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The advocates of President Donald Trump's campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, have resumed talks with Special Adviser Robert Mueller's team about a possible deal before the second Manafort trial in Washington, DC.
Bloomberg said the discussions focused on the charges that Manafort could potentially plead and the length of his sentence.
Manafort was sentenced in Virginia last month for eight counts of tax evasion, bank fraud and non-reporting of bank accounts abroad. He faces a decade of prison. Prosecutors accused Manafort during his trial in Washington of obstruction of justice, money laundering, conspiracy and unregistered foreign agency.
The second trial is to begin on September 17th. By pleading guilty, Bloomberg said that Manafort could avoid the risk of a longer prison sentence if he is sentenced a second time and save on legal fees and eventual confiscation of assets.
Manafort and Mueller spokespersons declined to comment on reported discussions.
The Wall Street Journal had previously reported that the Manafort legal team had discussed the same deal with prosecutors, but these discussions had failed when Mueller had raised a number of issues with Manafort's lawyers.
Manafort's former right hand man, Rick Gates, reached an agreement with Mueller's team in February, pleading guilty to lying to investigators and to a charge of conspiracy.
According to a file filed last month, Mueller's team plans to introduce three times more evidence in the Washington, DC trial than at the Virginia trial. In the latter case, they showed the jury about 400 documents, e-mails and financial documents to put forward their arguments. They plan to introduce more than 1,000 exhibits into the Washington trial, the court said. They also said they expected to take ten to twelve days to argue their case at the second trial.
Manafort's efforts to secure an advocacy agreement do not necessarily indicate that he is ready to launch Mueller's investigation into Russia, which examines Russia's interference in the elections. of 2016 and if the members of the Trump campaign plotted with Moscow.
Instead, in most cases, the accused usually plead guilty to avoid a lengthy trial and reduce the sentence if prosecutors agree to such an agreement.
That being said, the biggest question for legal experts is why Manafort chose to go to first instance.
The answer to the question of why Manafort has not rocked, they say, can be summed up in one thing: a presidential pardon.
Rudy Giuliani, Trump's lead counsel, said the president was not currently considering a pardon for anyone caught in Mueller's viewfinder. He will wait until the end of the investigation to make his final decisions.
But Trump made several statements saying that he could be lenient towards his former campaign chairman. It has also been recently reported that Trump had already begun to give thanks to Manafort, even though the White House council and several other senior administration officials have died against him.
