Burisma sought McCain Institute training deal in 2017 while under U.S. scrutiny and Hunter Biden sat on board

Emails made public by the White House Government Transparency Task Force show that Burisma Holdings continued its image‑rehabilitation drive in September 2017, eight months into President Donald Trump’s first term, by seeking a training partnership with the McCain Institute for International Leadership.

The request, sent by a senior director at the institute, asked U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch for her assessment of a proposal from Burisma and its Washington lobbyist, Blue Star Strategies, to fund a two‑week Leadership Development and Professional Capacity Building program for Ukrainian public prosecutors.

Yovanovitch forwarded the request to her deputy, George Kent, who replied tersely that a company previously investigated by Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office (GPO) should not be providing funding for training to that same office. Kent warned the proposal would not survive a “Washington Post sniff test.”

Following Kent’s blunt response, Yovanovitch asked for a summary of the concerns surrounding Burisma’s reputation and later wrote to the McCain Institute urging caution. The correspondence underscores that Burisma’s attempts to improve its standing in Washington extended well beyond the period when Hunter Biden, son of then‑Vice President Joe Biden, first joined its board.

Earlier efforts included recruiting Blue Star Strategies to halt investigations into Burisma founder Mykola Zlochevsky and to lobby the U.S. embassy for a visa restoration. Blue Star also arranged meetings with the embassy in early 2018, suggesting the outreach persisted throughout the Trump administration despite ongoing scrutiny.

The newly released emails add another layer to the controversy surrounding Burisma’s political connections, highlighting that the firm continued to seek legitimacy through U.S. institutions even as it remained under investigation. The task force’s disclosure may prompt further examination of how foreign entities engage American policy influencers during periods of heightened political tension.