Tag: Trump campaign manager

Paul Manafort released from prison, granted home confinement due to coronavirus fears

Washington Post logoPaul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman, was released Wednesday to serve his prison term under home confinement because of coronavirus fears, one of his lawyers confirmed.

Manafort had been imprisoned since June 2018 when he was indicted by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III on a charge of witness tampering while awaiting trial on bank and tax fraud charges, for which he was convicted that summer. He later pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruct justice related to his undisclosed lobbying for a pro-Russian politician and political party in Ukraine.

Manafort, serving a seven-year term, was released to his home in Alexandria, Va., from the minimum-security Loretto Federal Correctional Institution in central Pennsylvania. His term was set to end in November 2024. His release was first reported by ABC News. Continue reading.

Paul Manafort’s legal problems keep going from bad to worse

AlterNet logoThe legal problems of Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager, have been going from bad to worse. The 70-year-old Manafort is already serving seven and one-half years in federal prison, but when he appeared in a courtroom in New York City on Thursday, June 27, he was fighting separate accusations and entered a “not guilty” plea to mortgage fraud charges. And if he is ultimately convicted, there is a possibility that Manafort could end up with even more prison time.

The mortgage fraud charges Manafort pled “not guilty” to were not federal charges, but rather, charges in New York State and were part of an indictment by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr. And the fact that Vance is prosecuting Manafort at the state level is important.

In 2018, Manafort’s federal prosecution and trial in Alexandria, Virginia were a result of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. Manafort was never accused of criminally conspiracy with Russian government officials, and when Mueller wrapped up his investigation earlier this year, he concluded that the 2016 Trump campaign’s interactions with Russians — although questionable — never reached the level of a full-fledged criminal conspiracy. But Mueller’s team found a mountain of evidence of tax and bank crimes on Manafort’s part, and he was convicted on multiple counts last year.

View the complete June 28 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Trump’s campaign manager gave a paid speech in Romania, prompting ethics concerns

BRUSSELS — The day before special counsel Robert S. Mueller III submitted his report to the Justice Department last month, Washington was abuzz with what revelations it might contain about contacts between the 2016 Trump campaign and foreign officials. But President Trump’s 2020 campaign manager, Brad Parscale, was an ocean away, delivering a paid speech to a room full of Romanian politicians and policy elites.

Legal analysts said Parscale’s visit broke no laws so long as he does not do any lobbying in the United States on behalf of foreign clients without registering. But ethics experts said any money changing hands between foreign citizens and campaign officials creates an obstacle course of potential risks. And some ethics lawyers worried that Parscale’s engagement — which received little attention outside Romania at the time — is a sign that the 2016 Trump campaign’s freewheeling approach to foreign contacts may be carrying over to its 2020 successor.

“The appearances are terrible,” said Richard Painter, a chief ethics lawyer to President George W. Bush. “You would certainly think that a campaign manager would not take money from foreign nationals in this political environment.

View the complete April 30 article by Michael Birnbaum and Ioana Burtea on The Washington Post  website here.

After two convictions, pressure mounts on Trump

The following article by Dan Balz was posted on the Washington Post website August 21, 2018:

In one hour on Aug. 21, the presidency of Donald Trump was dramatically altered with the conviction of Paul Manafort and the guilty plea of Michael Cohen. (JM Rieger/The Washington Post)

No day during President Trump’s 19 months in office could prove as dangerous or debilitating as Tuesday. Everything that happened in a pair of courtrooms hundreds of miles apart strengthened the hand of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and weakened that of the president of the United States.

This was a day when truth overran tweets, when facts overwhelmed bald assertions. Presidential tweets, however provocative, eventually disappear into the ether. Tuesday’s convictions could send two people who have had close relationships with Trump to prison for several years, while one of them brought the investigation to the doorstep of the White House. Continue reading “After two convictions, pressure mounts on Trump”

Paul Manafort’s Trial Starts Tuesday. Here Are the Charges and the Stakes.

The following article by Sharon LaFraniere and Emily Baumgaertner was posted on the New York Times website July 29, 2018:

Paul Manafort after his arraignment hearing in March at the federal courthouse in Alexandria, Va. Credit: Al Drago, The New York Times

WASHINGTON — Paul Manafort, the veteran Republican political operative and lobbyist who helped run President Trump’s 2016 campaign, is scheduled to go to trial on financial fraud charges starting on Tuesday in United States District Court in Alexandria, Va.

The main points to be aware of:

  • It is the first trial stemming from charges brought by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel investigating Russia’s interference in the campaign.

View the complete post here.