Section: TPM (USA)
This Week: A Judge Agrees With Mueller That Manafort Lied
An Aug. 2, 2016 meeting in a Manhattan cigar room — at which then-Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort met with a former colleague linked to Russian intelligence, Konstantin Kilimnik, to discuss a peace plan for Ukraine — is key to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, prosecutor Andrew Weissmann told U.S. District Judge Amy Berman...
Pompeo Meets With Top EU Official As Pence Lambastes Europe
BRUSSELS (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met Friday with the European Union’s top diplomat in Brussels following a scathing attack from the Trump administration on the bloc and several of its main members over their approach to Iran. Pompeo held what was expected to be a tense working breakfast with EU foreign policy chief...
Manafort Lied To Mueller Team After Agreeing To Cooperate, Judge Rules
U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson said in order Wednesday that Paul Manafort had violated his plea agreement with special counsel Robert Mueller. Her order also said the Mueller had shown by a preponderance of evidence that Manafort had lied about three of the five topic areas prosecutors accused the former Trump campaign chairman of making...
Lobbyist Involved In Inauguration Straw Donor Scheme To Be Sentenced In April
Lobbyist Sam Patten, who pleaded guilty in August to failing to register as a foreign agent, will be sentenced on April 12. The Wednesday order setting Patten’s sentencing date came just two days after prosecutors filed a status report on Patten’s cooperation entirely under seal. They similarly filed a status report under seal in...
Manafort Again Insists He Did Not Purposefully Lie To Mueller’s Team
Paul Manafort is making one last push to convince a federal judge that he “did not lie” to the special counsel Robert Mueller’s office during his cooperation sessions — at least not on purpose. In a Feb. 8 filing unsealed Wednesday, Manafort’s attorneys accuse prosecutors of inflating the importance of small details and...
Patten’s Cooperation With Feds Stays Secret As Inaugural Probe Heats Up
The D.C. lobbyist who pleaded guilty in August in a prosecution linked to special prosecutor Robert Mueller’s Russia probe will have the details of his case remain under wraps, after prosecutors added yet another mystery filing to the docket. D.C. federal prosecutors filed a joint status report in Patten’s case under seal Monday,...
For Mueller, It’s More Than A Cigar Room
It’s Rudy Giuliani’s favorite New York City hangout spot: the Grand Havana Room on Fifth Avenue. The members-only club (located in a building owned by the Kushner family) played host to an August 2, 2016 meeting between then-Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort, his deputy Rick Gates, and Konstantin Kilimnik, a former Russian military...
Unsealed Manafort Transcript Reveals Inner Workings Of Mueller Probe
Since Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort’s plea deal fell apart last year amid accusations from prosecutors that he had lied to them (and separate claims in the press that he had funnelled information to President Trump), there’s been little to pierce the veil of what Manafort was discussing with the special counsel prosecutors about...
Why Trump’s Inauguration Was So Sleazy, Even For Washington
Presidential inaugurations can seem like a parody of D.C. influence-peddling. Corporate lobbyists, foreign dignitaries and political mega-donors converge on the capitol for days of glitzy events, waltzing alongside incoming administration officials at inaugural balls and networking with members of the U.S. Congress over plates of lobster. As...
Trump Wanted $20 Million For 2006 Moscow Tower Deal, Oligarch Says
Trump wanted $20 million for a 2006 Trump Tower Moscow project that never materialized, his prospective business partner Russian-Ukrainian oligarch Pavel Fuchs told journalists in Kyiv this week. “He said $20 million is nothing,” Bloomberg quoted Fuchs as saying. “I said, no, it’s a lot of money. We couldn’t agree.” Fuchs, who says...
