On Media Blog Archives Select Date… December, 2015 November, 2015 October, 2015 September, 2015 August, 2015 July, 2015 June, 2015 May, 2015 April, 2015 March, 2015 February, 2015 January, 2015

The Times reported Paul Manafort had been in debt to pro-Russia interests by as much as $17 million before he joined Trump's presidential campaign. | Haxorjoe via Wikimedia Commons NYT rejects Manafort's retraction request

The New York Times has rejected a retraction request from former Donald Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort.

Manafort demanded The New York Times retract an article published Wednesday, which reported he had been in debt to pro-Russia interests by as much as $17 million before he joined Trump's presidential campaign in March 2016.

In the article, Mike McIntire reports based off of audited financial statements filed with government authorities in Cyprus, that the money was owed by shell companies connected to Manafort’s consulting business with a pro-Russia Party of Regions in the Ukraine.

"The Cyprus documents obtained by The New York Times include audited financial statements for the companies, which were part of a complex web of more than a dozen entities that transferred millions of dollars among them in the form of loans, payments and fees,” McIntire wrote.

Jason Maloni, a spokesperson for Manafort, said in an email to the Times that “despite the implications and innuendo, The New York Times offered no evidence that these transactions represent current obligations” and that “the documents you provided are LLC docs that do not show these are personal or current obligations.” (The Times piece includes Maloni saying the Cyprus records are “stale”). Maloni also claims the Times wrote the piece as though Manafort personally kept bank accounts in Cyprus and that “times substituted unproven allegations from a counter party in litigation as actual evidence of a debt.”

Morning Media Your guide to the media circus — weekday mornings, in your inbox. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

But the Times isn’t budging.

"We have carefully reviewed the request from Manafort's representatives and see no basis for a correction,” a spokesperson for the paper said.

Maloni said they are “disappointed” by the response and that they would “expect more from The New York Times.” He would not comment on further action, except to say, “We will examine all options available to us.”