During the Monday hearing, prosecutors made clear that they viewed Paul Manafort’s interactions with Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian-Ukrainian national, as important to Robert Mueller’s mission to investigate evidence of Russian influence on the 2016 presidential campaign. | Keith Lane/Getty Images mueller investigation Mueller: Manafort downplayed Russian associate’s conduct even after plea deal

Special counsel Robert Mueller’s team has accused Paul Manafort, the former Trump campaign chairman, of continuing to try to minimize the conduct of an associate with alleged ties to Russian intelligence, even after Manafort agreed last year to plead guilty and cooperate with prosecutors, according to a newly released court transcript.

The partially redacted transcript, of a lengthy hearing that took place behind closed doors on Monday, shows that Mueller’s team contended that when Manafort was debriefed by prosecutors and FBI agents, he seemed to be trying to avoid providing information that could be damaging to Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian-Ukrainian national who was deeply involved in Manafort’s political consulting work in Ukraine.


“I think Mr. Manafort went out of his way in this instance … to not want to provide any evidence that could be used with respect to Mr. Kilimnik,” deputy special counsel Andrew Weissmann told U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson during the court session, which spanned more than four hours, including a lunch break.

Prosecutors have accused Manafort of breaching his plea deal by repeatedly lying during debriefing sessions and during appearances before a grand jury late last year. Manafort’s attorneys say any misstatements were the result of confusion or foggy memory, rather than a deliberate effort to mislead.

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The closed-door hearing on Monday served as a forum for the attorneys to hash out the latest lying charges against Manafort ahead of his sentencing in federal court in Washington, which Jackson has scheduled for March 13. Additional briefs on the allegations against Manafort are due on Friday, and Jackson also has another sealed hearing scheduled for next Wednesday.

Manafort pleaded guilty last September to conspiracy against the U.S. and conspiracy to obstruct justice on the eve of his scheduled jury trial. He also faces sentencing in federal court in Alexandria, Va., stemming from his conviction last summer on bank and tax fraud charges, but Judge T.S. Ellis III has postponed a formal date for that hearing until the dispute over his lying to prosecutors is resolved.

During the Monday hearing, prosecutors made clear that they viewed Manafort’s interactions with Kilimnik as important to Mueller’s mission to investigate evidence of Russian influence on the 2016 presidential campaign.

“This goes, I think, very much to the heart of what the Special Counsel’s Office is investigating,” Weissmann said in response to questions from Jackson about the relevance of some of Manafort’s alleged lies.

The full context of the prosecutors’ complaints and Manafort’s responses is difficult to determine because of deletions from the transcript made public Thursday, but Mueller’s team appears intently focused on efforts during the campaign and after to advance a peace plan aimed at resolving the conflict between Russia and Ukraine over Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

Some figures with longstanding ties to President Donald Trump also worked to advance the plan that Mueller is investigating, including Trump personal attorney Michael Cohen and Felix Sater, a real estate developer involved in efforts to develop a Trump Tower Moscow project.

Weissmann said on Monday that prosecutors had particular doubts about Manafort’s statements about a meeting he held with Kilimnik on Aug. 2, 2016, at the Grand Havana Club in New York. Weissmann said it was surprising that Manafort would have held such a meeting given his many responsibilities running the Trump campaign.

“There is an in-person meeting at an unusual time for somebody who is the campaign chairman to be spending time, and to be doing it in person,” Weissmann said. “That meeting and what happened at that meeting is of significance to the special counsel.”

The transcript also reveals that Manafort and Rick Gates, his deputy and longtime colleague, used cloak-and-dagger tactics to avoid being seen with Kilimnik. Manafort and Gates left the cigar club separately from the Russian as a “precaution,” Weissmann said.

Kilimnik was originally an unnamed co-conspirator in charges filed against Manafort in 2017. Last June, however, Mueller’s office obtained an expanded grand jury indictment charging Manafort and Kilimnik with witness tampering.

One of the charges to which Manafort ultimately pleaded guilty was conspiring with Kilimnik to obstruct justice by tampering with the testimony of two witnesses.

At the hearing on Monday, Manafort attorney Kevin Downing dismissed the special counsel’s suggestions that the peace plan or other efforts Manafort was connected with were steps towards easing U.S. sanctions on Russia.

Downing called one aspect of the prosecution’s presentation “nonsense because no matter who gets elected the sanctions against Russia were going to continue.”

However, after the election, Trump’s incoming national security adviser, Michael Flynn, is known to have discussed the sanctions with the Russian ambassador during the transition. Flynn has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about those discussions. He is awaiting sentencing.

There have also been numerous new reports about various Trump officials considering moves to ease sanctions in the months after he took office.

The transcript that was released on Thursday also reveals that Manafort continued to work for one potential political candidate in Ukraine into 2018.

The candidate’s name was deleted from the version of the transcript made public, but Mueller’s prosecutors described a draft poll prepared in connection with Kilimnik and said it was to include questions that seemed intended to go beyond that candidate’s campaign and to instead focus on broader issues.

Prosecutors appear to view the 2018 poll proposal as evidence that Manafort’s work on the peace plan continued even after he was indicted the previous year.

Darren Samuelsohn contributed to this report.