[ April 23, 2024 ]
I like Paul Manafort. In some ways, he reminds me of John Gotti. His appearance is always immaculate, he maintains a pleasant demeanor even in the face of Robert Mueller’s aggressive, politically motivated tactics and he refuses to grovel before Mueller’s henchmen. That’s where the similarities end. Manafort is not a murderer.
As the trial of the former Trump campaign chairman begins, all eyes turn to Alexandria, Va. Manafort is facing 18 charges including income tax evasion, lying on bank loan applications and failure to report foreign bank accounts. Mueller is charging Manafort with crimes that predate his association with Trump by a decade. If convicted on all counts, Manafort faces a maximum potential sentence of 305 years, which is a disproportionately long sentence. Tucker Carlson points out that the average sentence for a violent felon in the US is 6 ½ years. And, once this trial ends, Manafort will be tried in a Washington, DC courtroom for an additional seven charges.
Because Mueller has been unable to find evidence that President Trump colluded with Russia to win the 2016 election or that he obstructed justice, he feels that throwing the book at a Trump associate is the best he can do. According to Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz, Manafort’s real crime is his association with Trump.
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He argues that Mueller and his team are trying hard to “squeeze” Manafort into a deal where he will testify against President Trump in return for leniency. Prosecutors would like for Manafort to “sing.” Dershowitz said, not only do they want him to sing, they want him to “compose” – “get a little creative.” So far, Manafort has refused to give in to this pressure. His former business partner, Robert Gates, has accepted an immunity deal from Mueller for testifying against Manafort.
From the beginning, Mueller has treated Manafort far more harshly than his alleged crimes would justify. Although Manafort had been cooperating with authorities, the FBI raided his home on July 26, 2017 before dawn and seized documents pertaining to the Trump Russia collusion case. It seems to have been an unnecessarily dramatic action meant to intimidate.
“Using a search warrant, agents appeared the day Manafort was scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee and a day after he met voluntarily with Senate Intelligence Committee staff members.”
Manafort had been on house arrest as he awaited trial until June 15th when a judge revoked his $10 million bail due to alleged “witness tampering.” He currently spends 23 hours each day in solitary confinement.
Many people believe it will be difficult for Manafort to win acquittal on all charges. George Washington University Law professor Jonathan Turley says a full acquittal for Manafort is as likely as the Baltimore Orioles winning the World Series.
However, it is possible that the political nature of this case may lead to a presidential pardon. Polls show a steady decline in public support for Mueller’s investigation every month.
In addition, U.S. District Judge T. S. Ellis III, who is presiding over the trial, had some sharp words for Mueller’s team members in May:
Ellis said the indictment appeared to be a way for Mueller to leverage Manafort into providing information about Trump.
Ellis said, “The vernacular is to sing…You don’t really care about Mr. Manafort. You really care about what information Mr. Manafort can give you to lead to Mr. Trump and his eventual prosecution or impeachment…It’s unlikely you’re going to persuade me the special counsel has unfettered power to do whatever he wants.”
Judge Ellis, a Republican, is a Reagan appointee. I’m not saying that he will steer the jury toward an acquittal, but he will stand up for Manafort’s rights.
On the first day of the trial, a jury of six men and six women were selected and seated, and opening arguments began.
The prosecution’s opening arguments call Manafort a liar and signal that they will build their case around his extravagant lifestyle.
The first challenge for the defense is that Manafort can be easily painted as someone who made millions off some of the most disreputable characters in the world.
Jurors will hear about his six homes, $2 million worth of antiques, a $500,000 landscaping bill, two silk rugs costing $160,000 and almost $1.5 million in clothes for himself.
This type of evidence invites class resentment and an unconscious desire to see an elitist fall. The legal chasm may be equally challenging. Jurors will be buried in a mountain of transactional and bank documents from numerous countries. Manafort is accused of hiding $30 million to evade U.S. taxes by using accounts in the United Kingdom, Cyprus and the Caribbean island nation of St. Vincent. Prosecutors claim he may have made more than $60 million in working for Ukrainian interests.
With multiple counts and such a daunting record, a jury often inclines to rely on prosecution witnesses. In this case, the witnesses will include Manafort’s former aide and confidant, Richard Gates. The combination of a less than sympathetic defendant, a tower of financial documents and a flipped former associate makes conviction on at least some of these counts a high likelihood.
The defense will argue that “Manafort trusted his right-hand man, Rick Gates. They will say that it was Gates who hid the money from the IRS and embezzled money.”
They will hammer away at the credibility of a witness who has been granted full immunity by Robert Mueller.
Good luck, Mr. Manafort. I’m on your side.
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13 Comments
5 years ago
They want to subvert or delegitimise Trump election so they and their crimes don’t get exposed. And scumbag Jeff session is part of it. why is he bot appointing second counsel to prosecute Hillary and her crimes, while allowing Mueller to continue his farce ?
Clinton mafia still active after Trump takeover as they kill another witness to email investigation http://tinyurl.com/y8p9cv5l
They know their hold overs in FBI / DOJ /NSC will help them out !
Unless they are totally purged including Left/Liberal judges to keep out their bias …its uphill task to prosecute them.
5 years ago
Reply to
Suresh
Exactly. This is a distraction away from Hillary’s provable crime. Sessions recused himself from that.
If they can’t get Trump on anything, and there is nothing there, thy want to isolate him and trash him.
As this farce continues, we get the BILL FOR IT! The DEMS are laughing all the way to the bank.
5 years ago
Ya know I forgot to bring duct tape with me and I got a few sentences in and…..I had to stop reading lest my head explode, in public, no less!
5 years ago
Manafort is an INTERNATIONAL political consultant.
He worked for Reagan. He worked for Dole and his speciality is the electorial college.
Trump hired him for that.
Yes, his CRIME Is being associated with Trump.
About 8 years ago, the Obama administration targeted him for the SAME ISSUES and there was not any evidence to pursue. GATES their key witness was nailed for embezzlement of which he is guilty. They are squeezing Gates to turn on Manafort but there is NOTHING THERE!
Collusion is NOT a crime. They have to prove a CONSPIRACY to make collusion a crime and there is
NO COLLUSION!
Colorful Manafort judge warns Mueller team case could tank without key witness
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/08/02/manafort-case-judge-warns-mueller-team-cant-prove-conspiracy-without-star-witness.html
5 years ago
Anyone with an association with Trump is under scrutiny for possible indictment. It is all part and parcel of the never-ending witch-hunt. There is no honor among the usurpers, Mueller, his Gestapo, and other subversive weasels embedded in the DOJ and other agencies are traitors to the Republic and the Presidency. If one, as a citizen, backs Trump, leftists bully, beat, and berate them for it. The benchmark of incivility, lawlessness, and bigotry among leftist progressives and the Democrats is at an all-time high. They, seemingly, perceive themselves as the Illuminati of our species. Nothing is further from fact; it is they who are the lowlifes, the bottom feeders of American society and politics. The Democrats’ detestation of Joe and Joanne America, proud citizens working, accountable for their lives not feeding from the Government hand-outs. A Socialist mandate to whoo and beguile the gormless, illegal immigrants, those of the gimme, gimme ilk.
Trump’s intent is the return of personal dignity, self-reliance via jobs to Americans. The Democrats loathe those who are self-sufficient and ambitious. Therefore, Trump is the leftist progressives’ boogeyman, for merely giving Americans impetus and direction.
5 years ago
Reply to
Ziggy46
Very well said. However, what truly confounds me is that the American conservative side seems incapable of mounting a similar campaign to sink crooked liberals and thus a vile and crooked piece of filth like Robert Mueller, a man devoid of ethics and decency who the piece of utter scum Russian dictator, Josef Stalin, who destroyed the lives of millions, would have admired and employed. I now truly hope this disgusting man, in fact at heart a criminal, meets a violent end that he sees coming.
5 years ago
Reply to
Rob Porter
“Mueller, a man devoid of ethics and decency who the piece of utter scum
Russian dictator, Josef Stalin, who destroyed the lives of millions,
would have admired and employed”.
Well stated, Rob; sadly, you are right on the money.
5 years ago
This all unconstitutional.. muler was fbi director in ’05 when all of this was coming down.. muler is buddies with rosnstein. misspelled to show disrespect.. I’d love to be that judge!!!
5 years ago
If you read about Robert “Mugabe” Mueller or heard the Rush show today. You would know what a DIRTY cop he is. He is the one that should be prosecuted, rounded up and put in jail.
Just like with the Nutzis. Why is this world ASS-BACKWARDS????
5 years ago
Reply to
Alleged-Comment
Agreed. Remember, it was Mueller’s FBI that missed the signals on 9/11, Ft. Hood, and the Boston Marathon bombing even after the Russians supplied massive warnings about the Tsarnaevs. It was Comey’s FBI that missed on Orlando and San Bernardino.
5 years ago
In addition to guilt by association, it is now somehow a criminal act to earn and spend money in a capitalist society?
5 years ago
The FISA warrant was for the wrong address.
Rod Rosensteins wife is a Clinton Lawyer who specializes in blocking or pushing through FISA warrants, mostly against Judical Watch, or to push phoney warrants to be used politically to attack Trump donors..
This single conflict of interest voids his efforts.
Mueller is appointed, and is therefore an inferior
officer, Rosenstein is a principle officer, he was confirmed in the Senate.
Rosenstein granted Mueller powers of a principle officer illegally, and this granted unlimited powers to Mueller, essentially making Mueller more powerful then all Congress, the executive branch and EVERY other elected official….If this is allowed to continue with impunity, then in the future, the FBI can arrest EVERY winner of EVERY presidential election the day after they win the election… which undermines our entire political system and gives the director of the FBI sole responsibility of determining who should be president regardless of what the people who vote want…
5 years ago
Not to mention cheating on his taxes, defrauding his bankers…
