Latest Media 'Bombshell'? Manafort May Have Shared Polling Data With A Russian

Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort shared polling data during the 2016 presidential campaign with a business associate accused of having ties to Russian intelligence, and prosecutors say he lied to them about it, according to a court filing.

The allegation marks the first time prosecutors with special counsel Robert Mueller’s office have accused Trump’s chief campaign aide of sharing election-related information with his Russian contacts. Although the filing does not say whether the polling information was public or what was done with it, it raises the possibility that Russia might have used inside information from the campaign as part of its effort to interfere with the election on Trump’s behalf.

The accusation could be important evidence in Mueller’s ongoing probe into potential coordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.

The information was accidentally revealed in a defense filing Tuesday and was meant to be redacted. The Associated Press was able to review the material because it wasn’t properly blacked out.

[...] The defense filing was aimed at rebutting allegations that Manafort intentionally lied to Mueller’s team after agreeing to plead guilty last September. Prosecutors say Manafort breached their plea agreement by lying, but defense lawyers argued that any misstatements were simple mistakes made by a man coping with illness, exhaustion and extensive questioning from investigators.

The defense lawyers said Manafort suffers from depression and anxiety, has had little contact with his family and, on days when he met with investigators, was awakened before dawn to have hourslong interviews with little time to prepare for the questioning.

“These circumstances weighed heavily on Mr. Manafort’s state of mind and on his memory as he was questioned at length,” the lawyers wrote.

Manafort’s attorneys don’t specify the details of the peace plan but they write that Manafort told prosecutors in September that “he would have given the Ukrainian peace plan more thought, had the issue not been raised during the period he was engaged with work related to the presidential campaign.

“Issues and communications related to Ukrainian political events simply were not at the time forefront of Mr. Manafort’s mind during the period at issue and it is not surprising at all that Manafort was unable to recall specific details prior to having his recollection refreshed,” they said.

They say the same about his recollection of sharing polling data with Kilimnik related to the campaign.

Natalya Veselnitskaya, who attended a 2016 Trump Tower meeting with Donald Trump Jr. and Jared Kushner, was charged Tuesday with obstruction of justice in an unrelated case. https://t.co/doXnwaxAT1

— The Associated Press (@AP) January 8, 2019

The Russian lawyer who attended the Trump Tower meeting that is a focus of the special counsel’s investigation into possible collusion was charged with obstructing an unrelated tax-fraud case, federal prosecutors in New York said Tuesday.

Natalya Veselnitskaya was indicted on one count of obstruction of justice after prosecutors said she teamed up with a senior Russian prosecutor and submitted deceptive declarations in a civil proceeding involving a Russian tax refund fraud scheme.