On Monday, the
New York Times exposed the history of Paul Manafort, top Trump adviser and campaign manager. Manafort was installed late in the primary season and made one of his first marks the assertion that Trump’s wildly divisive campaign rhetoric was only a show, one which the candidate would soon conclude.
Trump, of course, continues to ride racism and bigotry to the polls in November, having never stopped his rhetoric, only adding to the increasingly worrisome nonsense he spews and standing by what he has said in the past. He isn’t looking at a good chance of a win, with his hatred for everyone who isn’t a rich white Republican having driven the GOP and its poll numbers into the ground.
According to the Times, Manafort was an instrumental figure in the inner circle of recently ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.
While Manafort worked as a political consultant for Yanukovych, the Ukranian people rose up in protest against Yanukovych’s government, and he fled the country in fear. He found refuge in Russia, a nation which he —
and Manafort –– had long been allied with.
The day after he fled the Ukraine marks the beginning of the war carried out by Russian forces against the nation, a war resulting in the Russians claiming to have annexed the Crimean peninsula, adding it to the Russian territory.
During all of these events, leading to untold numbers of violent deaths among noncombatant Ukrainian civilians, Manafort
continued to work on behalf of the pro-Russia and pro-Putin forces inside the Ukraine. He helped lead the efforts to oppose the government that arose in place of Yanukovych, a government aligned with the United States and against Russia.