WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 02nd October, 2019) Family members of senior US officials would be banned from profiting in Ukraine under new legislation proposed in Congress, Senator John Kennedy said on Tuesday announcing the bill.
"Specifically, his bill will ban an immediate family member of a member of the Senate, the House, the president's cabinet, the vice president and/or the president from serving as a consultant, employee, independent contractor or board member for or owning 5 percent or more in any entity doing business in or with Ukraine," Kennedy said in a statement.
The legislation was prompted by former Vice President Joe Biden's threat in early 2017 to withhold $1 billion in US aid unless Ukraine fired a prosecutor. The prosecutor was investigating a Ukraine energy company that reportedly paid Biden's son Hunter $50,000 a month to serve on its board of directors.
US House Democrats have started an impeachment inquiry into a July 25 telephone call between US President Donald Trump and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenski during which Trump said Ukraine should investigate the Biden allegations.
Democrats have argued the US president sought dirt from a foreign government on his likely political rival in the 2020 presidential election.
Biden has publicly confirmed that just hours before leaving office ahead of Trump's January 2017 inauguration he demanded Ukraine prosecutor Viktor Shokin be fired or $1 billion in US loan guarantees would be withheld.
Shokin was subsequently dismissed and Biden has since said that his intervention was not connected to his son's work in Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers are demanding an investigation of collusion with Ukraine by Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee, suspecting that individuals in Ukraine were responsible for allegations that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller rejected the Trump-Russia collusion narrative following a probe that dominated the first two years of the Trump administration.
