Paul Manafort

[cariis]

Manafort included every single charge in his plea (including the 10 deadlocked ones) .

If, after the midterms, he is pardoned - is he totally off the hook?

 

[PayrollHRGuy]

I think you may have your numbers wrong but that matters not at all.
To your question, yes.

 

[justalayman]

I think you may have your numbers wrong but that matters not at all.
To your question, yes.

No, he isn’t. Given the situation state charges are possible and trump can’t pardon state crimes, only federal.

 

[ajkroy]

And the Justice Department gets to keep all of his property and his stuff, even if he is pardoned. Honestly, once he has sung, I don't care what happens to him. He'll be a broke felon in his 70s.

 

[eerelations]

No, he isn’t. Given the situation state charges are possible and trump can’t pardon state crimes, only federal.

And even if he could, I don't think Trump will be in much of a mood to do any pardoning now that Manafort's lawyers have announced that Manafort is about to break omerta.

 

[Whoops2u]

I'm not sure if he deserves the punishment he will get, but it seems pretty clear he is guilty of LOTS of crimes. The tax fraud ones seem the worst to me. The lobbying ones I am more ambivalent on. We have so many process "crimes" now its hard to really see how to tell if someone is doing something that should be considered illegal. Lots of people lobby in similar situations. There is a cadre of dirty fixers in Washington private individuals rely on to get "access" to those with power. Manafort is one of them. I don't see a lot of them going to jail for doing the exact same things.

 

[quincy]

I'm not sure if he deserves the punishment he will get ... There is a cadre of dirty fixers in Washington private individuals rely on to get "access" to those with power. Manafort is one of them. I don't see a lot of them going to jail for doing the exact same things.

You don't see a lot of the white-collar criminals being prosecuted and going to prison because white-collar crime prosecutions are at a 20-year low under Trump, this according to Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC).

In 2011, under Obama. there were over 10,000 white-collar crime prosecutions and in 2017, under Trump, there were fewer than 6,000.

One reason for this is that Trump's administration has focused on immigration investigations and prosecutions.

 

[ajkroy]

I'm not sure if he deserves the punishment he will get, but it seems pretty clear he is guilty of LOTS of crimes. The tax fraud ones seem the worst to me. The lobbying ones I am more ambivalent on. We have so many process "crimes" now its hard to really see how to tell if someone is doing something that should be considered illegal. Lots of people lobby in similar situations. There is a cadre of dirty fixers in Washington private individuals rely on to get "access" to those with power. Manafort is one of them. I don't see a lot of them going to jail for doing the exact same things.

Also, I think there is a difference between someone lobbying for Frito-Lay and someone lobbying for a foreign government (although I think they are both rotten). I do think the punishment should be worse for someone who can change an entire party's platform based on how much money a country has funneled into the campaign of the nominee.

 

[Taxing Matters]

Also, I think there is a difference between someone lobbying for Frito-Lay and someone lobbying for a foreign government (although I think they are both rotten). I do think the punishment should be worse for someone who can change an entire party's platform based on how much money a country has funneled into the campaign of the nominee.

Lobbying, so long as the relevant laws are followed, is perfectly legal to do. There is nothing inherently wrong with anyone — individual, business, or government — asking Congress or the President for laws and policies that will benefit them. The biggest problems occur when those requests are accompanied by money offered to the government official to get the wanted changes. So bribery, lobbying, and election contribution laws focus a lot on the money and restrict what can be done with that money. Congress is, however, restricted in the limits it can put on that by decisions of the Supreme Court like Citizens United that interpret the Constitution to give certain protection for this kind of activity under our rights of free speech and to petition the government.

 

[ajkroy]

But the issue is that he didn't follow the laws. He was an unregistered foreign agent (as was flynn). And it isn't like he was "lobbying" the people in power, who could ultimately decide whether or not to agree with his proposal -- they changed the rules from the inside.

 

[Whoops2u]

You don't see a lot of the white-collar criminals being prosecuted and going to prison because white-collar crime prosecutions are at a 20-year low under Trump, this according to Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC).

In 2011, under Obama. there were over 10,000 white-collar crime prosecutions and in 2017, under Trump, there were fewer than 6,000.

One reason for this is that Trump's administration has focused on immigration investigations and prosecutions.

Do you have a cite for that? The data is presented a bit differently at http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/03/28/federal-criminal-prosecutions-fall-to-lowest-level-in-nearly-two-decades/

With more raw data, I struggle to make a link between Manafort and the incredible awesome job the Obama administration did on dirty fixers.
https://www.justice.gov/usao/resources/annual-statistical-reports
https://www.justice.gov/usao/page/file/1081801/download

Finally, if you look at immigration prosecutions, I'm not finding anything that pops up that would indicate they are a reason for any reduction in "white collar" prosecutions.

 

[quincy]

Do you have a cite for that? The data is presented a bit differently at http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/03/28/federal-criminal-prosecutions-fall-to-lowest-level-in-nearly-two-decades/

With more raw data, I struggle to make a link between Manafort and the incredible awesome job the Obama administration did on dirty fixers.
https://www.justice.gov/usao/resources/annual-statistical-reports
https://www.justice.gov/usao/page/file/1081801/download

Finally, if you look at immigration prosecutions, I'm not finding anything that pops up that would indicate they are a reason for any reduction in "white collar" prosecutions.

Did you read my source?

From Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC):
http://trac.syr.edu/tracreports/crim/514/

 

[Whoops2u]

Did you read my source?

I looked up the website. Do you have a cite as to where I might find your claim?

https://cis.org/Cadman/TRAC-Once-Again-Cutting-Sign-Wrong-Direction
I deeply admire their tenacity in obtaining statistics and airing them for public view and examination, but I loathe their barely concealed bias in favor of aliens and against the rule of law, which frequently enough manifests itself in shallow or flawed analyses of the data they present, often skewing it in a way that is designed to make government enforcement efforts look ineffectual or callous. But sometimes their efforts simply render their own analyses as facile.

 

[laurakaye]

Do you have a cite for that?

Here's a link to the Trac report: http://trac.syr.edu/tracreports/crim/514/

 

[Whoops2u]

Now, we need the link to see this "white collar" prosecutions are reduced because of Trump's focus on immigration and we're there as a general matter. To make it relevant to this thread we might need the additional step to show how "white collar" prosecutions have been cleaning up the swamp and rolling up guys like Manafort who did not make the error of being associated with Trump before any focus on immigration took place.