The 31-page indictment released on Monday accuses Paul Manafort and Rick Gates with defrauding the U.S., at precisely the time that Manafort was the chairman of President Donald Trump’s campaign. Manafort was the former Trump campaign chairman, and Paul can be seen in the above photo leaving his house in Alexandria, Virginia, on the morning of Monday, October 30. Along with Manafort, his former business associate Gates was also instructed to surrender to federal authorities.
The indictments have caused the hashtag #IndictmentMonday to trend on Twitter, along with #ManafortMonday and the name Paul Manafort . Also currently trending is the hashtag #RickGates, along with the label “ Mueller Day .” According to CNN , President Trump’s name is not mentioned directly in the indictments, and the White House bigwigs learned about the indictments during a Monday morning meeting and are currently formulating a response. With the charges against Manafort and Gates being released to the public, the White House is reportedly happy that the indictment has not mentioned Trump’s name directly; however, the indictments represent one of the biggest controversies thus far related to the presidency.
Manafort has long been a source of controversy since stepping into the spotlight as part of the Trump camp, with questions about Paul’s lavish living seemingly stretching far beyond his means.
As seen on the first page of the indictment, Manafort and Gates are accused of acting as unregistered agents of the Ukraine government between as early as 2006 until 2015. It goes on to claim that Manafort and Gates laundered money via multiple U.S. and foreign companies and bank accounts.
Manafort and Gates were also not truthful when the Department of Justice questioned both men in 2016, claims the indictment, when their alleged filtering of millions of dollars in payments from the Ukraine was queried.
By the second page of the indictment, Manafort is accused of using his “hidden overseas wealth” to fund his lavish U.S. lifestyle, with no taxes paid on that income. Manafort is charged with using his offshore account income to buy multi-million dollar properties in the U.S. and borrowing millions of dollars in loans against those properties.
[Featured Image by Andrew Harnik/AP Images]
