Judge Dismisses Remaining Charges Against Paul Manafort

Amid reports that former Trump campaign executive Paul Manafort has been spending an awful lot of time in the special counsel's office (visiting at least nine times in the last four weeks, according to CNN), the Virginia judge who presided over the summer trial where Manafort was convicted of 8 counts of tax fraud and failing to disclose foreign bank accounts has dismissed the 10 remaining deadlocked counts against against the political operative, the first indication of how Manafort's efforts to cooperate with prosecutors (turning over information that some believe could lead to one more bombshell indictment from the special counsel) has benefited him.

Manafort appeared in an Alexandria Federal Court Friday in a wheelchair, and his lawyer complained of his client's ill health, and asked that he be sentenced as soon as possible. Judge T.S. Ellis then set a date for Manafort's sentencing was set for Feb. 8.

Manafort's lawyer, Kevin Downing, said this expedited sentencing was for Manafort’s safety. Moving up the pre-sentence investigation would allow Manafort to move as soon as possible out of a local jail and presumably to a federal prison, per the Washington Post.

Mueller's team of prosecutors approved the dismissal after Ellis criticized an arrangement between prosecutors in Manafort that would delay dismissal of his remaining charges as "highly unusual" after Manafort pleaded guilty to charges in a separate case in Washington and agreed to cooperate.

Under the deal, the special counsel did not have to decide whether to prosecute Manafort on the remaining 10 Virginia charges until after he was done cooperating. But Ellis called that agreement "highly unusual" and told the special counsel to make a decision now.

Lawyers with the special-counsel probe agreed, saying they would accept a dismissal of the counts and prepare for sentencing as long as it remains possible to refile the charges in the future. (It is also possible for charges to be dismissed “with prejudice,” meaning they can never be filed again).

We still don't know what Manafort told Mueller, but reports have speculated that he could have provided information on a range of issues, from the Trump campaign's relationship with Russia to the Republican Party's decision to soften language in its convention platform pertaining to Russia and Ukraine.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-10-19/judge-dismisses-remaining-charges-against-manafort

BREAKING: Honduran Migrants in Caravan Tear Down Border Gate in Guatemala – Rush Mexico Border (VIDEO)

Caravan chaos!

The bulk of the Honduran migrant caravan reached the Mexican border late Thursday and hundreds of Mexican police were waiting and ready.

Chaos erupted as the Honduran caravan faced off with Mexican police on the border town of Tecun Uman Thursday.

The organizer of Pueblo Sin Fronteras, Irineo Mujica was arrested by Mexican police and thrown into a white van.

Happening now…

According to the Associated Press, the migrants in caravan just tore down the border gate in Guatemala and rushed toward the border bridge into Mexico.

According to Karla Zabs, a BuzzFeed reporter live on the scene, “The people from the caravan have crossed. They opened the gates.”

Video of Honduran migrants crossing the bridge from Guatemala into Mexico via embedded Buzzfeed reporter, Karla Zabs:

BREAKING: Honduran Migrants in Caravan Tear Down Border Gate in Guatemala – Rush Mexico Border (VIDEO)

Cristina Laila by Cristina Laila October 19, 2018

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Caravan chaos!

The bulk of the Honduran migrant caravan reached the Mexican border late Thursday and hundreds of Mexican police were waiting and ready.

Chaos erupted as the Honduran caravan faced off with Mexican police on the border town of Tecun Uman Thursday.

The organizer of Pueblo Sin Fronteras, Irineo Mujica was arrested by Mexican police and thrown into a white van.

Happening now…

According to the Associated Press, the migrants in caravan just tore down the border gate in Guatemala and rushed toward the border bridge into Mexico.

According to Karla Zabs, a BuzzFeed reporter live on the scene, “The people from the caravan have crossed. They opened the gates.”

Video of Honduran migrants crossing the bridge from Guatemala into Mexico via embedded Buzzfeed reporter, Karla Zabs:

Women and children will be let through the gate first.

Video of migrants jumping over the border fence:

“The caravan breached the gate on the Mexico side of the bridge and @jameslfredrick have moved further back. Heard about six detonations that sounded/look like tear gas but we are too far to confirm.”

On Thursday, President Trump issued a blunt warning to Mexico and other Central American nations over their failure to stop illegal migrants and criminal cartels targeting the U.S. southern border, saying he would send the military and shut down the southern border.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/10/breaking-honduran-migrants-in-caravan-tear-down-border-gate-in-guatemala-rush-towards-bridge-into-mexico-video/

Russian space boss ‘temporarily’ taken off sanction list so he can visit US – NASA chief

NASA managed to convince the White House to ‘temporarily’ lift the travel ban imposed on Russian space chief Dmitry Rogozin so he could pay a visit to the US, the head of NASA said on Friday.

NASA “succeeded” in temporarily “removing” the head of the Russian national space agency ‘Roscosmos’ from the sanctions list, Jim Bridenstine told TASS news agency. He explained that this was done so that the Russian official could travel to the US and “meet with NASA representatives and several of our contractors.”

The US space agency wants to secure “strong working relations” with Russia as it will benefit both nations, Bridenstine said.

“We wish to uphold such relations and will do everything we need to do that.”

Bridenstine and Rogozin met earlier this month in Moscow where the NASA chief arrived to discuss joint space launches. The two later spent some time with the crew from Expedition 57, which successively conducted an emergency landing in Kazakhstan on October 11.

Recalling how he delivered a speech at Moscow State University a week ago, Bridenstine said he hopes that one day he could invite his Russian counterpart to make a speech in his alma mater, Rice University in Houston.

Washington imposed a travel ban on Rogozin in 2014 after Crimea voted to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia.

https://www.rt.com/news/441751-jim-bridenstine-rogozin-sanctions/

US and South Korea cancel military exercises as they work to improve relations with North Korea

The United States and South Korea have decided to suspend joint military exercises in order to better improve relations with North Korea.

Didn’t Trump already cancel the exercise?

The exercise that was suspended was known as Vigilant Ace and was scheduled to take place in December. The Vigilant Ace exercises last year involved 12,000 U.S. troops and 230 military aircraft from the U.S. and South Korea.

This exercise is different from the Freedom Guardian exercises that President Donald Trump canceled in June, before his summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.

Kim has long objected to the military drills between the United States and South Korea, claiming that these games are merely preparations for an invasion.

In August 2017, he vowed “merciless retaliation” against one of these exercises. In March 2015, a spokesman for the North Korean People’s Army general staff said that the exercises were proof that “the situation on the Korean Peninsula is again inching close to the brink of war” and that the only way to deal with “the aggression and war by the U.S. imperialists and their followers is neither dialogue nor peace. They should be dealt with only by merciless strikes.”

Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White said that this exercise was suspended by Secretary of Defense James Mattis and South Korean Minister of National Defense Jeong Kyeong-doo in order “to give the diplomatic process every opportunity to continue.” Mattis and Jeong had been meeting in Singapore when they made the decision to cancel the exercise.

What else?

South Korea and the United States are eager to encourage North Korea to abandon its efforts to develop a nuclear weapons program. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been in talks with the North Koreans to organize a second summit between Trump and Kim.

Trump has criticized these exercises in the past, saying in June that he “hated them from the day I came in” and that he thought canceling them “saved a lot of money.”

https://www.theblaze.com/news/2018/10/19/us-and-south-korea-cancel-military-exercises-as-they-work-to-improve-relations-with-north-korea

>>3533555

Cabal controls both sides of conflicts