Posted on 02/23/2018 11:22:47 AM PST by Innovative
Rick Gates, a former top official in President Trump’s campaign, has agreed to plead guilty Friday afternoon to conspiracy and lying to the FBI, according to court papers filed by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III.
The guilty plea, which is scheduled for 2 p.m., caps a busy week for Mueller’s investigation of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election and related issues. It also ends a tumultuous period for Gates, who found himself re-indicted, changing lawyers and agreeing to plead guilty all within 24 hours.
According to a criminal information — a document filed with the permission of the defendant which traditionally signals that person plans to plead guilty — Gates conspired to defraud the United States regarding the money he and his business partner Paul Manafort earned, and lied to the FBI in a Feb. 1, 2018 interview about a 2013 meeting between Manafort, a lobbyist, and a congressman.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Gates worked for Manafort since 2006. Manafort worked for Ford, Reagan, Bush & Dole.
Feb 23, 2018 Superceding Information
Statement of Offense
Plea Agreement
Trump, with a campaign staff of about 4 people, needed an experienced person to whip the convention vote. The RNC was openly hostile to Trump so he relied on a recommendation. Two days after receiving his first security briefing, which seemed to include info derogatory to Manafort, Trump took immediate action and fired him.
Chain of events from wiki :
...In February 2016 Manafort approached Donald Trump through a mutual friend, Thomas J. Barrack Jr.
... In March 2016 he joined Trump’s presidential campaign to take the lead in getting commitments from convention delegates
...In June 2016, Trump fired campaign manager Corey Lewandowski and promoted Manafort to the position.
...In August 2016, Manafort’s connections to former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and his pro-Russian Party of Regions drew national attention
...On August 17, 2016, Donald Trump received his first security briefing.[38] The same day, August 17, Trump shook up his campaign organization in a way that appeared to minimize Manafort’s role.
...two days later, Trump announced his acceptance of Manafort’s resignation
What memo? The one nobody seems to give a shit about? The one that nobody is doing a damn thing about?
These people plead guilty because they have no other reasonable choice. Fight Mueller and they'll be ruined, bankrupt for generations. Cut a deal, do a year in Club Fed, and maybe your kids won't be giving hand jobs for milk money.
Meanwhile, Sessions snoozes and President Trump tweets exasperatingly about it.
Nothing to do with Trump.
Right. And Gates worked for Manafort. When Manafort left the campaign, Gates staid on as a volunteer.
More the Cozy Bear and Fancy Bear business. Wikileaks/Kremlin ties.
It’s very wishful thinking. If the FISA warrant had only been approved once, it would be a reasonable hope, however the fact that it was renewed four times indicates either new non-dossier information came to light, or the wiretap was generating corroborating information.
Mueller is working steadily to get higher and higher people in the Trump campaign to plead guilty and provide testimony. Gates indicated he might not plead guilty and Murller slammed him with new charges, enough that he was facing life in prison.
One of the lawyers is charged with lying to Mueller about a single email. The lawyer claimed he did not know why it wasn’t produced when he did know, he’s charged with lying to investigators.
Mueller is going after Trump HARD, if there’s anyone out there who still thinks this is some kind of ‘false flag’ that’s eventually going to roll up Hillary, Obama, and the Dems for Uranium One or whatever - basically beliving that Q Anon crap - that person’s a moron.
Deputy campaign chairman. He was the number two guy behind Manafort while Manafort was running things.
It was renewed all times with the same fake dossier info. Go read Nunes memo. Stop peddling lies.
I have no idea who or what Q anon is.
I see many posted news items, but for some reason, I have not been interested in reading any of them.
WTF? Why the hell aren’t Hillary and her minions being charged. This is so strange. Tons of real evidence against Hillary but no charges. I just don’t get it.
I could give you the rundown if you want, short answer is it’s a conspiracy theory that someone with the highest level of security clearance has been dropping hints about what’s going on behind the scenes in Washington and the Trump admin.
That’s not how the FISA court works.
Rohrabacher
Boy, you have a real knack for condensing things.
I had a feeling it was something like that, but I don’t take disappointment well and if every good thing that he/she tells us turns out not to be true, I’ll just assume Snowflake position and weep.
Facts are hard to come by, but I can wait.
This is what I have read recently about Paul Manafort:
He used to be a whizz-kid spin doctor in Washington winning at everything he did. He literally couldn’t lose as when handling primaries his firm represented all the contenders. He was so good that he managed to make African warlords and Arab arms dealers respectable.
He had a character flaw though. He stole from his business partners. Now this part is why I believe it is not just another MSM smear campaign as the interviewed former business partners didn’t have anything nice to say about him.
So this reputation finally caught up with him and Washington wasn’t a place for him any more. He went to work with Russian oligarchs and took a gamble trying to become very rich himself. Then the economic crises happened and he ended up owing a lot of people a lot of money. Importantly he owed a Russian gangster named Oleg Deripaska something like $19 million.
He didn’t seem to have seen a way out and checked into some fancy depression clinic. After brooding there for a while he started acting again and approached Donald Trump. He said he is a big admirer and offered to work for no salary while representing himself as still successful. Trump is not impartial to flattery and he ended up making him part of his campaign, later his campaign manager. A telling thing of Manafort’s true motivation is that once this was announced he sent a newspaper clipping announcing it to Oleg Deripaska and suggested this is a way to settle the debt.
Now this is my conjecture, but I think it is significant that Trump fired Manafort the day after receiving his first secret intelligence briefing.
Hmmm - they used the "III" at the end of his name...don't see that too often.
i just read “Let Trump Be Trump”, and don’t recall Gates’ name being in there. Of course, Manafort wasn’t there long (thank God), so not much time was given to him in the book.
Manafort wasn’t the best personnel choice Trump ever made.
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