I believe the federal crime is called ‘Seditious Conspiracy’, right along with real perjured testimony to congress, under oath.

Impeachment Boomerang: Contacts exposed between US embassy, Hunter Biden-connected Ukraine firm

During President Trump’s impeachment, former U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch testified to Congress that she knew little beyond an initial briefing and “press reports” about Burisma Holdings, the Ukrainian natural gas firm that had hired Vice President Joe Biden’s son Hunter and was dogged by a corruption investigation.

“It just wasn’t a big deal,” she declared under oath on Oct. 11, 2019.

But newly unearthed State Department memos obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show Yovanovitch’s embassy in Kiev, including the ambassador herself, was engaged in several discussions and meetings about Burisma as the gas firm scrambled during the 2016 election and transition to settle a long-running corruption investigation and polish its image before President Trump took office.

Yovanovitch, for instance, was specifically warned in an email by her top deputy in September 2016 — three years before her testimony — that Burisma had hired an American firm with deep Democratic connections called Blue Star Strategies to “rehabilitate the reputation” of the Ukrainian gas firm and that it had placed “Hunter Biden on its board,” the memos show.

She also met directly with a representative for Burisma in her embassy office, less than 45 days before Trump took office, a contact she did not mention during her impeachment deposition.

The discussions about Burisma inside Yovanovitch’s embassy were so extensive, in fact, that they filled more than 160 pages of emails, memos and correspondence in fall 2016 alone, according to the State Department records obtained under FOIA by the conservative group Citizens United.

The contacts included a detailed private letter hand-delivered to Yovanovitch by one of Burisma’s lawyers in September 2016, a briefing later that month from her staff on Burisma’s issues, and a meeting scheduled between the ambassador and a Burisma representative shortly before Christmas 2016 as the Obama administration was preparing to leave office.

Yovanovitch, who recently retired from State, did not respond Tuesday to a message sent to her private email seeking comment. Her lawyer during the impeachment proceedings, Lawrence S. Robbins, also did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

State officials declined comment.

David Bossie, a former congressional investigator and current outside adviser to Trump who runs Citizen United, said the documents his group obtained raise questions about Yovanovitch’s testimony last fall and what else Congress may not know about the embassy’s involvement with the Hunter Biden-connected Burisma firm.

“These new records clearly don’t support Ambassador Yovanovitch’s testimony under oath during [Rep. Adam] Schiff’s sham impeachment. Her sworn testimony must be investigated and scrutinized just like in the case of General [Michael] Flynn,” he said. “You can’t have two sets of rules.”

The impeachment hearings last fall, which focused on efforts by Trump and his lawyer Rudy Guiliani to find evidence inside Ukraine on the Bidens and Burisma and to remove Yovanovitch from her job as U.S. ambassador, included testimony from Yovanovitch herself………….

“What do you know about the investigation of Burisma?” Yovanovitch was asked at one point during her October testimony.

“Not very much. And, again, that happened before I arrived,” she testified. “… Burisma wasn’t a big issue in the fall of 2018 — 2016 when I arrived.”

“Were you aware at that time of Hunter Biden’s role with Burisma?” she was asked at another point.

“Yes. As I mentioned, I became aware during the Q&A in the prep for my testimony,” she answered.

Yovanovitch said she believed she learned from press reports that Burisma’s criminal case had been dormant by the time she arrived in Kiev in late summer 2016.

“I’m trying to understand your testimony, because earlier in the day you said that, based on press reports, your understanding was that it was dormant. You may have had additional information it was dormant, or you don’t know?” Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., inquired at one point.

“Yes. And all I can tell you is it was a long time ago and it just wasn’t a big issue,” she said.

“So I just want to understand your position. Obviously, you knew that Burisma was dormant, based on press reports. That was what you stated earlier,” Zeldin pressed.

“Uh-huh,” she answered.

“But you’re saying that you may have had other information, but you don’t recall that now?” the lawmaker followed.

“I may have had other information, but I don’t recall how I had that impression …” she answered.

During a nationally televised impeachment hearing a month later in the House, Yovanovitch doubled down on her testimony that Burisma and Hunter Biden weren’t on her radar when she took over as ambassador. “It was not a focus of what I was doing in that six-month period,” she testified anew.

But the memos show Yovanovitch was informed that the criminal cases were actively being settled in fall 2016 and that Burisma and its founder Mykola Zlochevsky were trying to repair the company’s reputation with the U.S. Embassy.  ………….