President Trump’s longtime informal adviser Roger Stone suggested the president sent a signal to his former campaign advisers ensnared in the Russia probe with his recent pardon of conservative author Dinesh D’Souza.
“It has to be a signal to Mike Flynn and Paul Manafort and even Robert S. Mueller III: Indict people for crimes that don’t pertain to Russian collusion and this is what could happen,” Stone told the Washington Post on Thursday. “The special counsel has awesome powers, as you know, but the president has even more awesome powers.”
[Opinion: Trump’s pardon of Dinesh D’Souza signals he’ll also pardon anyone caught up in the Mueller probe]
Flynn pleaded guilty to one count of lying to the FBI about his contacts with the former Russian ambassador to the U.S. Manafort, meanwhile, was indicted on numerous charges.
Since Mueller took over the investigation into potential Russian meddling in the 2016 election last year, 19 people, including 13 Russian nationals, and three Russian companies have been charged.
The president announced Thursday he would be granting a full pardon to D’Souza, who pleaded guilty in 2014 to a federal charge of making illegal contributions to a U.S. Senate campaign.
Trump later said he was open to a pardon for Martha Stewart and commuting the sentence of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
Stewart was found guilty in 2004 of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and making false statements to federal investigators about the sale of stock in a biotechnology company.
Blagojevich is nearly halfway through a 14-year prison sentence after he was convicted of attempting to extort a children’s hospital for campaign donations and seeking to sell the Senate seat vacated by former President Barack Obama.
Blagojevich’s charges include wire fraud, extortion, and soliciting bribes.
