Trump pardons more criminals - Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and Charles Kushner

[uk666]

Trump pardons more criminals - Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and Charles Kushner

US President Trump has pardoned former campaign manager Paul Manafort, ex-adviser Roger Stone and Trump's son-in-law, father Charles Kushner.

Manafort was convicted in 2018 in an investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 US election.

Trump has previously commuted the prison sentence of Stone, who was convicted of lying to Congress.

They are among 29 people to benefit from Trump's latest pardons before he leaves office next month. Twenty-six of them won full pardons on Wednesday night, while another three received commutations.

A commutation usually takes the form of a reduced prison term, but does not erase the conviction or imply innocence.

A pardon is an expression of the president's forgiveness that confers extra privileges such as restoring the convict's right to vote.

Presidents often grant pardons in the final days of office, and Trump has used the power less than any president in modern history apart from George HW Bush.

Roger Stone
Stone was found guilty of lying to Congress about his attempts to contact Wikileaks, the website that released damaging emails about Trump's 2016 Democratic election rival Hillary Clinton.

On Wednesday night, the long-time Trump friend and adviser welcomed his upgrade from a commutation to full pardon.

Paul Manafort
Trump's pardon for Manafort spared his former campaign chairman from serving most of his seven-and-a-half-year prison term for financial fraud and conspiring to obstruct the investigation into himself.

He had been serving his term under home confinement since being released from federal prison in May over fears of coronavirus, but is now a free man.

Charles Kushner
Another pardon went to Charles Kushner, a real estate magnate who is the father of Ivanka Trump's husband, Jared Kushner, a White House adviser.

Kushner Snr - whose family boasts a portfolio of 20,000 properties from New York to Virginia - was sentenced to two years in prison in 2004 for charges including tax evasion, campaign finance offences and witness tampering.

The witness tampering charge arose from Kushner Snr's retaliation against his brother-in-law, who was co-operating with authorities against him. Kushner Snr hired a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law, recorded their encounter with hidden cameras and sent it to his own sister.

How have US politicians reacted?

Adam Schiff, the Democratic head of the influential House Intelligence Committee, tweeted: "During the Mueller investigation, Trump's lawyer floated a pardon to Manafort. Manafort withdrew his co-operation with prosecutors, lied, was convicted, and then Trump praised him for not 'ratting'.

"Trump's pardon now completes the corrupt scheme. Lawless until the bitter end," Mr Schiff said.