After getting shot down in court, Paul Manafort makes desperation move involving Donald Trump
Earlier this week, a judge ruled that the evidence from Paul Manafort’s storage locker could be used against him at trial. Palmer Report explained at the time that this was essentially his last stand, and it left him with no real defense strategy at all. Now Manafort and his team are resorting to a desperation move – and it directly relates to Donald Trump.
Manafort and his lawyers are now asking the judge to bar Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team from even mentioning during the trial that Manafort worked for Trump, according a CBS News report. If your first instinct is to laugh at this, you’re right, because it’s absurd. To be clear, there are people out there who have no idea who Manafort is; I recently had a conversation with some folks who had never heard of him. But just based on the Russia-related crimes he’s being prosecuted for, it won’t take long for the jury to figure out that Manafort is one of Trump’s guys, even if Trump is never mentioned.
So why even bother trying such a pointless and strange move? There is a mountain of evidence against Paul Manafort that should be enough to get him convicted ten times over. Manafort and his lawyers were banking on getting much of the evidence against him thrown out, leaving the legal case against him full of holes. Now that the judge has decided to admit the most damaging evidence against him, Manafort has no good options left. He and his lawyers are now grasping at straws, because there’s nothing else left to do.
At this point Paul Manafort is locked in a jail cell, and facing the overwhelming probability that he’ll never spend another day of his life outside of a cell unless he cuts a plea deal against Donald Trump. His lawyers are still trying things, because that’s what they’re paid to do. But this is basically over. Unless Manafort is enough of a naive rube to think that Trump might actually pardon him, he’s got to be at least thinking about a plea deal right about now.
