So much for a trial interfering with the midterms, eh?Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort is pleading guilty to two federal charges stemming from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation and has reached a "cooperation agreement" as part of the plea deal.
Manafort has agreed to cooperate “fully and truthfully” with Mueller’s investigation, Judge Amy Berman Jackson said in court on Friday, including by submitting to interviews with the special counsel and providing documents related to the probe.
The Hill
Trump, probably: "I barely knew the guy. NO COLLUSION!"Speaking at the hearing before U.S. District Court judge Amy Berman Jackson, Weissmann said the 17-page plea document included the terms of Manafort’s expected cooperation.
[Prosecutor Andrew] Weissmann gave a detailed, 40-minute description of the criminal conduct in the Manafort case.
“I believe it’s fair to say that’s probably the longest and most detailed summary that ever preceded this question, but is what the prosecutor said a true and accurate description of what you did in this case,” Jackson asked Manafort.
“I did. It is,” Manafort, said, resting both hands on the lectern before him and flanked by his attorney, Richard Westling.
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White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders issued a brief statement following the announcement. “This had absolutely nothing to do with the President or his victorious 2016 Presidential campaign,” she said. “It is totally unrelated.”
The president’s lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, said “once again an investigation has concluded with a plea having nothing to do with President Trump or the Trump campaign. The reason: the president did nothing wrong.”
WaPo
The best people. No, wait, make that: Trump didn't do anything wrong.A criminal information — a legal document filed by prosecutors to detail the criminal conduct to be admitted by the defendant — was filed in advance of the plea. The document shows Manafort intends to plead guilty to two crimes of the seven he faced at trial: conspiring to defraud the United States and conspiring to obstruct justice.
The document indicates he will admit to funneling millions of dollars in payments into offshore accounts to conceal his income from the Internal Revenue Service. “Manafort cheated the United States out of over $15 million in taxes,” the document states.
The filing also offers new details about the various ways in which Manafort sought to surreptitiously lobby the U.S. government and influence American public opinion toward Ukraine.
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As part of his deal, the government plans to seize four properties, including a nearly $2 million house in Arlington, Virginia, owned by one of Manafort’s daughters. The deal also calls for forfeiture of four financial accounts and a life insurance policy.
The move toward a guilty plea is another reversal for Manafort, who has fought vociferously — but unsuccessfully — against Mueller’s probe. The 69-year-old political consultant was convicted last month in Alexandria federal court on charges of bank and tax fraud.
He has yet to be sentenced in Virginia, where legal experts say he faces eight to 10 years in prison under federal guidelines on the eight of 18 counts on which he was convicted.
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Earlier this year, Manafort derided Gates, his former business partner, for striking a deal with prosecutors that provided him leniency in exchange for testimony against his former partner.
“I had hoped and expected my business colleague would have had the strength to continue the battle to prove our innocence,” Manafort said in February.
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Several defendants have cooperated or pleaded guilty in connection with the special counsel probe, including Manafort’s former right-hand man Rick Gates; former national security adviser Michael Flynn; Alex van der Zwaan, a lawyer who worked with Manafort; W. Samuel Patten, who admitted arranging for a Ukrainian businessman to illegally donate to Trump’s inauguration; and former Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, who was sentenced to 14 days in jail last week after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI.
Can't wait to see what he has to say about Manafort now.The decision by Trump’s onetime personal lawyer Michael Cohen to plead guilty last month in a federal investigation in Manhattan particularly angered the president, who denounced him as a “flipper.”
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Prosecutors “applied tremendous pressure on him and . . . he refused to ‘break’ - make up stories in order to get a ‘deal,’ ” the president tweeted last month. “Such respect for a brave man!”
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