Trump disowns indicted aides
Papadapoulos reached out to Trump but nothing happened, says White House press secy Sanders
WASHINGTON: Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and associate Rick Gates pleaded not guilty to the 12-count indictment and the White House distanced itself from them as well as a third campaign aide George Papadapoulos.
Manafort was ordered a bail amount of $10 million and Gates $5 mn. They were put under house arrest and ordered to surrender their passports as they were considered a flight-risk given their work in the past for foreign governments.
Investigators probing Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential elections have accused Manafort and Gates of conspiring against the US, failing to declare themselves as foreign agents — working for the Ukrainian government, concealing foreign income to avoid paying taxes and making false statements.
Papadapoulos, who was a foreign policy adviser to the campaign, has already pleaded guilty to lying about contacts with Russian officials and has since been cooperating with the investigation in a plea deal.
The White House sought to dismiss him as only a “volunteer” with the campaign, whose outreach to the Russians, meticulously detailed in his offence-document, were repeatedly rebuffed.
“He reached out and nothing happened beyond that, which...shows, one, his level of importance in the campaign, and, two, shows what little role he had within coordinating anything officially for the campaign,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the president’s press secretary told reporters.
She also dismissed the indictment of Manafort and Gates as having “nothing to do with the President” or his campaign, a line taken by Trump earlier.
Manafort’s lawyer Kevin Downing took the same line , saying Manafort’s work with Ukraine wrapped up long before he began working for Trump.