On Tuesday’s Good Morning America, ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos couldn’t hide his desire that President Trump would be implicated in the new Paul Manafort trial. Even though the charges against Manafort are completely unrelated to the Russia collusion investigation, Stephanopoulos kept suggesting that Trump could be impacted negatively by the trial.
Reporter Kyra Phillips shared the news that broke overnight, that the trial for former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was beginning Tuesday. After raiding his home last year, Mueller has charged Manafort with multiple counts of financial crimes including money laundering and tax evasion.
However, ABC skipped one crucial detail to the case: All of this happened before Manafort was Trump’s campaign chairman.
Phillips did note that the business dealings were unrelated to the Russia investigation, but ended her report by suggesting foul play, saying that the president might bail out his former adviser:
But for President Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, this trial has nothing to do with Russia. At least for now.
Manafort is facing 18 counts of financial crimes, allegations that he laundered at least $60 million from consulting work on behalf of pro-Russian/Ukrainian politicians and funneling the funds through offshore bank accounts and in turn living a lavish lifestyle fit for a king, luxury car, beach front properties and shopping sprees at the house of bijon, one of the most exclusive showrooms for men's fashion. What jurors will hear prosecutors making their case for tax and bank fraud. What they probably won't hear, if Manafort has any knowledge about the Trump campaign allegedly coordinating with Russia during the 2016 presidential election.
Now, just to add to the intrigue Paul Manafort is the only American charged that has opted for a trial instead of cooperating with investigators and if convicted he could spend the rest of his life in jail and it raises the question, George, does he believe he did nothing wrong, or could he be holding out for a presidential pardon?
Afterwards, Stephanopoulos continued the speculation in a discussion with ABC contributor Chris Christie. The anchor eagerly wondered why the court would leave Trump out of the trial: “Put on the prosecutor's hat for a second. Why are they so focused on not saying the name Trump?” he asked Christie.
Christie emphasized that since the trial was about Manafort’s business dealings, it was a “smart strategy” for the prosecution to leave politics out of it. But Stephanopoulos kept insisting Trump could be implicated as part of the Russia collusion investigation.
“Even though they don't name Trump, the stakes are very, very high for both the prosecutors and the president,” he pressed.
“Oh, absolutely,” Christie agreed, before suggesting that this trial would be crucial to Mueller’s case against Trump:
“Listen, when you're a prosecutor, you know, we used to say all the time if you're going to try to kill the king make sure he's dead and the fact is this case is going to be very important to establish credibility for Bob Mueller,” he emphasized, before adding that it would be a colossal failure if Mueller failed to do so.
“If he were to lose this case it would be an extraordinary --” Christie began before Stephanopoulos dismissed the idea.
“It looks like a strong case,” Stephanopoulos insisted.
He then argued repeatedly that Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani was “moving the goalpost” of what Trump could be found guilty of in relation to the Russia investigation:
Meanwhile the president's lawyer Rudy Giuliani seems to be shifting the goalpost on the Russia investigation, you know, for the longest time the Trump campaign said there was no contact with Russia. We now know there were 80 something contacts. Now we hear no collusion. That was the mantra of the president for a long time. Now Rudy Giuliani is out there is saying collusion is not a crime. It appears to be moving the goal pose. But aiding and abetting a crime, is a felony, is a crime.
Christie denied they were moving the target, saying that they were simply pointing out the alternative. He added that the media needed to “take a deep breath” and stop bringing politics into it:
He's saying the president didn't collude but even if he did collusion it self it's not a crime. A conspiracy, as they’ve charged in other cases, to defraud the United States is certainly a crime. But they're so far away from that. Over the weekend saying, you know, you look at what's gone on with the Michael Cohen situation, no one from Cohen's camp has taken credit for anything that's leaked. They're not taking any credit for it, they’re not taking any responsibility for it either. So we don't know if Cohen was at a meeting, really heard what was rumored to have been heard and tagged it on the president so, again, this is -- it's the prosecutor's hat, not the politician's hat, George. We got to take a deep breath.
But Stephanopoulos wouldn’t let it go, suggesting that the Trump Tower meeting might be the way Trump gets implicated in the Cohen tape:
“If the president did know about that meeting and subsequently called on Russia to send over emails, that would be a problem for him,” he claimed to end the segment.
