A federal judge in Washington on Wednesday tentatively set a Jan. 25 date to help her decide whether former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort is in breach of the plea deal agreement he agreed upon in September with special counsel Robert Mueller’s office.
U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson set the date at a Tuesday afternoon status hearing.
Richard Westling, a lawyer for Manafort, said his side is still looking for more details about how Mueller’s team says Manafort breached his plea deal. That agreement included a commitment from him to cooperate with Mueller’s office.
“I don’t know what we know at this time,” said Westling, who explained that once they will get all the details from Mueller’s team, they will check it with the information they have and confer with Manafort before deciding whether to challenge the allegations. Westling said he and Manafort’s other attorneys had begun discussions earlier in the day with the special counsel’s team in which they were told more details about the allegations.
Mueller’s team explained how Manafort violated his plea deal in a memo filed Friday, but it was heavily redacted. Even the judge, Jackson, said there wasn’t enough information in the memo to to make any factual findings on the claim that Manafort violated the agreement.
Manafort’s defense team has until Jan. 7 to respond to the special counsel’s allegations, and Westling said that is when they will decide on next steps.
If Manafort’s defense team does decide it wants to challenge the allegations, then the special counsel has until Jan. 14 to file a document detailing the basis of the claim that Manafort deliberately gave false statements. It is only then that the judge will rule on the allegations at the Jan. 25 hearing.
Through his attorneys, Manafort, 69, has previously denied lying and said he “believes he provided truthful information” during a series of interview sessions with Mueller’s team. Manafort had also disagreed that he breached his plea agreement.
Manafort was first found guilty on bank and tax fraud charges brought against him by Mueller in Virginia in August. A day before a trial on similar charges was set to begin in September in Washington, Manafort took the plea deal, pleading guilty to conspiring to defraud the United States by hiding years of income and failing to disclose lobbying work in Ukraine.
Manafort is considered a key witness for Mueller’s team, as the special counsel works to uncover any links between the Trump campaign and the Russians.
For example, Manafort attended the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower when Russians offered damning campaign information on Hillary Clinton. He also was part of the Trump campaign during the time when Russian hackers worked to steal Democratic Party and Clinton campaign emails, to then disseminate them publicly. Manafort also led the campaign during the Republican National Convention in 2016.
Mueller has been in a detention center in Alexandria, Va., since June after his bond was revoked by Jackson due to allegations he tampered with witnesses.
Late last month, Mueller’s team said in an unexpected court filing that Manafort had breached the terms of his plea deal by lying about “a variety of matters.”
Then, at a Nov. 30 hearing, Mueller’s team indicated it was considering both retrying Manafort on the 10 charges that resulted in a hung jury in Virginia, as well as filing new charges.
