Notorious Republican operative Roger Stone was sentenced today to 40 months in prison for lying to Congress over his role in President Donald Trump‘s 2016 election bid.

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Stone, a longtime confidant of Trump, was found guilty earlier this year of lying to Congress, as part of the legislative branch and Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

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Stone is widely considered to have been a go-between for the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks, who received emails stolen from Hillary Clinton’s campaign by the Russian government.

Stone tweeted about having advance knowledge of the WikiLeaks dump, however, he has denied he was involved.

Stone had been found guilty on all seven counts of his indictment, and prosecutors recommended he be given a 7-9 year sentence for his crimes.

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However, in the wake of interference and objection from President Donald Trump, the lead prosecutors on the case stepped down, after the Justice Department overruled their sentencing recommendation.

It is widely assumed that President Trump will issue a pardon in the case given how close he has been with Stone, and how frequently he has tweeted about what he has deemed an unfair prosecution of one of his allies.

Given how vocal Trump has been about the Stone case, a pardon by him will raise serious questions about how the president sees the independence of both the Department of Justice and the judiciary.

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