Two months after Paul Manafort announced he would cooperate with Robert Mueller in his probe of Russian collusion as part of a guilty plea, the ex-Trump campaign chief has once again found himself in hot water, with a late Monday filing by prosecutors accusing Manafort of lying in the Russia investigation.
In the latest just filed Joint Status Report, Robert Mueller alleges that after signing the plea agreement, in which Manafort had agreed that if he “engages in any criminal activity prior to sentencing,” he would be in breach of the agreement, “Manafort committed federal crimes by lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Special Counsel’s Office on a variety of subject matters”, which constitute breaches of the agreement.
There was no detail on the lies in question, and instead the report said that “the government will file a detailed sentencing submission to the Probation Department and the Court in advance of sentencing that sets forth the nature of the defendant’s crimes and lies, including those after signing the plea agreement herein.”
And since Manafort was found to be in breach the plea agreement, Mueller notes that “there is no reason to delay his sentencing.”
In response, while Manafort said that he has provided truthful information and does not agree with the government’s characterization or that he has breached the agreement, he does agree that “there is no reason to delay the sentencing herein, and he asks the Court to set a sentencing date in this matter.”
Manafort was convicted on eight counts of bank and tax fraud over the summer and agreed to cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller in September in order to avert a second federal trial in Washington. He had been cooperating with Mueller’s team for roughly two and a half months.
While it is unclear as of yet what it is that Manafort lied about, it now appears that his sentencing and incarceration will be imminent as a result. Overall, it also appears that his “cooperation” with the Special Counsel’s Office was not particularly fruitful.
The full court filing is below.
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