Indicting former Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort and his business partner Rick Gates for “conspiracy” against the U.S., 73-year-old former FBI Director now Special Counsel Robert Mueller highlights what’s wrong with the Special Counsel Law. Mueller was named Special Counsel May 17 by Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Rosenstein, given the broad mandate to investigate Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election. Mueller was also told to investigate alleged ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Indicting Manafort and Gates for essentially money laundering and income tax evasion for consulting work from 2006 to 2016 with former pro-Kremlin Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich goes beyond Mueller’s mandate. While Manafort may have acted improperly, it has nothing to do with his brief stint as Trump campaign chairman from March 1 to August 19, 2016.
Mueller’s indictment of Manafort and Gates doesn’t come close to a year-and-half-old investigation started by former FBI Director James Comey into alleged ties between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Alleged by former Democratic nominee Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Oct. 19, 2016 debate in Las Vegas, the Democratic Party has tried, in three Congressional committees, to tie Trump’s campaign to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Hillary flat-out called Trump a “Putin puppet” in the last debate, starting the narrative that Russian hackers won Trump the Nov. 8, 2016 election. Mueller knows that former Obama administration officials together with Comey unmasked and wiretapped Trump campaign officials since July 2016. Comey never confessed his “probable cause” for going to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act [FISA] Court to obtain warrants against Trump officials.
Indicting Manafort and Gates, Mueller shows egregious prosecutorial over-reach, whether or not Manafort deserves the charges. Mueller’s mandate involved investigating Russian influence in the 2016 election and any alleged ties to the Trump campaign. Charging Manafort and Gates shows, beyond any doubt, he hasn’t been able to establish any criminal ties between the Trump campaign and Moscow. Alleging that Manafort laundered $18 million for consulting work overseas or ran $75 million through offshore accounts, says zero about Trump’s alleged ties to the Kremlin. Mueller’s prosecutors showed what they really think of Manafort in the indictment, “hidden overseas wealth to enjoy a lavish lifestyle in the United States.” Putting that statement in an indictment is outrageous, as if Mueller’s office should not be commenting about how any American citizen spends his money.
Itemizing how Manafort spent cash on vendors or personal items [$12 million], Mueller’s indictment talks about his home improvements in the Hamptons [4.5 million], payments to a rug merchant in Virginia [$934,000], clothing store in Beverly Hills [$520,000] or landscaping his Bridgehamption N.Y. home [$655,000]. Soho condo [$1.5 million], Brooklyn brownstone [$3 million] and Virginia house [$1.9 million]. How any of the these purchases relates to Kremlin’s influence peddling in the 2016 election is anyone’s guess Given Mueller’s mandate, he should have referred Manfort’s case to a another federal prosector. Giving the mainstream media something to jump up-and-down about, Mueller’s done zero to advance his mandate of investigating the 2016 election or alleged Trump ties to Russia. Manafort’s spending habits shouldn’t be part any federal indictment.
Talking about the plea deal with once Trump foreign policy advisor George Papandopoulos for lying to the FBI on when he first heard “dirt” about Hillary from a Russian “professor” also says nothing about alleged Trump ties to Moscow. Whether Papandopoulos got the information before or after joining the Trump campaign is extraneous nitpicking. Splitting hairs in FBI interviews hardly constitutes perjury. What Mueller should be looking at is Comey’s reliance on Hillary’s phony paid “Russian” dossier on Trump. If there’s any collusion with the Russians, Mueller knows that Hillary paid Fusion-GPS investigator former MI6 agent Christopher Steele to dredge up all the dirt from Ruissian contacts. Mueller should be investigating whether Comey used Hillary’s dossier as probable cause to get warrants in FISA court to spy and wiretap Trump campaign officials.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) were the first to warn Trump not to fire Mueller. “The president must not, under any circumstances, interfere with the special counsel’s work in any way . . “ said Schumer, raising more nonsense in the press. There’s been zero indication that Trump seeks to fire Mueller, creating more bogus headlines in the mainstream press. Neither Schumer nor Pelosi want Mueller to investigate Hillary’s dossier that sought Russian help to dredge up dirt on Trump during the 2016 campaign. Both don’t fault Comey for using the dossier as “probable cause” to seek warrants in FISA court to spy on Trump campaign officials. Indicting Manafort and for financial crimes long before he joined the Trump campaign speaks volumes about how little Mueller has found of Russian influence and alleged Trump campaign collusion.
