Confirmed: the House now has the recording of Donald Trump telling Lev and Igor to “take her out”
Earlier today, ABC News reported that it had heard a recording of Donald Trump telling Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman in April 2018 to “take her out,” in reference to U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. ABC did not, however, publicly release the recording. Now it turns out the House has the audio in question.
ABC News reported that the recording had been made by Igor Fruman. This raised questions about who brought the recording to ABC, and whether or not Fruman was involved in the process. We still don’t know who the source was. But we do know that the House now has a copy of the recording. Lev Parnas’ attorney Joseph Bondy just told PBS NewsHour reporter Yamiche Alcindor that Lev went back and found it in his iCloud account, and he’s turned it over to the House Intelligence Committee.
It’s not entirely clear what will happen now. Adam Schiff and the House impeachment managers are wrapping up their prosecution presentation in Donald Trump’s Senate impeachment trial tonight. Will they play the relevant portion of the recording tonight, during the trial? Or will they simply release it to the public tomorrow, while Trump’s defense attorneys are trying to put on their trial defense?
In any case, it now seems a given that we’re all about to hear this recording of Donald Trump telling Lev and Igor to “take her out.” Trump couldn’t have possibly been talking about firing Ambassador Yovanovitch, because Lev and Igor clearly didn’t have the power to fire anyone. Trump knew that Lev and Igor were criminal henchmen, and he could only have been instructing them to carry out a criminal offense against Yovanovitch.
