The White House helped arrange a phone call between Rudy Giuliani and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo the day after the President’s personal lawyer handed over materials with unproven claims about former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter, according to documents released by the State Department late Friday night.
The documents show that Pompeo spoke with Giuliani briefly twice in late March – both before and after he handed off a packet of information that included claims against the Bidens. Only the second conversation was facilitated by the White House.
The emails provide new insight into how Giuliani’s efforts were coordinated through the White House. Pompeo had previously attempted to distance himself from the packet of information on Biden that Giuliani had compiled.
Emails released Friday evening show Giuliani and Pompeo spoke first on March 26 for five minutes. Giuliani told NBC that he handed over the packet of material to the State Department on March 28 and he spoke again to Pompeo on March 29, this time for four minutes.
That second phone call occurred after a senior manager in Giuliani’s office reached out by email to Madeleine Westerhout, the then-personal assistant to Trump, to see if she had a phone number for Pompeo.
“I’ve been trying and getting nowhere through regular channels,” wrote Giuliani’s assistant.
Westerhout then asked the State Department how to get Giuliani and Pompeo in touch. The arrangement for the call happened even before the documents were given to Pompeo.
The emails released Friday also indicate Pompeo spoke with Republican Rep. Devin Nunes, the House Intelligence Committee ranking member, two days after his March 29 call with Giuliani. But like his calls with the former New York mayor, no topics are revealed.
The documents were released to the non-partisan watchdog group American Oversight as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for State Department Ukraine records.
Some of the documents released on Friday night were the same as those provided to Congress by the State Department’s inspector general, which contained unproven claims about Joe and Hunter Biden. There is no evidence of wrongdoing by either Biden.
Giuliani told CNN in October that some of those documents provided to Congress by the inspector general had originated with him.
Giuliani gave the documents to the White House, which then passed them to Pompeo, a source familiar with the matter told CNN at the time.
Pompeo gave the documents to a subordinate, who provided them to the legal counsel at the State Department, the source said. The documents were ultimately given to the inspector general.
Giuliani said that in late March, he had “routed” what he called an “outline” of allegations against Biden, as well as former American Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, to Pompeo’s office. He said he also had sent details of his interviews from earlier in the year with the incumbent and former top prosecutors in Ukraine, who helped provide him with the information in his outline.
Giuliani said he received a phone call shortly thereafter from Pompeo, who told Giuliani he would be referring the documents for investigation.
“They told me they were going to investigate it,” Giuliani told CNN.
CNN’s Caroline Kelly, Jeremy Herb, Lauren Fox, Manu Raju and Jennifer Hansler contributed to this report.