Dershowitz: Manafort Knows He Gets a Better Deal If He Supports Mueller’s Narrative

Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz said Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort knows he will get a better deal with special counsel Robert Mueller “if he can help support the narrative of the prosecutor.”

Alan Dershowitz said, “I think both Manafort and President Trump acted too late. Manafort, if he was going to make a deal, should have made it before he was convicted. He would have gotten a better deal. And President Trump, if he was going to pardon, he should have pardoned before Manafort agreed to cooperate. So there’s not going to be any pardon now,”

He continued, “Manafort has a deal. His sentence will reflect how much cooperation he gives. There is always the risk, you know, a man like Manafort has to walk a tightrope. If he’s caught lying, the deal is over. On the other hand, he knows he gets a better deal if he can help support the narrative of the prosecutor. So we may see, and there’s always the risk of that, and Judge Ellis said that in the first Manafort case, some people like this they not only sing, they compose, that is they elaborate a little bit, they remember things a little better than they occurred. And that’s the risk to justice that could occur here.”

He added, “I understand why Rudy Giuliani, who’s a good lawyer wants to put this in the most positive light. But this was a very bad day for the Trump Administration. It’s bad because he doesn’t know what Manafort is saying and he can’t count on Manafort saying only things that the special counsel already knows, and when you don’t know what a corroborating witness will say it’s a bad day for you because you’re vulnerable and exposed.”

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