Paul Manafort on Trial – Day 2

Posted on August 1, 2018 by SouthernGirl2

Paul Manafort, President Trump’s onetime campaign chairman, is on trial in federal court in Alexandria on bank and tax fraud charges. Prosecutors allege he failed to pay taxes on millions he made from his work for a Russia-friendly Ukrainian political party, then lied to get loans when the cash stopped coming in.

The case is being prosecuted by the special counsel investigating Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Here is what happened on the trial’s first day.

A jury of six men and six women was selected.

The government presented its opening statement, accusing Manafort of failing to pay taxes on millions of dollars he earned working for a pro-Russia political candidate in Ukraine and using the money to fund a lavish lifestyle, including purchasing a $15,000 jacket “made from an ostrich.”

Manafort’s defense sought to place the blame on his former business partner, Richard Gates, who they said embezzled money from Manafort.

Prosecutors called their first witness, Tad Devine, who was Bernie Sanders’s chief strategist in the 2016 election.

Defense attorney Richard Westling began his cross examination of Tad Devine by asking what he thought of Paul Manafort. Devine said he thought highly of the work Manafort did as a political consultant. “Paul worked harder than anybody,” Devine testified. “There were emails sent through the night.”

Devine agreed with Westling that you could make a lot of money as a political consultant “sometimes.”

On what is known as a “redirect,” with prosecutors again asking the questions, Devine testified that he had no bank accounts in Cyprus. Prosecutor Greg Andres had asked the question to highlight the difference between the Democratic strategist and his boss in Ukraine.

Outside court, Devine declined to comment, saying “Paul deserves a fair trial.”

That concluded the first day of the trial. Prosecutors indicated the first witness Wednesday will be Daniel Rabin, another political consultant who worked with Manafort in Ukraine, and an unnamed FBI agent. The proceedings start at 9:30 a.m.

About SouthernGirl2

A Native Texan who adores baby kittens, loves horses, rodeos, pomegranates, & collect Eagles. Enjoys politics, games shows, & dancing to all types of music. Loves discussing and learning about different cultures. A Phi Theta Kappa lifetime member with a passion for Social & Civil Justice.
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7 Responses to Paul Manafort on Trial – Day 2

  3. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2018 at 2:22 pm

    Again, HUNDREDS of ppl are under investigation for #KremlinGate. And in the grand scheme of things, Mueller’s work is just getting started, so that figure will keep growing. The rot is systemic to the point of threatening national security. Time to clean house.

    — Counterchekist (@counterchekist) August 1, 2018

    Reply
  4. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2018 at 12:14 pm

    This Is So Much Bigger Than Paul Manafort
    With Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman on trial, America is reckoning with its very serious kleptocracy problem.

    FRANKLIN FOER
    JUL 31, 2018

    On the eve of the Paul Manafort trial, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin casually announced that the Trump administration was considering a fresh $100 billion tax cut for the wealthy. The two events—the trial and the tax cut—should be considered plot points in the very same narrative. Manafort had grown very rich by looting public monies, and Mnuchin was proposing an arguably legal version of the same.

    Unlike past Trump tax cuts, this proposed cut would be implemented by executive fiat, without a congressional vote—a highly unusual and highly undemocratic act of plunder that would redirect money from the state to further enrich the American elite, not to mention Mnuchin himself.

    The trial of Paul Manafort is not merely an episode in a larger scandal that will unfold over many chapters. It is a warning not to be ignored. It’s an occasion for the United States to awaken from its collective slumber about the creeping dangers of kleptocracy.

    So much about the American view of itself resists accepting a disturbing reality. Conventional wisdom long held that America’s free market would never tolerate the sort of clientelism, nepotism, and outright theft that prevailed in places like Brazil and Italy. Americans thought that globalization would export the hygienic habits of this nation’s financial system and its values of good government to the rest of the world. But over the past three decades, the opposite transpired: America has become the sanctuary of choice for laundered money, a bastion of shell companies and anonymously purchased real estate. American elites have learned to plant money offshore with acumen that comes close to matching their crooked counterparts abroad.

    Manafort is one of the architects of this new world order.

    Reply
  5. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2018 at 8:16 am

    Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chairman, opened more than 30 bank accounts in three foreign countries to “receive and hide” his income from Ukraine, a federal prosecutor said on Tuesday. https://t.co/ogNeMm02yE

    — SeriouslyUS? (@USseriously) July 31, 2018

    Reply
  6. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2018 at 8:09 am

    Curtains will be raised: The Paul Manafort trial is about the growing rot of the American elite. https://t.co/2uC1hgshFX

    — Franklin Foer (@FranklinFoer) July 31, 2018

    yup

    Reply

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