Todd whitman is my guest. Lets if out front. Good evening. Im erin burnett. Breaking news, a shrewd leader, how President Trumps lawyers are painting Paul Manafort. A jury of six men and six women listening as hewellers team outlined its case describing manafort as a con artist who ran a global scheme to avoid paying millions in taxes. Prosecutors say manafort made 60 million in ukraine and that he didnt report to it the irs. They say he had 30 Bank Accounts in just three Foreign Countries which he used in part to store untaxed income to spend on luxury goods like range rovers, a watch costing 21,000, a 15,000 custom made ostrich jacket. Who doesnt need one of those, right . The defense hitting back saying manafort is the victim that he was taken advantage of by the man he trusted most rick gates, his right hand man in ukraine and his deputy in the trump
A news and interview program, anchored by Erin Burnett. Countries. He owns seven homes, including in the hamptons, in florida, and here in alexandria, virginia. They said he spent half a million on fancy clothes. 21,000 on that watch and 15,000 on that ostrich jacket. Essentially they made it clear that his extravagant lifestyle, their words, was going to be on trial here because they said this is what paul many of the was using these offshore banks accounts in cypress and in other places to hide the money from the irs. Interesting, evan, because it doesnt sound like at least from what we heard today that the defense is going to be, no, we did pay our taxes. It sounds like its going to be a defense of okay, fine but its rick gatess fault . Kind of a defense of blame it on that guy. Rick gates was his deputy who worked closely with him not only in business in ukraine. But also remember, erin, he was his Deputy Working in the Trump Campaign. Matter of fact he stayed on the
A news and interview program, anchored by Erin Burnett. Close eye on it here at the white house. Of course this is Bob Muellers First Public Be Case here. For the next three weeks they will say they are not watching, erin. Privately im told they are. Certainly are. Because this may be about one thing but manafort is linked to a whole lot of other thing as well. Jeff, thank you. I want to go to democratic congressman adam schiff of california, the Ranking Member on the select committee on intelligence. Part of the russia investigation there. Congressman this trial is not about collusion with the Trump Campaign and russia as you know. Just about an accused shrewd lawyer who avoided taxes and bought a 15,000 as trip jacket. They are saying its not connected with the rump campaign. Is it that simple. No. If it were i dont think you would fine the president watching so keenly. This is Donald TrumpsCampaign Manager who is pointing the finger at his deputy Campaign Manager. If the he is convicted, as you
point out erin he will face substantial time if he is convicted on these charges. He may flip. That will be profoundly concerning to the president. We are already hearing conflicting reports about the easy weres knowledge and approval of the Tower Meeting that paul many of the sat in on. If he is facing time he may come clean about what he knows about that meeting. Also if mueller were to be unsuccessful it is an opportunity to further bash him. Im betting on mueller on this. These are very documentspecific allegations that are i think firly easy to prove. When it comes to paying your taxes or not. As you point out, it should be document driven. But you know, the ostrich coat, the 21,000 watch, the fleet of range rovers. The list they are putting out goes on and on. You would think with all that he would just cooperate but he didnt, right . Unlike other Trump Associates who have been charged right,
flynn, papadopoulos, and rick gates. Is it possible that manafort is not cooperating because he is not guilty . Do you even entertain that possibility at this point . I dont entertain that possibility. I think what is going on here is, if Paul Manafort even if he cooperated with authorities, he was still looking at a very substantial amount of time given the weight of these charges. At his age he may have concluded he doesnt have that kind of time to spend behind bars. It is going to go all in for a pardon. He is going to be the last man defending donald trump and bet it all on a pardon. That may be where at least hes making his appeal. Which is an interesting point. I want to ask you, the judge in the case, judge ill ellis is important. As you remember n may he told muellers team, quote, you dont really care about mr. Manaforts bank fraud. He basically accused prosecutors of only caring about many of the because he could lead to trumps Quote Prosecution or impeachment. Thats were the judges words. He asked for muellers mandate,
he looked at it and said okay this can go forward. He did do that. What do you think of him . Do you think the trial will be fair . I certainly hope the trial will be fair. I was concerned by those comments because they didnt really go to any of the legal issues. It sealed like gratuitous political commentary which you dont expect from a federal judge. They you this look at the law, the mandate, the jurisdiction. All of that was clear. Ultimately he ruled the right way but those kind of political comments i think are concerning. The first government witness on the stand today, as we were reporting, it is the rocket docket. 34 witnesses on that side. They want to bang through this. It could be two or three weeks. It was Bernie SandersCampaign Strategy in to 16. Divine was the first person on the stand. He worked with manafort in ukraine. He described his relationship with many of the as friendly, said he was impressed by many of the, saw him as a hard working
guy. You are a former assistant u. S. Attorney. What do you make of that . Bernie sanders former top strategist saying he is a Hard Working Guy and impressed by manafort. I dont know the details of this, but Paul Manafort may be a very Hard Working Guy and he may have worked very hard to hide his money and to fail to disclose his taxes. Bear in mind that some of these charges pertain to Money Laundering that was going on while he was the Campaign Manager for donald trump. So it may take a lot of work to get that ostrich coat but it doesnt mean it was lawful work. It certainly doesnt appear so from the indictment. As the russia Investigation Continues and mueller obviously is very focus on the manafort case right now because this trial is his first. But facebook announces today they are shutting down dozens more facebook and instagram accounts believed to be run by russians. It sort of confused me congressman. You know, you have got facebook. Mark zuckerberg comes and testifies before congress. They shut everything down and
now they are still finding accounts that they need to shut down . Even now. Does that make sense to you . It does make sense because the russians arent going to stop and they are not going to be as overt as they were in 2016. They are not going to use the same ip addresses to out of st. Petersburg. We have seen continuing activity since the last election. It never stopped. I think we should view what facebook disclosed in combination with what microsoft disclosed within the week. That is both of these same vectors that appear in these two mueller indictments, the social Media Campaign and hacking. You belief its new accounts not facebook willing incomplete but sort of a continued onslaught from the russians . Am i translating it right. Yes. Okay. I think thats the case. We kept getting Additional Information from facebook about advertising and organic content from these original ip addresses from st. Petersburg, but they are going to continue to learn about more as the russians move and hide and use other proxies. So this is going to continue to
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milligram. Frank rooney and carey cordero. Ann, does the fact that this jury is so white matter . I dont think it matters. I mean first of all i think there is some diverse knit the jury, which we see. But the second point is what both sides want to do when they pick a jury is they are trying to find people that they think we will aligned with the way they see the world. The government wants people who follow the rules pay their tax who is think its terrible that someone didnt pay their taxes. The defense i suspect is looking for people with proxies for being super conservative, more simple athletic and who heard this is a witchhunt and is politically motivated. I think thats how you wind up getting people selected for juries. You never know. Interesting, the first thing a lot of us will look at is racial component. Est as you point out thats actually not the driver here for either side. Carry, you live in Northern Virginia where the trial is
car tax. We pay high Property Taxes federal taxes of course. So the lying and the Tax Evasion Component of this case i think will be relevant to this jury. Frank, many of thes team is blaming rick gates. Yeah. Which we were just talking about. Its interesting. Not saying it didnt happen, saying this other guy did it. Right. His Attorney Says quote this case is about taxes and trust. Mr. Manafort laced his trust in the wrong person, rick gates. Now rick gates of course knows pretty much everything about Paul Manafort, right. Yes. They worked together on this campaign, worked together before in ukraine. They have a long history together. Bernie sanders former Campaign Strategist testified manafort is hard working but also said rick orkd for paul, paul was in charge. Will anybody buy that gates was the mastermind . I think its tough to sell that because you are talking about more than 60 Million Dollars mate over five or four years. You are talking about 15 million of taxes not being made and we are supposed to believePaul Manafort never noticed that sort of savings in his financial flow . We are supposed to believe this guy who ran such a big business who traveled the world, lived that large who was that much of a Master Of The Universe was completely content to just sign papers without reading then and hand them over to rick gates. Hard to believe that i dont think thats going to be something the jury is going to be persuaded from and rick gates testimony is going to be the moment of this trial. They are saying he is going to be the star in all of this. And blaming gates, ann, do you think it is a good defense. No. If it is the best defense. I think its the latter, the best defense. If you gates is testifying and he is cooperating and he knows everything. He is the right hand man, the inside narrator of the entire scheme. So the jury is either going to believe him or not. If they believe him, manafort is guilty. So he has to chip away at his credibility. Has going to be a paper trail proof of the Bank Accounts, proof of taxes not paid. This is not like a he said she said type of crime. The problem for manafort is exactly what frank just said, he signed the tax forms. He got the opulent homes, got the ostrich coat or hat. I want there to be a picture of the coat. Oh. Its hard to argue away i didnt know, right. I think gates is going to be the most exhaustively prepared witness in the history of witnesses. Carry, the Opening Statements obviously significant. From the prosecution, key words, shrewd lie e 15,000 custom ostrich jacket. Follow the money. He, manafort believed The Law Didnt Pry to him. Thats the prosecution. From the defense, two sides to every story, talented consultant, Driving Force in the candidacy of multiple u. S. President s. That third one is true. Paul manafort has been crucial in the candidacy of multiple u. S. President s. Who was more effective do you think carry in the opening
states tchblts prosecutors approach in the Opening Statement did track what they put in the indictment which is their theory that manafort is a liar, that the crimes that they are alleging he did involve lying, lying to banks. Lying to the irs. Lying to the treasury department. So his crime is the criminal act of lying on all of these different types of forms and compliancerelated issues. The defense is going to have a hard time countering the Documentary Evidence that is going to be in this case. And then rick gates, his partner in business, verifying a lot of those documents, which is what i expect part of his role will be. Frank, Kellyanne Conway today decided to take the tack of hey, i was the Winning Campaign chairman. Forget the guy that came before me that delivered the actual nomination. You know, she said look the trial has nothing to do with tru