President Trump on Wednesday said he has not spent any time considering whether to pardon his former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, but he feels “very badly” for him.
“I have not even given it a thought as of this moment,” Trump told reporters during a briefing on drug trafficking on the southern border. “It’s not something that’s right now on my mind.”
Manafort, 69, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson earlier Wednesday to an additional 43 months in prison on two federal conspiracy charges. The sentencing from Berman in the District of Columbia comes after he was sentenced by a federal judge in Virginia last week to 47 months on charges of bank and tax fraud.
His total sentence amounts to more than 7.5 years in the two cases, which stem from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Trump noted Manafort has worked for a host of notable Republicans, including former President Ronald Reagan, the late Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Sen. Bob Dole, R-Kan.
“I think it’s a very sad situation,” Trump said. “Certainly on a human basis, it’s a very sad thing.”
The president said Manafort’s case proves there was no collusion between his campaign and Russia.
“There’s no collusion. There hasn’t been collusion and it was all a big hoax. And you know it,” Trump said.
Immediately after Manafort was sentenced in D.C., state prosecutors in New York announced that he had been indicted on 16 state felony charges, including residential mortgage fraud.
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said in a statement Manafort engaged in a “yearlong residential mortgage fraud scheme” through which he and others falsified business records in an effort to “illegally obtain millions of dollars.”
Many believe Manafort is angling for a pardon from Trump, but the state charges could reduce the value of that pardon, as the president can only issue pardons for federal crimes.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders told reporters Monday that Trump would decide whether to pardon Manafort “when he is ready.”
