Judge Challenges Special Counsel in Manafort Case

News  |  May 4, 2018

The federal judge presiding over Paul Manafort's fraud case in Virginia had strong words for the government's lawyers in court Friday, but did not issue a ruling.

The Washington Post

“You don’t really care about Mr. Manafort’s bank fraud,” Judge T.S. Ellis III said during a morning hearing. “You really care about getting information Mr. Manafort can give you that would reflect on Mr. Trump and lead to his prosecution or impeachment.” 

Manafort was seeking to have bank and tax fraud charges against him dismissed in federal court in Alexandria, with his lawyers arguing that the alleged crimes have nothing to do with the election or with President Trump.

Ellis agreed, emphasizing that some of the charges involve alleged conduct that occurred over a decade ago. But he made no immediate decision on the defense motion. He said even without such a connection the special counsel, which is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election, may well still have the authority to bring the charges.

“I’m not saying it’s illegitimate,” Ellis said.

CNN

He repeated his suspicion several times in the hour-long court hearing.

(...)

Mueller's prosecutors will have to turn over a full, unredacted version of the August 2 memo that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein used to describe the criminal allegations Mueller's team could investigate, Ellis ordered.

The judge said he would like to see the full memo, which prosecutors submitted to the court in Virginia and in Washington, DC, for another case against Manafort with more than a page of redactions.

The visible part of the memo says Mueller should investigate allegations about Manafort's financial relationship with former Ukrainian politicians, and that he may have assisted Russia with attempts to interfere in the presidential election. The redacted portion appears to outline several other legs of the ongoing Russia probe.

Ellis said prosecutors may present the full classified memo to him under seal -- without showing Manafort its additional details -- in two weeks.

Mueller's prosecutors have argued this memo gives them the authority to bring cases against Manafort related to his work in Ukraine reaching back more than a decade before he joined the Trump campaign.

Manafort is charged in Virginia with financial violations related to his lobbying work in Ukraine prior to joining Trump's 2016 campaign. [Prosecutor Michael] Dreeben said they had to "follow the money" and find Manafort's contacts with Russians through the Ukrainian work and his financial dealings as part of their investigation.

Manafort lost a similar bid to have charges dismissed in DC last week. 

President Trump used Judge Ellis' remarks in his speech before the NRA Friday as he repeated his assertion the Russia investigation is a witch hunt. 

Bloomberg Politics:

“Judge T.S. Ellis -- who is really something very special, I hear from many standpoints, he is a respected person,” Trump said, reading from a news article at the NRA’s annual conference in Dallas, “Suggested the charges before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia were just part of the Mueller team’s designs to pressure Mr. Manafort into giving up information on President Donald Trump or others in the campaign.”

“I’ve been saying that for a long time,” Trump continued. “It is a witch hunt.”

Continuing to read from the article, Trump said “none of that information has to do with information related to the Russian government coordination and the campaign of Donald Trump.

“It doesn’t have anything to do,” Trump said. “It’s from years before. Then how does this have anything to do with the campaign, the judge asks? Let me tell you, folks, we’re all fighting battles, but I love fighting these battles.”

Trump called Manafort “a nice guy” but also said he was part of his campaign for “a very short period of time.”

Donald Trump has known Paul Manafort since the 1980s when Trump hired him as a lobbyist. 

Reporters and sources familiar with federal court habits in general and Judge Ellis in particular say it is not uncommon for the judge to go after the government before siding with them. 

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Federal judge in Virginia grills special counsel on Manafort investigation (WaPo

Judge in Manafort case says Mueller's aim is to hurt Trump (CNN)

Trump Shows Sympathy for Manafort After Judge Questions Case (Bloomberg Politics)