Another big cloud of smoke has appeared in the Trump-Russia investigation.

Associated Press reports this morning that Trump’s former Campaign Manager Paul Manafort received off-the-books payments from a pro-Russia political party in the Ukraine.

It seems that investigators have been aware of a “ledger” – which came to light as part of a Ukrainian investigation into the recovery of stolen national assets – listing payments to various individuals, including Manafort for several months. Investigators had thus far been unable to confirm the veracity of the ledger, but AP determined that at least some of the entries in the ledger matched payments that Manafort’s firm received. Many of the individuals listed, including Manafort, are being investigated by authorities across the globe.

Manafort and his spokesman had previously maintained that the ledger was fabricated, but now are changing their tune: “any wire transactions received by my company are legitimate payments for political consulting work that was provided. I invoiced my clients and they paid via wire transfer, which I received through a U.S. bank,” Manafort said in a statement to AP.

The payments verified by AP were made in 2007 and 2009, years before Manafort was involved in the Trump campaign, however here are several reasons that these findings are of interest to those investigating the Trump – Russia connection.

Firstly, now that at least some of the entries in the ledger have been validated, the ledger has new credibility and authorities will be able to redouble their efforts investigating those transactions. Second, they expose a pattern of denial and deception on the part of Manafort around these transactions.

And lastly, they create questions around why the Trump Administration made an effort to downplay Manafort’s role in the campaign. Sean “Hitler was misunderstood” Spicer basically described Manafort, who was Trump Campaign Chairman between March and August 2016, as something between an office boy and the guy who fixed the campaign copiers. Spicer said in a March 20 White House press briefing, responding to a reporter’s question about references to Manafort during the hearing:

“Obviously there’s been discussion of Paul Manafort, who played a very limited role for a very limited amount of time,”

That statement was at odds with what was said during the campaign when Manafort was described as Campaign Chairman and Chief Strategist. Candidate Trump said of Manafort, a long-time player in Russian and Ukrainian politics, who lived in Trump Tower and lobbied hard for a role in Trump’s campaign,

“I am organizing [campaign] responsibilities under someone who has done this job successfully in many campaigns. Paul is a well-respected expert in this regard and we are pleased to have him join the efforts to Make America Great Again.”

It certainly appears in retrospect that the Administration was making a concerted effort to distance themselves from a potentially toxic former ally. It is not known if the Trump administration knew during the campaign or has become aware of additional payments from Russian interests to Manafort or any additional contacts Manafort might have had with Russian agents before, during or after the campaign – especially ones that might tend to implicate Trump.

It remains to be seen whether evidence will tie Trump and his campaign to the pattern of payments from Russia and Ukraine, for now it seems that investigators are content to “follow the money” to see where it leads.

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