Bombshell Dropped As Manafort Created An Opening for Russian Interests In Trump Campaign

Last updated on October 3rd, 2017 at 01:22 pm

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This seems a lot like an offer of collusion from the Trump campaign chair to a Russian billionaire closely aligned with the Kremlin, and it is reportedly in written form via an email. Manafort made an offer that seems to investigators “created a potential opening for Russian interests at the highest level of a U.S. presidential campaign.”

Paul Manafort, acting as Trump campaign chairman, offered to provide briefings on the 2016 election to a Russian billionaire closely aligned with the Kremlin and with whom he had done business in the past, according to a Washington Post report.

Manafort made the offer for a briefing in a July 7, 2016 email to an intermediary, asking it to be sent on to Russian billionaire and aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska, according to an email read to the Washington Post reporters Tom Hamburger, Roz Helderman, Carol Leonnig and Adam Entous.

While there is “no evidence in the documents showing that Deripaska received Manafort’s offer or that any briefings took place”, the Post further reports, “…investigators believe that the exchanges, which reflect Manafort’s willingness to profit from his prominent role alongside Trump, created a potential opening for Russian interests at the highest level of a U.S. presidential campaign, according to people familiar with the probe.”

In Robert Mueller putting on the pressure to determine if the President of the United States is compromised by the Russians, conservatives are pointing fingers at Obama for his language skills.

That talking point isn’t a one-off, Paul Manafort’s spokesperson is trying to claim the FISA warrant on Manafort was “political action” by the Obama administration.

That is not how FISA warrants work. At all. That’s not how any of this works. If these emails are real and can be produced, they are evidence that Paul Manafort offered collusion to a Russian billionaire closely aligned with the Kremlin.

The Obama talking point is a sign that things have come to the place where denials will no longer work. It’s now time to blame Obama and hope it works with rational people as well as it does with the Trump base.

There is no one but Paul Manafort to blame for his offer to brief someone associated with the Kremlin on the campaign just weeks before Trump accepted the nomination.

Sarah Jones

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