President Trump told GOP lawmakers that he didn’t want to make the phone call to the Ukrainian president that sparked an impeachment inquiry in the House but did so after being urged by Energy Secretary Rick Perry, according to a report.
Defending his conversation with President Volodymyr Zelensky as “perfect,” Trump told Republican House members on Friday that Perry brought up the call, Axios reported on Saturday.
“Not a lot of people know this but, I didn’t even want to make the call. The only reason I made the call was because Rick asked me to. Something about an LNG [liquefied natural gas] plant,” the news site reported.
Trump has said he made the call to Zelensky on July 25 to congratulate him on his election win before it turned to the topic of corruption in the eastern European country.
That’s when he urged Zelensky to contact Attorney General William Barr and personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani about investigating Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who had been employed by a Ukrainian natural gas firm.
A whistleblower’s account of that conversation released last month led House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to launch an impeachment inquiry.
And a rough transcript of Trump’s call to Zelensky did not mention Perry by name.
In an interview on the Christian Broadcasting Network on Friday, Perry, who is reportedly planning to exit the administration by the end of November, said Biden or his son never came up with Trump White House officials.
“Not once, not once as God as my witness, not once was a Biden name – not the former vice president, not his son ever mentioned,” Perry said.
His spokeswoman, Shaylyn Hynes, acknowledged that Perry “encouraged” Trump to talk to Zelensky “to discuss matters related to their energy security and economic development.”
There is no evidence that Biden or his son did anything wrong.