Mueller's Latest Charges Bring Together Trump Campaign, Russia

By Chris Strohm
June 9, 2018, 5:00 PM EDT

Manafort fixer had Russian intelligence ties, FBI found

New indictment doesn’t make connection to election meddling

U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s latest indictment is significant beyond the new charges, in that it links senior officials on President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign to Russian intelligence in a criminal matter.

Mueller’s indictment released Friday against Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, adds witness-tampering charges to allegations that Manafort did illegal lobbying work for Ukraine and laundered millions of dollars in proceeds. It also included an allegation that a fixer described by the FBI as a former Russian spy, Konstantin Kilimnik, helped Manafort obstruct justice.

"This is the first indictment we have where an American and a Russian are charged together," said Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor who is now a partner at the Thompson Coburn LLP law firm in Chicago.

"This is an alleged Russian spy committing crimes with the former campaign chairman for Trump," Mariotti said. "When people first thought of the Mueller investigation, this is what people thought would result from it."

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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-09/mueller-s-latest-charges-bring-together-trump-campaign-russia