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Politics|Pardoned by Trump, Manafort Is Back and Looking for Foreign Work
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/12/us/politics/trump-manafort.html
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The president-elect’s 2016 campaign chairman, four years after receiving clemency, is testing the international market with a team of Trump-linked consultants.
Jan. 12, 2025, 9:55 a.m. ET
Four years after receiving a pardon from President Donald J. Trump for crimes related to foreign lobbying, Paul Manafort is again seeking business from political interests abroad.
Mr. Manafort, who led Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign for a few months, has assembled a team of consultants who helped run Mr. Trump’s 2024 effort and is looking to advise campaigns for opposition and far-right political factions in Latin America and Europe, according to documents and interviews.
Mr. Manafort has discussed working for a French billionaire supporting anti-immigration politicians including Marine Le Pen, as well as an ultraconservative Peruvian mayor seen as a possible presidential candidate. Mr. Manafort has even engaged with interests in Ukraine, the country where his work for Russia-aligned interests led to his downfall.
The circumstances around his re-emergence on the international political consulting scene are murky and fraught, particularly in Ukraine, where there are concerns about Mr. Trump’s commitment to supporting the defense against Russian aggression and where Mr. Manafort’s previous activity remains infamous.
A memo detailing the team’s members and pitching its services recently circulated in political circles in Kyiv, generating anxious buzz.
Mr. Manafort said in a statement that he has been contacted “by numerous parties in Ukraine,” but “never submitted a proposal on any matter to anyone in Ukraine,” and has not signed any contracts with interests there.
