This week, as the Russia investigation continued to run its course whether President Donald Trump wanted it to or not, another bombshell dropped — even after entering into a cooperation agreement with the government, former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort had taken some steps to conceal the truth from Special Counsel Robert Mueller. MSNBC’s Danny Cervallos has now joined the conversation to point out exactly how this revelation could backfire big time not only for Manafort, but also trapping the president.
In short, whereas in the past, key information might have been withheld from the public eye during the future course of Manafort’s case, it’s now again all hands on deck. Cervallos explained that there’s a continued presumption that federal court proceedings will be available to the public, and there are still significant court dates left to go for the fallen GOP operative. He’s set to be sentenced in February after being declared guilty of financial fraud charges, and he’s still got a second sentencing date after pleading guilty to political conspiracy allegations as part of the agreement he breached.
At that time, the full scope of Manafort’s lies could easily be revealed. For now, Mueller’s team has only revealed he lied on “a variety of subject matters” as part of regular updates they’ve provided to the relevant court.
Cervallos explained:
‘At some point, Manafort will be sentenced, and at that point there will be a prolonged hearing where there will be witnesses called and information revealed and we will learn that information because the sentencing will be open to the public and people will be able to hear what exactly Manafort did and did not do.’
Watch below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wHsfMGahUA&t=3s
Fellow MSNBC analyst Matthew Miller pointed out separately:
‘Manafort is either an incredibly stupid criminal or he’s protecting some secret so big that he’s willing to spend the rest of his life in jail to keep the world from discovering it.’
Manafort is either an incredibly stupid criminal or he’s protecting some secret so big that he’s willing to spend the rest of his life in jail to keep the world from discovering it. https://t.co/1sCxZxpk9y
— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) November 27, 2018
Concurrent to these developments, it’s come out that Manafort secretly met with Wikileaks head Julian Assange inside the Ecuadorian Embassy where he’s been holed up for years around the time Manafort worked for Donald Trump’s campaign — a time frame that stretched through months despite Trump’s attempts to dismiss the legitimacy of his connection to Manafort.
Assange’s organization, of course, peddled emails that Russian government hackers stole from the Democrats during the 2016 election season. During the private meetings Manafort held both during his association with Trump and before, any number of steps towards direct private collusion with Russia could have been undertaken — and although it’s not clear yet, that might be precisely what he sought to conceal from investigators.
Meanwhile, Trump keeps ranting about how supposedly far off the rails Mueller and his team are as if that’s going to keep him from culpability in the matter when his name comes up or anyone cares besides his most diehard fans.
Just this Tuesday, after the news of Manafort lying, Trump whined:
‘The Fake News Media builds Bob Mueller up as a Saint, when in actuality he is the exact opposite. He is doing TREMENDOUS damage to our Criminal Justice System, where he is only looking at one side and not the other. Heroes will come of this, and it won’t be Mueller and his terrible Gang of Angry Democrats.’
Featured Image via screenshot from the video
