President Donald Trump’s name has not been mentioned in the 31-page PDF representing the indictment of Paul Manafort and Rick Gates. Thus far, Trump supporters are jumping on that fact to distance Trump from the Manafort and Gates melee. According to CNN , Manafort was eventually fired or asked to resign by Trump, with the White House already separating themselves from the indictments. As the world waits for the next tweetstorm from Trump’s Twitter account in response to Manafort and Gates still being processed and booked as they await being taken by federal authorities to address the charges filed against them, the White House is already responding to the indictment.
Update : President Trump has tweeted the below allegation, claiming that the happenings were “years ago,” prior to Manafort joining the Trump campaign. However, CNN notes that the indictment accuses the men of crimes that lasted allegedly during the same time they worked on Trump’s campaign, and is calling Trump’s tweet “simply untrue.”
CNN reports that a White House source claimed that Manafort and Gates were “bad guys” before they joined Trump’s camp, and were “bad guys” after they left Trump’s camp. Sara Murray , a CNN White House Correspondent, was reportedly told by the White House source that the “bad guys” had nothing to do with Trump, and that the indictment doesn’t specify Russia collusion. Such a statement is not sitting well with folks asking on social media why Trump would align himself with “bad guys” who are now being accused of charges as varied as money laundering, failure to pay taxes, and hiding income.
Sorry, but this is years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign. But why aren’t Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 30, 2017
Serious charges but don’t see anything that links directly to Trump, 2016 election or Russia collusion. Yet. https://t.co/Rb0mwdBFeY
— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) October 30, 2017
Meanwhile, Piers Morgan has weighed in on the controversy. As seen in the above tweet, Morgan called the indictment one that contains serious charges, but Piers admitted he didn’t yet see anything directly linking the charges to President Trump. Also trending on Google Trends is the question, “Can Trump pardon Manafort?”
The former presidential campaign manager who is Manafort is being accused of all sorts of illegal behaviors, along with former business partner Gates. With questions about money laundering and failure to file as foreign agents, the public is wondering what exactly Manafort’s role and Rick’s role entailed during their time with the Trump camp.
Paul Manafort has been indicted by Robert Mueller and told to surrender to federal authorities, @nytimes reports. https://t.co/RPgwLxMYJF
— Twitter Moments (@TwitterMoments) October 30, 2017
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