The daughter of Paul Manafort wants to legally change her last name after her father, President Trump’s former 2016 campaign chairman, was convicted of eight counts of tax and bank fraud stemming from special counsel Robert Mueller’s federal Russia investigation.
“I would like my new name to be Jessica Anne Bond, in place of my present name,” Jessica Manafort said in legal documents filed in New York’s Supreme Court in Manhattan Friday, according to the New York Post.
Bond is her mother Kathleen’s maiden name.
In the petition, Jessica Manafort writes that the name “more closely suits my profession,” the Daily Mail added.
A federal district court in Virginia found Paul Manafort guilty in August of five tax fraud charges for filing false income tax returns from 2010 to 2014. He was also found guilty of one count of failing to file foreign bank and financial account reports in 2012. In addition, the jury returned guilty verdicts concerning two bank fraud charges related to a $3.4 million loan from Citizens Bank and a $1 million loan from Banc of California.
“I am a passionate liberal and a registered Democrat and this has been difficult for me. Although I am ‘the daughter of,’ I am very much my own person and hopefully people can realize that,” Jessica Manafort told the Los Angeles Times in July ahead of the release of the independent film “Rosy,” which she wrote and directed.
She was credited as “Jess Bond” in post-production.
Paul Manafort is expected to face a second trial in Washington in September that again emanates from Mueller’s federal probe.
He is yet to be sentenced as part of the first trial.
