so a little over an hour from now an alleged russian spy who is due to plead guilty to conspiracy. she is cooperating now to a point with prosecutors. cnn s jessica snyder is at the d.c. federal courthouse. tell us how her participation fits into the larger story here. reporter: a tantalizing, intriguing story for sure. this 29-year-old came here to washington portraying herself as a gun rights activist. but she was actually here working at the direction of a former russian bank official to
this is the third in three days of hearings where we ve seen paul manafort and others. maria butina, the charges aren t brought by robert mueller. she could be a witness like the others that could prove useful to robert mueller. that s because she came over with a similar goal to some of the people robert mueller has been investigating. she wanted to be able to unofficially infiltrate the republican party leading up to the 2016 election and she used her position as a gun rights activist to get inside the nra and try to set up some of those channels of communication. they also mentioned the church. she used a national prayer breakfast to begin what she called back channels of communication. if that sounds similar, one of the things rasht mueller is looking into, whether or not there were back channels between in that case the trump campaign and russian officials. so maria butina falls outside the koconcentrated trump campai.
tonight. reporter: she s accused of being a glamorous and manipulative secret agent, sent here by russia. but tonight, maria butina has agreed to cooperate with the justice department. in a draft agreement obtained by abc news, the russian gun rights activist pleads guilty to conspiracy, admitting she sought to establish unofficial lines of communication with americans having power and influence over u.s. politics for the benefit of the russian federation. prosecutors say she did it with the help of an american, republican operative paul erickson, with whom she had a romantic relationship. they even recorded this video together. tale as old as time reporter: butina says erickson helped her cozy up to conservative leaders and top nra officials. she acknowledges that in 2015, she told a russian official she had laid the groundwork for an unofficial channel of communication with the next u.s. administration.
headline from this week with you. arrest of an alleged russian agent accused of trying to infiltrate the u.s. political system. take a listen to pete williams report on this woman, maria butina. reporter: at 2015 trump event in las vegas she askeded candidate a question. if you would be elected as a president what would be your foreign politics especially in the relationships with my country. reporter: court documents say she offered sex for access to an unnamed political group. the fbi arrested her last weekend when she was packing up to move. who is she? what was her alleged role as a russian agent, john? well, we don t know everything that she was trying to accomplish, but we do know that she purported to be a gun rights activist. she came to the united states. she made contact with the national rifle association, and she was trying to infiltrate conservative republican political circles.
both considered potential presidential candidates. rick santorum did run for president. this guy, alexander. he claimed to be a gun activist working on behalf of the kremlin. can you tell us about that. no, he s not a gun rights activist working for the kremlin. he s a kremlin. he s close to the inner circle of vladimir putin. he s also very close to the russian mafia. in fact there s an indictment outstanding for him. warrant for his arrest in spain. in spain and the state prosecutor. working with the st. petersburg mafia. same mafia vladimir putin brought under control when he was liquidating the city of saint petersburg. so he appears to have been tasked out as the principal