Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort is in discussion with prosecutors about pleading guilty to some of the charges he’s facing in Washington, D.C. in order to avoid a second trial scheduled to begin later this month, Bloomberg reported Friday.
A person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg that the talks have been about what charges Manafort would plea guilty to and the recommendation that special counsel Robert Mueller’s prosecutors would make to the judge for his sentence.
The Wall Street Journal previously reported that similar plea talks had been underway while Manafort awaited a verdict in the Virginia trial that wrapped up last month, but that those negotiations fell through.
The jury in the Virginia case — where Manafort was facing charges of bank fraud and tax fraud — returned guilty verdicts on eight of the counts and were deadlocked on 10 others. Manafort, in the D.C. case, faces charges of money laundering, witness tampering and failure to disclose foreign lobbying.