Former U.S. Ambassador to the Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch
Saul Loeb / AFP – Getty Images file
Rudy Giuliani, after saying in interviews that ousted U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was an obstacle to getting the country to announce investigations desired by his client President Donald Trump, claimed Tuesday that she “needed to be removed for many reasons.”
…
“I believed that I needed Yovanovitch out of the way,” Giuliani told The New Yorker in a report published Monday afternoon, adding, “She was going to make the investigations difficult for everybody.”
In text messages to NBC News Tuesday morning, Giuliani repeated the assertion that the former ambassador was impeding his attempts to investigate his claims about the Bidens and Democrats.
Speaking with The New York Times following publication of The New Yorker story, Giuliani shed more light on his role in her removal and said he provided Trump with information showing that Yovanovitch was, in Giuliani’s assessment, blocking investigations into the Bidens and Democrats. That led Trump to have Giuliani speak with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo about Yovanovitch, The Times reported, adding that Yovanovitch was recalled as ambassador within weeks.
“I think my information” played a role in her ouster, Giuliani told The Times. “I don’t know. You’d have to ask them. But they relied on it,” he said of Trump and Pompeo.
Navy Vet