WASHINGTON (AP) – On a black Monday for Donald Trump’s White House, the special counsel investigating possible coordination between the Kremlin and the Trump presidential campaign announced the first charges, indicting Trump’s former campaign chairman and revealing how an adviser lied to the FBI about meetings with Russian intermediaries.
The formal charges against a total of three people are the first public demonstration that special counsel Robert Mueller and his team believe they have identified criminal conduct. And they send a warning that individuals in the Trump orbit who do not cooperate with Mueller’s investigators, or who are believed to mislead them during questioning, could also wind up charged and facing years in prison.
Paul Manafort, who steered Trump’s campaign for much of last year, and business associate Rick Gates ended the day under house arrest on charges that they funneled payments through foreign companies and bank accounts as part of their private political work in Ukraine.
George Papadopoulos, also a former campaign adviser, faced further questioning and then sentencing in the first – and so far only – criminal case that links the Trump election effort to the Kremlin.
Manafort and Gates, who pleaded not guilty in federal court, are not charged with any wrongdoing as part of the Trump campaign, and the president immediately sought to distance himself from the allegations. He said on Twitter that the alleged crimes occurred “years ago,” and he insisted anew there was “NO COLLUSION” between his campaign and Russia.