Paul Manafort pleads guilty to reduced charges and agrees to cooperate with special counsel's probe
Del Quentin Wilber
Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman, has agreed to plead guilty to reduced charges and to cooperate with special counsel Robert S. Muller III in his investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential race, prosecutors said Friday, marking a dramatic about-face for the former Trump deputy.
The plea deal, announced Friday in federal court in Washington, will allow Manafort, 69, to avoid a second trial on charges stemming from his lucrative work for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine before he joined the Trump campaign.
Andrew Weissman, one of the prosecutors, told U.S. District Judge Amy Jackson that Manafort would plead guilty to conspiring against the United States and conspiring to obstruct justice. He said Manafort had agreed to cooperate with the special counsel investigation as part of his plea.
Weissman said the remaining five charges against Manafort would be dropped at sentencing or upon completion of his successful cooperation.
The plea deal is mixed news for the White House. It could provide Mueller with new evidence or leads to chase in a politically sensitive probe that President Trump has relentlessly denounced as a “witch hunt” but that already has led to more than two dozen indictments.
But it also avoids a federal trial, scheduled to start on Sept. 24, that would keep Manafort’s criminal charges in the headlines before the November midterm elections.
Manafort is the fourth Trump campaign aide or administration official to plead guilty as a result of the Mueller investigation.
The longtime Republican political strategist was scheduled to stand trial in Washington on charges of conspiracy to commit money laundering, acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign principal, making false statements and obstruction of justice.
He was convicted last month in Alexandria, Va., on eight charges of bank and tax fraud, also related to his work in Ukraine, and could face up to 80 years in prison. The jury could not reach a verdict on 10 other counts.
Prosecutors alleged that Manafort failed to report tens of millions dollars in income he earned from 2010 through 2014 by working for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine. He used that money to finance a lavish lifestyle and turned to lying on bank loans to keep the cash flowing after his Ukrainian business dried up, prosecutors alleged.
“Manafort cheated the United States out of over $15 million in taxes,” the government document filed Friday states.
The obstruction of justice charge stemmed from an effort by Manafort and a former business associate in Ukraine, Konstantin Kilimnik, a dual Russian and Ukrainian citizen, to “influence, delay and prevent the testimony” of two witnesses in the planned second trial. Mueller’s prosecutors have alleged in court papers that Kilimnik has ties to Russian intelligence services.
Manafort and his legal team had long said they were not interested in pleading guilty or cooperating in Mueller’s investigation of Russia’s election meddling and related matters.
But Manafort has been under mounting financial pressure, which may have contributed to a change of heart. Legal defenses in financial fraud cases are costly, and his conviction in Virginia will probably result in a prison sentence of about 10 years, according to legal experts.
It is not clear how Trump will react to a plea deal by Manafort. The president has repeatedly called Mueller’s investigation a “witch hunt” and has lamented the prosecution of his former campaign chairman.
“It doesn’t involve me, but it’s a very sad thing,” Trump said after Manafort’s conviction last month.
Manafort’s team has been engaged in plea discussions with Mueller’s prosecutors since last month to avoid a second trial.
Rudolph W. Giuliani, Trump’s lawyer, told Politico late Wednesday that a guilty plea would not preclude Trump’s granting Manafort a pardon. “No, it doesn’t. I can’t speak for his exercising discretion on a pardon. But I don’t see why it would foreclose it, no.”
Several other former senior Trump aides, including Trump’s former national security advisor, Michael Flynn, have already pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with Mueller as part of their plea agreements.
Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty last month to campaign finance violations in a deal with federal prosecutors in New York City that did not require cooperation.
Since being appointed in May 2017 after the abrupt firing of FBI Director James B. Comey by the president, Mueller has been working at a brisk clip. He has obtained indictments of a dozen Russian intelligence officers on charges of hacking Democratic Party organizations and making sure the stolen information became public. He also has charged three Russian companies and 13 Russian citizens in a widespread effort to wield social media messages, fake online personas and staged rallies to sow discord in the United States.
8:50 a.m.: This article was updated with Manafort’s agreement to cooperate with the special counsel investigation.
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-p ... story.html
Paul Manafort agrees to cooperate with Robert Mueller's prosecutors – live updates
Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman agrees to cooperate at a court hearing in Washington DC, according to federal prosecutor
Trump’s ex-campaign chair strikes plea deal with special counsel
LIVE Updated 4m ago
Fri 14 Sep 2018 12.09 EDT First published on Fri 14 Sep 2018 10.52 EDT
There are still many outstanding questions about what the deal entails and how – if at all – it impacts the president.
Here’s what we know so far.
Manfort has entered into a “cooperation agreement” with federal prosecutors. Prosecutor Andrew Weissmann did not provide additional details on the agreement.
Trump’s former campaign chair pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges.
The deal will allow Manafort to avoid a second trail, which was scheduled to start in Washington D.C. next week. This helps Republicans and the president avert weeks of potentially damaging headlines ahead of the 2018 congressional midterms.
The second trial was related to his consulting work on behalf of Kremlin politicians and oligarchs in Ukraine.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/liv ... ve-updates
IN THE WORDS OF MARCI WHEELER
Trump is well and truly fucked.
So here’s what Robert Mueller just did:
He sewed up the key witness to implicate the President,
and he paid for the entire investigation.
And it’s only now lunch time.
CHECKMATE: THE MANAFORT COOPERATION IS PARDON PROOF
September 14, 2018/74 Comments/in 2016 Presidential Election, Mueller Probe /by emptywheel
I was virtually certain that the plea deal Manafort is pleading to today would include cooperation — and I was correct. Andrew Weissmann told Amy Berman Jackson that the deal does require Manafort cooperation.
I was certain not just because of the tease in the Special Counsel announcement, above, that additional information would be forthcoming.
But the fact that no media outlet was able to confirm whether or not the plea would include cooperation could only be possible if Mueller had made silence about that fact part of the deal. Otherwise, Manafort’s lawyers would have confirmed that it included no cooperation to placate the President. As it was, no one outside of the deal knew that the plea did include cooperation until Manafort was already pleading guilty.
And at this point, the deal is pardon proof. That was part of keeping the detail secret: to prevent a last minute pardon from Trump undercutting it.
Here’s why this deal is pardon proof:
Mueller spent the hour and a half delay in arraignment doing … something. It’s possible Manafort even presented the key parts of testimony Mueller needs from him to the grand jury this morning.
The forfeiture in this plea is both criminal and civil, meaning DOJ will be able to get Manafort’s $46 million even with a pardon.
Some of the dismissed charges are financial ones that can be charged in various states.
Remember, back in January, Trump told friends and aides that Manafort could incriminate him (the implication was that only Manafort could). I believe Mueller needed Manafort to describe what happened in a June 7, 2016 meeting between the men, in advance of the June 9 meeting. I have long suspected there was another meeting at which Manafort may be the only other Trump aide attendee.
And Manafort has probably already provided evidence on whatever Mueller needed.
So here’s what Robert Mueller just did: He sewed up the key witness to implicate the President, and he paid for the entire investigation. And it’s only now lunch time.
As I disclosed July, I provided information to the FBI on issues related to the Mueller investigation, so I’m going to include disclosure statements on Mueller investigation posts from here on out. I will include the disclosure whether or not the stuff I shared with the FBI pertains to the subject of the post.
https://www.emptywheel.net/2018/09/14/t ... don-proof/
Remember, too, that in the wake of the Gates plea, Mueller got warrants for the phones of probably around 10 Trump aides.
Manafort will probably get him to more
Manafort has to meet now with Mueller WITHOUT his lawyer present
Manafort now works for the FBI
