The charges against Trump’s former campaign manager.
What Are the Charges?
This trial concerns only one segment of the charges filed against Manafort.
A
superseding indictment filed Feb. 22 in the Eastern District of Virginia charged Manafort and his longtime business associate Richard (Rick) Gates with 32 counts of bank fraud, tax fraud and failure to report foreign bank accounts. Prosecutors allege that beginning as early as 2006, Manafort and Gates disguised millions of dollars’ worth of overseas income stemming from Manafort’s political and lobbying work in Ukraine, where clients included then-President Viktor Yanukovych, Yanukovich’s pro-Russia political party and the party that succeeded Yanukovych’s party after he fled—to Russia—following an uprising in 2014. Funneling millions through accounts in Cyprus, the Seychelles and other locations, the indictment charged, Manafort “used his hidden overseas wealth to enjoy a lavish lifestyle in the United States” that involved spending more than $900,000 on rugs and more than $1 million on clothing for himself.
The February indictment expanded on
allegations of money laundering and other charges filed by the special counsel last October, including failure to register as a foreign agent. Charges
against Gates were quickly dismissed after he agreed in February to cooperate with the prosecution and
pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI and conspiracy to defraud the United States. Gates, who continued working for the Trump campaign in 2016 even after Manafort left and who went on to work on Trump’s inaugural committee, is expected to
testifyagainst Manafort.
So at least one of two things have to be true.
Trump did a piss poor job of vetting Manafort .
Or....
Hired him because of all his Russian and Ukrainian ties.
