This is a tax evasion charge he is copping a plea to isn’t it? He and Manafort may have diverted money they made doing political consulting for foreign countries and then laundered that money through real estate investments where they claimed large building renovation costs. So this has nothing really to do with Russia collusion or Trump but it meant to tarnish any of those who even remotely worked for Trump’s campaign in the eyes of the public to thwart any prospect of Trump’s re-election.
This is all about flipping Paul Manafort, Trump campaign manager. Rick Gates was deputy campaign manager and Manafort’s business partner.
I think that Manafort’s close and longstanding ties to the Kremlin may well become part of Mueller’s case in establishing that there was A. a Russian conspiracy, and B. Trump officials were at least aware of it, and maybe participating.
Clearly A is pretty well proven already. No one disputes there was “meddling” directed by the Russian state.
Mueller is trying to get B via these various plea deals. That still doesn’t necessarily touch Trump, though he did “joke” that the Russians should look for Hillary’s missing emails, and he did draft the lie about Don Jr’s meeting in Trump tower with Kremlin operatives.