roger stone and paul manafort
© Drew Angerer/Getty Images, Alexandria Sheriff's Office via Getty ImagesStone and Manafort.
President Trump granted full pardons to 26 more people on Wednesday night, including his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, longtime associate Roger Stone and Charles Kushner, the father of Trump's senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Why it matters: It's a continuation of the president's controversial pre-Christmas pardon spree, which began in earnest Tuesday night with pardons for a trio of convicted former GOP congressmen and several military contractors involved in the 2007 massacre of Iraqi civilians.

Background

Manafort was one of the first major Trumpworld figures to be charged in special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia.
  • He and deputy campaign chairman Rick Gates were indicted for their unregistered lobbying work on behalf of the pro-Russian government of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. He later faced additional charges for witness tampering and was ultimately sentenced to 7.5 years in prison.
  • The Senate Intelligence Committee's report into Russian interference in the 2016 election found that Manafort passed internal campaign polling data to his business partner Konstantin Kilimnik, whom the report described as a Russian intelligence officer.
  • Manafort's business dealings are still under legal scrutiny from the Manhattan district attorney, who could bring state charges that are not protected by Trump's pardon.
Stone was charged and convicted for lying to investigators who were probing his contacts with WikiLeaks, which released damaging Democratic emails hacked by the Russian government during the 2016 campaign.


Comment: No they didn't. Wikileaks published leaked emails (probably leaked by Seth Rich, who was then murdered) that had nothing to do with Russia. See:
  • The longtime Trump associate was sentenced to 40 months in prison, but had his sentence commuted by the president in July.
  • Stone and Manafort are the latest figures caught up in the Russia investigation to receive pardons from Trump, joining former national security adviser Michael Flynn, former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos and Dutch lawyer Alex van der Zwaan.
Charles Kushner is a real estate developer who pleaded guilty in 2004 to filing false tax returns, retaliating against a witness and making false statements to the Federal Election Commission as part of a prosecution by then-U.S. Attorney Chris Christie.