WASHINGTON (AP) – Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort has been indicted in New York on state charges, seen as a strategy for preventing a potential presidential pardon.
An indictment unsealed Wednesday in Manhattan accuses the 69-year-old Manafort of conducting a yearlong residential mortgage fraud scheme that netted millions of dollars.
The indictment filed March 7 was unsealed the same day Manafort was sentenced in Washington in the second of two federal cases against him.
He would serve more than seven years in prison in those cases. Trump has repeatedly defended him and floated the idea of granting a pardon, but would not be able to do so in a state case.
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WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge on Wednesday sentenced former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort to an additional three and one-half years of prison, questioning his remorse and rebuking him for his crimes and years of lies. That makes seven and one-half years for Manafort, coming on top of the roughly four-year term he received last week in a separate case in Virginia.
Adding to his legal woes, Manafort was also charged Wednesday with mortgage fraud, conspiracy and other counts in a new indictment in New York City. The state charges appear at least partly designed to guard against the possibility that he could be pardoned by President Donald Trump and freed early on his federal convictions. The presidential power does not extend to state charges.
