A longtime Ron Paul aide helped a Russian businessman get into a Trump fundraiser; Trump later pardoned him for another campaign finance crime.
Elections “reflect the values and the priorities and the beliefs of American citizens,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Michelle Parikh said in her closing argument this week. “Jesse Benton by his actions did damage to those principles.”
Witnesses from the RNC and the firm hired to organize the event said they weren’t told Vasilenko was a Russian citizen. Benton said in an email to his RNC contact that Vasilenko was “a friend who spends most of his time in the Caribbean”; he described Vasilenko’s interpreter as “a body gal.” In factBenton argued that he followed the advice of his previous counsel, David A. Warrington, whoTrump.
“If Oprah was available,” defense attorney Brian Stolarz said in his closing argument, “we wouldn’t even be here.” “He wants to be an influencer,” Stolarz said. “This is just shameless self-promotion from a guy who can afford to take this picture.”
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