Accused Russian agent Maria Butina appeared in federal court in DC Thursday morning and formally pleaded guilty "to one count of conspiracy to violate the law governing foreign agents operating in the United States." Her written plea agreement is here.
Butina was charged by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, D.C., unconnected to Robert Mueller's investigation.
Butina, 30, became the first Russian national convicted of seeking to influence U.S. policy in the run-up and through the 2016 election as a foreign agent, agreeing to cooperate in a plea deal with U.S. investigators in exchange for less prison time.
Butina admitted to working with an American political operative and under the direction of a former Russian senator and deputy governor of Russia’s central bank to forge bonds with officials at the National Rifle Association, conservative leaders, and 2016 U.S. presidential candidates, including Donald Trump, whose rise to the Oval Office she presciently predicted to her Russian contact.
“Guilty,” Butina said with a light accent in entering her plea with U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan at a hearing Thursday morning in federal court in Washington.
As part of her plea, Butina admitted seeking to establish and use “unofficial lines of communication with Americans having influence over U.S. politics” for the benefit of the Russian government, through a person fitting the description of sanctioned Russian central banker Alexander Torshin, prosecutor Erik Kenerson said.
Butina's next status update will be February 12th. The judge did not set a sentencing date, pending the outcome of her promised cooperation.
Butina is likely to provide information about her supposed boyfriend, Republican political operative Paul Erickson.
In plea documents read by prosecutors in court Thursday, Butina admitted to undertaking a multiyear influence campaign coordinated through Torshin, a top Russian official, that she proposed in March 2015 as multiyear “Diplomacy Project.”
Requesting $125,000 from a Russian billionaire and citing the NRA’s influence on the Republican Party, Butina traveled to conferences to socialize with GOP presidential candidates, host “friendship dinners” with wealthy Americans, bond with NRA leaders and organize a Russian delegation to the influential National Prayer Breakfast in Washington.
Butina’s efforts, which continued after she moved to Washington as a graduate student at American University in 2016, included asking whether the Russian government was ready to meet her contacts.
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Butina crossed paths with Trump in July 2015, when she asked the newly declared Republican candidate about Russia and sanctions at a public event in Las Vegas. “We get along with Putin,” Trump told Butina, referring to the Russian president. “I don’t think you’d need the sanctions.”
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Butina faces a possible maximum prison sentence of five years followed by deportation. Under the deal, her defense agreed that she could face a recommended zero to six months in prison under federal guidelines, and could seek a lower sentence. Prosecutors did not agree on any guidelines range, but agreed to request leniency if she provides “substantial assistance.”
Butina, who has been jailed since her arrest in July, agreed to remain behind bars pending sentencing.
Before the plea, the Russian foreign ministry continued to support Butina, planning to send embassy personnel to her hearing and posting a statement on Twitter by spokeswoman Maria Zakharov, saying, “We demand that Washington observe legal rights of Maria Butina & release her as soon as possible.”
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Butina had served as an interpreter for Torshin, an NRA member, as he attended its annual conventions, and her profile as a self-made gun activist in Putin’s restrictive Russia charmed American associates.
Butina and Torshin invited NRA leaders to Moscow in December 2015, a delegation that included David Keene, a former NRA president and past head of the powerful American Conservative Union. Documents reviewed previously by The Washington Post show the group met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
After the meeting ended, Butina sent Torshin a message: “We should let them express their gratitude now, we will put pressure on them quietly later.”
Russian Maria Butina pleads guilty in effort to forge Kremlin bond with U.S. conservatives (WaPo)
Russian operative Maria Butina pleads guilty to conspiracy (NBC News)