct evidence.

Though I was not
able to testify,

the Republicans
made a huge stink

and they didn't allow me in.

What were they scared of?

- Do you know if Mr. Giuliani
was ever in contact with

Mr. Barr, specifically
about the fact

that he was trying
to get Ukraine

to announce these
investigations into Joe Biden?

- Oh, absolutely.
- Mr. Barr knew about that.

- Mr. Barr had to have
known everything.

- It was clearly
a high level of concern

at the highest levels

of the Justice Department
and Congress.

A lot of people
had to be involved

to try to keep the truth
from coming out.

- Bill Barr not
only politicized,

he weaponized the DOJ
on behalf of Donald Trump

to go after his
political enemies

and help his political friends.

- Swaddled the critic,
shut up the witness,

changed the charging decisions

to cover up to try to
protect the president.

I believe that this was worse
than Watergate.

- Lev Parnas,
an associate of Rudy Giuliani,

sentenced to 20 months
in federal prison

in Lower Manhattan.

- Parnas has been found guilty

of federal campaign
finance criminal charges.

Prosecutors accused Parnas
of hatching a scheme

to funnel millions
of dollars in funds

from a wealthy Russian
financier into US elections.

- I always used to
watch cult movies.

- Well, you know what
they think of me?

They think I'm the Son of God.

- Think, you know, something
wrong with these people.

Never happen to me.

- People play games, friend.

They'll lie and they'll lie.

- But by God's grace,
if I didn't get arrested,

indicted, de-cultinized,

whatever caused me
to stop following this madman

and to be able
to wake up again,

I would have been divorced.
I would have lost my family.

- He just got caught up.

And by the time he realized
that, unfortunately,

he was already behind bars.

- Trump inspired me,
for the first time in my life,

to vote, and I did.

I voted for Joe Biden, 2020.

- Hopefully, it's not too late
for other people.

- I betrayed Ukraine.
I betrayed America.

I'm sorry.

- When I met him,

I saw a man that, you know,
he was a broken man.

He paid a huge price
for all of this.

Luckily, he's got a strong
family and that remained.

- And since the day
of my arrest,

every day for
the past five years,

I've been saying I'm sorry
to my wife, to my family.

And I'll be saying sorry
for the rest of my life.

[indistinct chatter]

I saw Marie Yovanovitch
testify in the impeachment.

And to see the pain and to
see what she went through,

what I put her through--

- President Trump said

that I was bad news
to another world leader

and that I would be going
through some things.

- She didn't deserve
any of this.

- It was--
it was a terrible moment.

- I feel foolish.

I feel disgusted.
I feel--I'm ashamed of myself.

[indistinct chatter]

I truly believed
we were helping America.

But looking back at it now,
we've destroyed America.

[clamoring]

We have such division.

People are at
each other's throats.

[chanting]

And the sad part?

That was exactly what
Vladimir Putin wanted.

And we gave it to him
on a silver platter.

And how ironic is it?

The Reagan Republicans were
the anti-Soviet Union Russia,

stopped the Cold War,
pushed for democracy.

- Mr. Gorbachev,
tear down this wall.

[cheering]

- And now here we have
the Republicans

screaming literally
Russian propaganda.

- Why shouldn't I root
for Russia? Because I am.

- Putin ain't woke.

- Putin's a killer.

- A lot of killers--
we got a lot of killers.

What, you think our country's
so innocent?

- I don't know how anyone
can look at Putin

and think anything
but a monster,

just like I don't think
you can look at Trump--

I can't look at Trump without
thinking that he's a monster.

- Anybody that's ever been
around Donald Trump

to work for him at the
White House knows the truth.

He's unfit for office.

- I cannot in good conscience
endorse Donald Trump.

- Pence is joining
a remarkably large choir

of former Trump administration
officials

who have come out against him.

Trump's former
attorney general,

two former defense secretaries,
two of his chiefs of staff,

two national
security advisors...

- I was as close
as you could get to him.

I did all his dirty work.

And Donald Trump doesn't
care about anybody

except for himself.

He doesn't care about
the Constitution.

He doesn't care about
the United States.

Because Donald Trump
doesn't want to be president.

He wants to be a dictator.

He wants to be Vladimir Putin,
president for life.

I hope one day not only
will the country forgive me,

Ukraine will forgive me.

I hope one day Hunter Biden
could really forgive me.

I feel a lot of responsibility

because of our actions
in Ukraine.

Pushing all of this
disinformation against

Hunter Biden has now
caused real problems,

real criminal problems
that he is now facing.

- The first child of
a sitting US president

has been convicted of a crime.

- To watch Hunter Biden,
an American citizen

that has nothing to do
with politics, a son--

[voice breaks]
And I have sons--

[sniffles] To watch the pain
I caused in his life--

- A jury in Delaware
finding presidential son

Hunter Biden guilty
of three federal counts.

- I just hope one day,

I can say I'm sorry
and make it right.

[somber music]

♪ ♪♪

- Ready, babe?

- Are you ready?

♪ ♪♪

- Hunter.

It's been a long time.

- Thanks for making the trip,
my friend.

[soft dramatic music]

- 2018, November,

we were sitting
with Rudy in New York

at the Grand Havana Room.

Rudy gets a call from
one of his investigators

and starts telling him
all this stuff about Burisma

and all kinds of stuff.

And Rudy, like usual,
he'd sit back down.

We'd have drinks, have cigars,

and he'd tell us
everything that was going on.

- Yeah.
- And he starts talking.

A few months before my partner
Igor got sent a video

from Ukraine, from one of these
that we later found out

to be a Russian operative--
the infamous video

of your father
basically saying--

- Well, son of a bitch.

[laughter]
Got fired.

- Rudy took a look at that
video and basically said,

we got you, Joe.

A week later,
we were at the White House.

- Yeah.

- We're meeting with Trump
in the Red Room.

A week later,
we were in Ukraine

looking for Viktor Shokin
to pressure him

to give us dirt
or make up information

to be able to start
this whole thing.

- I'll see you in Ukraine soon.
- Yeah.

- When did it cross over
from being

a harebrained
Rudy Giuliani operation

in concert with Trump
to the DOJ?

When did Trump's lackeys
inside the DOJ

begin to also conspire to,
like--you know, to take me on?

- I mean, basically
from the very beginning,

from that first initial
meeting with Trump.

And right after that,
Giuliani started

calling all his contacts
at the DOJ and FBI

to start putting pressure
to look into you,

to look into your dad and
all of your Ukraine dealings.

You have to understand,
Hunter, at that time,

I truly believed
there was a deep state.

I truly believed that
you were up to some shit.

But there was never any
criminality in anything.

That's the whole thing.

They were just basically,
you know, innuendos,

conspiracy theories,
but no actual facts.

The crazy part, I mean,
I feel embarrassed, Hunter.

I mean,
I got your bank records.

- How did they get
my bank records?

My bank records aren't
even on a computer.

- I got an email
from John Solomon

that said that his friends
at the FBI got your records.

I don't know where, how, what.

- So the FBI
secretly subpoenaed

and got my bank records under
the Trump administration,

handed them to John Solomon,

and then Rudy Giuliani
recirculates them

back into the DOJ
and on the media?

- Absolutely.

John Solomon,
him and Hannity and Fox

had a whole system go out.
- Yeah.

So Fox was definitely like--

so Fox definitely, like,
directly involved?

- Oh, 100%.

- I watched
after you got arrested

and then clearly
were kind of shunned.

They turned their back on you.

And at that point, I--

just so you know,
I wasn't very sympathetic.

- Oh, I'm sure.
[laughter]

I'm sure.

- What conversations
have you had

with Lev Parnas
and Igor Fruman?

- I don't know those gentlemen.

- What they did, though,
is that they so quickly

turned you into
this supervillain.

- It may very well be,
with these Russian payments

to Lev Parnas,
that Lev himself

is part of a disinformation
campaign.

- A guy that's
under indictment,

a guy that's a known grifter,

a guy that had a company
called Fraud Inc.

that he ran into the ground.

- The man is
a demonstrated liar.

- And they, you know,
go after your personal life.

And they talk about, you know,
that you're really a Russian.

I mean, all of these things.

Similarly,
I gave them a lot of--

- Ammunition. Yeah.
- Ammunition.

Addiction is never an excuse,
but it's an explanation.

It's an explanation why
I ended up in

some of the rooms
that I ended up in,

doing things that
I'm ashamed of today.

- The best thing that could
have ever happened to me

was getting arrested,
as crazy as that sounds.

- It really takes a big person

to not only admit
that they're wrong,

but to do so in public

and to do it
on the stage you did.

- Lev Parnas was
the centerpiece

of a bomb-throwing
congressional hearing

on the Biden impeachment
inquiry this week.

- Today, I admit
my own wrongdoings.

I have been a convicted
federal election campaign

and fraud crimes
and served my sentence.

Despite rigorous attempts by
those in power to silence me,

I will be silenced no longer.

- To go in front of
a hostile committee

in Congress that you know
has no compunction

to break every rule
to embarrass you

and to put yourself
in that position

just so you could
tell the truth--

- The American people have been
lied to by Donald Trump,

Rudy Giuliani,
and various cohorts

of individuals in government
and media positions.

They created falsehoods to
serve their own interests,

knowing it would undermine
the strength of our nation.

- One of the hardest things to
do in life is to make amends.

And it's one of the principles
of, like, the program I follow

in terms of my own addiction.

But to do it the way
that you've done it,

on TV, in public,
while you're getting

the goddamn hell
beat out of you--

- Sounds like
everyone here today,

the only one working for
a Russian oligarch was you.

- They didn't listen
to the truth

because if they will
listen to the truth--

- The question Mr. Gaetz
had is for--

- They didn't want
to hear the truth.

You can't handle the truth,
Matt Gaetz.

- What I saw was
somebody with just

an enormous reserve
of character

when it really counted.

- Today, I ask you to
consider the following.

In nearly a year
traveling the world

and interviewing officials
in different countries,

I found precisely zero evidence

of the Bidens' corruption
in Ukraine.

The only information
I ever pushed on the Bidens

in Ukraine has come
from one source

and one source only--
Russia and Russian agents.

- And so, bottom of my heart,

I promise you,
you're a hero to me.

- Thank you so much.

- I was really,
really, really proud.

I was proud of you.

- Everything was for
the ultimate benefit

of Donald Trump and
thereby Vladimir Putin,

who used this narrative
to manipulate the public

ahead of the 2020 elections.

Sadly, they are still
doing this today

as we approach
the 2024 elections.

"Hunter, I want you to know
I wrote this book

"to tell the truth
about what happened

"during the Trump
administration.

"He used your battle with
addiction for his own agenda,

"to hurt you and your
family and your father.

"You were a casualty
in all of this.

"I regret very truly
my decision to work

"with those that tried to bring
you and your family down.

"I will do everything
in my power

to clear your name
going forward."

- Thank you, my friend.
You know, I'll treasure this.

And one thing I've learned

is that truth and love
always prevail.

May take a little while.
But the fact of the matter is,

we get up every day and we do
the next right thing, we win.

- [voice breaking]
And I'm sorry for what--

- Yeah.

Hey.
- That wasn't me.

[speaks indistinctly]
- Hey.

- I promise you.
- Hey. Listen, listen.

We get a second chance.
- Yeah.

- Both of us.
- We do. That's right.

- Both of us. Yeah.
- We do. Both of us.

[soft dramatic music]

♪ ♪♪