Tag: Trump campaign

Manafort associate pleads guilty to illegal lobbying

The following Morgan Chalfant and Lydia Wheeler was posted on the Hill website August 31, 2018:

Courtroom sketch of Paul Manafort listening to U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III at federal court in Alexandria. Credit: Dana Verkouteren, AP

Sam Patten, a former associate of Paul Manafort, pleaded guilty in federal court on Friday to illegally acting as a foreign agent and is now cooperating with the government.

Patten was charged with failing to register as a foreign agent in the United States.

The charges are related to Patten’s work lobbying on behalf of a political party in Ukraine, known as the Opposition Bloc, according to the criminal information document federal prosecutors filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Friday.

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Donald Trump’s approval rating sinks to lowest of his presidency

The following article by Joanna Walters was posted on the Guardian website August 31, 2018:

New survey shows first time the national displeasure rating has exceeded 50%, and a majority of support for Mueller’s Russia investigation

Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Indiana. Credit: Mandel Ngan, AFP, Getty Images

Donald Trump has slumped to the lowest approval rating of his presidency, with 60% disapproving of his performance as the US president, according to a new national survey.

The figure includes 53% who say they disapprove strongly of his performance in the White House, the first time the national displeasure rating has exceeded 50%, according to a new ABC/Washington Post poll published on Friday morning.

The poll also found that a majority support the special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation and think Trump should not fire the attorney general, Jeff Sessions.

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Trump’s Criminal Ex-Campaign Chair Almost Reached Deal with Robert Mueller — But It All Fell Apart: Report

The following article by Cody Fenwick was posted on the AlterNet.org website August 27, 2018:

Paul Manafort was found guilty on eights counts of federal crimes last week.

Donald Trump, Paul Manafort and Ivanka Trump check the podium at the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland, July 21, 2016. Credit: Bill Clark, CQ Roll Call, Getty Images

Only one person targeted by special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation has tried to fight the prosecutors’ charges and taken the case to court: President Donald Trump’s former campaign chair Paul Manafort.

Manafort was convicted last week on 8 counts, including bank and tax fraud. But according to a new report, his legal team actually met with Mueller to discuss to possibility of a plea deal, according to a new Wall Street Journalreport. He faces another set of charges in an upcoming case from the special counsel in September:

The plea discussions occurred as a Virginia jury was spending four days deliberating tax and bank fraud charges against Mr. Manafort, the people said. That jury convicted him on eight counts and deadlocked on 10 others. Prosecutors accused Mr. Manafort of avoiding taxes on more than $16 million he earned in the early 2010s through political consulting work in Ukraine.

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Trump gang’s criminal rap sheet: 20 guilty pleas and convictions … so far

The following article by Caroline Orr was posted on the ShareBlue.com website August 24, 2018:

Here’s a look at the charges, guilty pleas, and convictions piling up all around Trump.

Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, was found guiltyon eight federal charges Tuesday, just an hour before Trump’s longtime lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to eight counts, including illegally paying hush money for the purpose of helping Trump win the election.

With previous guilty pleas from Rick Gates (2 counts), George Papadopoulus (1 count), and Mike Flynn (1 count), that brings the total number of Trump associates who have pleaded guilty to or been convicted of criminal charges in the Russia probe to five, and the total count of criminal charges on their rap sheet to 20.

While Trump and his legal team tried to make the best of the situation this week, the only defense Rudy Giuliani could come up with was that Trump himself has not been indicted (yet), though legal experts say the charges against Cohen make Trump an unindicted co-conspirator in the illicit payment scheme.

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‘Grave Mistake’: Trump-Supporting Manafort Juror Warns the President Against Pardoning His Ex-Campaign Chair

The following article by Matthew Chapman was posted on the AtlerNet.org website August 24, 2018:

Paula Duncan is a hardcore Trump supporter. But she found Manafort guilty and doesn’t want the president to intervene.

Paula Duncan is a steadfast supporter of President Donald Trump. She considers Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation to be a “witch hunt.” When she was selected as a juror in the case of Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort, which stemmed from Mueller’s investigation, she even brought her “Make America Great Again” hat to the federal courthouse for the Eastern District of Virginia and kept it in her car during the proceedings.

But even she could see, once the trial got going and Mueller’s prosecutors presented their evidence, that Manafort was guilty of money laundering and tax fraud. She voted to convict him on all 18 counts. And now, she has a message for the president she loves: don’t interefere.

“I feel it would be grave mistake for President Trump to pardon Paul Manafort,” Duncan told CNN’s Anderson Cooper in an interview that will air on Friday night. “Justice was done, the evidence was there and that’s where it should stop.”

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Devin Nunes silent after Trump gang’s 16 convictions and guilty pleas

The following article by Caroline Orr was posted on the ShareBlue.com website August 24, 2018:

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.)Credit: Carlos Barria, Reuters

Rep. Devin Nunes seems to hope that ignoring the damning news will make it go away.

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) is one of Trump’s most outspoken defenders. He even admitted, during a private fundraiser, that he uses his position as head of the House Intelligence Committee to shield Trump from scrutiny as the ongoing Russia investigation continues to deliver damning evidence.

And to be sure, there’s plenty of damning evidence that Trump needs protection from: Two dozen people, including five in Trump’s inner circle, have been charged in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

That’s what makes Nunes’ silence this week so conspicuous.

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The three illegal acts that may have helped Trump win the presidency

The following article by Phillip Bump was posted on the Washington Post website August 24, 2018:

After Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen’s convictions, The Post’s Carol D. Leonnig unpacks the fallout and path forward for President Trump and the Russia probe. (Jenny Starrs /The Washington Post)

The nation heard this week accusations that Donald Trump was personally involved in the decision to offer two women money shortly before the 2016 election to keep them from sharing stories of alleged affairs. Trump’s longtime personal attorney, Michael Cohen, admitted under oath to having been instructed by Trump to work with David Pecker, chairman and chief executive of American Media Inc., to arrange a payment to former Playboy model Karen McDougal. He also admitted to having been instructed by Trump to pay off adult-film actress Stormy Daniels. Both payments involved felony violations of campaign finance law.

That revelation is remarkable in its own right. But it is also worth remembering it becomes the third allegation of an effort to surreptitiously aid Trump’s 2016 campaign that violated the law.

The hush money. According to the government’s delineation of how the campaign finance violations occurred (an account Cohen attested was accurate and has been bolstered by reports that Pecker is cooperating with authorities), AMI and Pecker’s commitment to aid Trump in burying unfavorable stories began in August 2015. The first occasion on which that effort was realized (and is publicly known) was the payment to McDougal, which was made in early August 2016. The payment was made with a commitment by Cohen to repay the money, the subject of the recorded conversation between Trump and Cohen that was released last month. In early October, Pecker called that deal off.

Here’s Why Paul Manafort’s Second Trial Could Be Even Worse for Him Than His First

The following article by Alex Henderson was posted on the AlterNet.org website August 22, 2018:

He will go to trial next month in Washington, DC for additional felony charges.

Albert V. Bryan Courthouse. Credit: Zach Gibson, Getty Images

Tuesday, August 21, 2018 was a very bad day for President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, who was found guilty of eight felony counts in a federal courtroom in Alexandria, Virginia near Washington, DC. After deliberating for four days, a jury determined that Manafort was guilty of five counts of tax fraud, two counts of bank fraud and one count of failing to file a report of foreign bank accounts. And the 69-year-old Manafort—a veteran political consultant who also worked on the presidential campaigns of Ronald Reagan, Gerald R. Ford, George H.W. Bush and Bob Dole—is facing another legal battle as well: next month, he will go to trial in Washington, DC for additional felony charges.  Continue reading “Here’s Why Paul Manafort’s Second Trial Could Be Even Worse for Him Than His First”

Lone holdout on Manafort jury blocked conviction on all counts, juror says

The following article by Matt Zapotosky was posted on the Washington Post website August 23, 2018:

This courtroom sketch shows Paul Manafort listening to U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III at federal court in Alexandria. Credit: Dana Verkouteren, AP

A juror in the trial of Paul Manafort said that all but one of the jurors wanted to convict President Trump’s former campaign chairman on every charge he faced — although she criticized special counsel prosecutors as seeming “bored” throughout the trial and said she believed their true motive was to “get the dirt on Trump.”

The juror, Paula Duncan, spoke to Fox News Channel on Wednesday and later to NBC News . She told Fox that jurors “again and again” laid out for the lone holdout the evidence that convinced them that Manafort was guilty. But the holdout, a woman, said she harbored reasonable doubt, Duncan said.

“The evidence was overwhelming,” Duncan said, pointing to prosecutors’ extensive paper trail. “I did not want Paul Manafort to be guilty, but he was, and no one’s above the law.”

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Trump Praises Manafort, Saying ‘Unlike Michael Cohen’ He ‘Refused to Break’

The following article by Julie Hirschfeld Davis and Eileen Sullivan was posed on the New York Times website August 22, 2018:

WASHINGTON — President Trump on Wednesday praised his just-convicted former campaign chairman for refusing to “break” and cooperate with federal prosecutors investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, expressing appreciation for the personal loyalty of a felon found guilty of defrauding the United States government.

In a series of tweets the morning after an extraordinary day in which Paul Manafort, his former campaign chief, was convicted of tax and bank fraudand his longtime personal lawyer, Michael D. Cohen, pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations he said were directed by Mr. Trump, the president appeared to suggest he was more concerned with the fallout for himself than with the crimes.

He compared Mr. Cohen unfavorably with Mr. Manafort, attacking Mr. Cohen as a bad lawyer who had caved to pressure from biased federal prosecutors while lauding Mr. Manafort as a “brave man” with a “wonderful family” who had stood strong.

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