Thread by @jentaub

📌 Highlights from the partial transcript from Monday's sealed court hearing with Paul Manafort.

cnn.com/2019/02/07/pol…

THE COURT: There are a series of lies I think -Can you tell me why that was - I guess where I got the most confused, what the importance is of any dissembling about whether Kilimnik knew who he was working for or not, and what his role was in creating the or advancing them?

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MR. WEISSMANN:
Why is that important? Okay. So, I mean, this goes to the larger view of what we think is going on, and what we think the motive here is. This goes, I think, very much to the heart of what the Special Counsel's Office is investigating.

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MR. WEISSMANN: [Manafort] very well aware of what Mr. Gates had said about sharing of polling data

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MR. WEISSMANN: So, the defendant was very well aware of what Mr. Gates had said about sharing of polling data, and that it was something that was not -- not
simply a matter of {REDACTED]

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MR. WEISSMANN: I do want to address one of the things that the Court
said about motive. The -- from our perspective, the motive here is, if
you remember Mr. Manafort, at the -- when he was working for
the Trump campaign, was unpaid.

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WEISSMAN: Second, as there's been a lot of evidence . . during that time period Mr. Manafort had a liquidity issue; not that he didn't have assets. But Mr. Yanukovych had fled in 2014 from the Ukraine, and there was a dramatic drop in income that was coming in to Mr. Manafort

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WEISSMANN: And one of the -- and so the -- one of the motives for the serial bank frauds that were charged, and now admitted by Mr. Manafort, was to, basically, increase his liquidity. Here, this was a way of getting cash. . .

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WEISSMANN: And it's not something that would be, I think, well received, that the unpaid campaign manager was getting [REDACTED]

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WEISMANN: And, instead, was being used to pay [REDACTED] in ways that were not reported in the contract -- the written contract so hat there would be a motive to conceal this.

THE COURT: Okay. All right

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WEISMANN: "This was one where a significant issue came up because 30 days after pleading guilty, we had a defendant before us saying, in fact, he is not guilty of the conspiracy. Again, the Court has it completely correct.

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WEISSMANN: We are not in any way saying that Mr. Manafort was saying that he,
himself, did not engage in what I think would be one of the counts that was charged, but he was saying it was not a conspiracy. He was not doing it with Mr. Kilimnik.

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WEISSMANN: THE COURT: So, this is an example where you're saying he didn't just correct or revise the information, but he denied having said the thing earlier?

MR. WEISSMANN: Yes.

THE COURT: Okay.

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THE COURT: So let's go on to III, the interactions with Kilimnik, which I think I'm going to break up a little bit into the Ukraine stuff and the [REDACTED] stuff.

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COURT: With respect to the first, sort of, subtopic here, the discussions concerning the [REDACTED] Ukraine, we were talking about [REDACTED] that was being floated by the [REDACTED]

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COURT: The Office of Special Counsel contends that Mr. Manafort lied about the number of times they discussed it, that he and Mr. Kilimnik had not just discussed it once on August 2nd, 2016 . . .

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COURT: But also in December of 2016; in January 2017, in person, in Washington, D.C., when Kilimnik was here for the inauguration; in February of 2017, including in person on [REDACTED] and even in the winter of 2018.

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COURT: As part of this issue, there's also testimony concerning the February 2017 meeting with Mr. Kilimnik in [REDACTED]. On September 11 of 2018 Mr. Manafort said: I traveled to [REDACTED] for other business. Didn't meet with Kilimnik.

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COURT: September 12th, he's told: Well, Kilimnik was there. And he says: Well, I don't recall meeting with him. But, if he was there, he would have been there to meet with me.

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COURT: And then, either on the 13th or 14th, he did say that that meeting touched on a number of issues involving the [REDACTED]. And then in the grand jury, he testified that he told [REDACTED].

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COURT: And this issue about Kilimnik and Ukand Ukrainian politics also involves Manafort's own work in 2017, as a consultant for a potential candidate in the Ukraine. And in particular, polls he arranged for there related to what the Ukrainians thought about the [REDACTED]

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COURT: So I want to put aside for a minute [REDACTED] so when we talk about , we all know what we're talking about. And I want to talk about whether his testimony about those efforts, including whether Kilimnik knew about those efforts, was accurate.

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MR. WEISSMAN: So I do think that the Court outlined the principal ones [lies]. There is the -- the statement from Mr. Manafort that this was a topic that was raised by Mr. Kilimnik on August 2nd, 2016, in person, in New York, and
that the topic ended.

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MR. WEISSMAN: There's -- there's also the substance of Mr. Manafort's reaction that we would like the Court to focus on, because Mr. Manafort gives an explanation for why it is that it ended. Which is that, to use his phrase, it was a
backdoor [RECACTED].

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THE COURT: Can you tell me why that was -- I guess where I got the most confused, what the importance is of any dissembling about whether Kilimnik knew who he was working for or not, and what his role was in creating the [REDACTED]
or advancing them? Why is that important?

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MR. WEISSMANN: Okay. So, I mean, this goes to the larger view of what we think is going on, and what we think the motive here is. This goes, I think, very much to the heart of what the Special Counsel's Office is investigating.

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MR. WEISMANN: And in 2016 there is an in-person meeting with someone who the Government has certainly proffered to this Court in the past, is understood by the FBI, assessed to be -- have a relationship with Russian intelligence, that there is [REDACTED]

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WEISSMANN: And there is an in-person meeting at an unusual time for somebody who is the campaign chairman to be spending time . . .That meeting and what happened at that meeting is of significance to the special counsel. . looking at the issue of what [REDACTED]

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WEISSMANN: all are the focus of -- and are raised by the issue of the August 2nd meeting

COURT: Well, I understand the August 2nd meeting and the meeting -- well, not so much the [REDACTED]My question is more the [REDACTED] effort was in 2018; is that correct?

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WEISSMANN: That's correct. . . So the work for Mr. [REDACTED] itself
is not of importance. . . . What is of interest to us is that the questions in the poll are completely consistent with the ongoing effort, at the very least by Mr. Kilimnik, to promote a [REDACTED].

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WEISSMANN: Mr. Kilimnik points out . . .that [REDACTED] would be able to facilitate Mr. Manafort being. . .the spokesperson, and denominated as such within the United States, that he would also have access to senior people [REDACTED] that's as far as I can go on this record

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COURT: . . .when you provided him with the [REDACTED] email, he does seem to agree that Kilimnik discussed it with him then. And he seemed to agree pretty readily that if Mr. Kilimnik was in [REDACTED] well, yeah, then he met with me there.

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WEISSMANN: we know Mr. Manafort took the precaution in August of 2016 of leaving separately -- Mr. Gates and Mr. Manafort leaving separately from Mr. Kilimnik, by February of 2017 there had been substantial focus on General
Flynn and others in terms of their contact.

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WEISSMANN: With respect to the Brady information, the defense, as is their right, asked us early on in the case to produce any and all communications with the American embassy in Ukraine.

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WEISSMANN: And so we then went to the State Department to get
communications that were either direct or indirect by Mr. Manafort with the State Department. So Mr. Kilimnik was encompassed in that search.

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WEISSMANN: There is no question that Mr. Manafort had communications with people at the State Department. There's no question that Mr. Kilimnik did.

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WEISSMANN: So -- so, first, in terms of the what it is that the special counsel is tasked with doing, as the Court knows from having that case litigated before you, is that there are different aspects to what we have to look at . . .

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WEISSMANN: . . ..and one is Russian efforts to interfere with the election, and the other is contacts, witting or unwitting, by Americans with Russia, and then whether there was -- those contacts were more intentional or not.

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WEISSMANN: And for us, the issue of [REDACTED] is in the core of what it is that the special counsel is supposed to be investigating.

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MR. WESTLING [COUNSEL FOR MANAFORT]: I think the first issue, Your Honor, is what actually happened. Special counsel says they believe [REDACTED] because Mr. Gates says so and because it's referred to in Mr. Kilimnik's various emails.

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THE COURT: And because Mr. Manafort told Mr. Gates
to do it?

MR. WESTLING: That's what Mr. Gates says, yes.

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THE COURT: I need to ask the Office of Special Counsel about something ex parte because . . it may be after I talk to them, they tell me there's no problem with sharing it with you. But I have received information in this case, in this binder . . .

Those were some highlights. . . A sealed hearing schduled for Feb. 13th at 9:30 a.m.

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