Gates Told Mueller About Sharing Polling Data, Transcript Shows

Paul Manafort’s former right-hand man, Rick Gates, told prosecutors about someone sharing internal polling data from Donald Trump’s presidential campaign with a translator suspected of having ties to Russian intelligence.

Gates told Special Counsel Robert Mueller about the sharing of polling data with Konstantin Kilimnik, a translator who worked with Manafort and Gates on political campaigns in Ukraine, according to a transcript unsealed Thursday.

The role of Gates, who pleaded guilty and is cooperating with Mueller’s prosecutors, emerged in a 142-page transcript of a hearing held in a sealed courtroom on Feb. 4 in federal court in Washington. The hearing was to determine whether Manafort, the former Trump campaign chairman, lied to prosecutors during debriefings after he pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate.

Manafort’s legal team first mistakenly revealed in an improperly redacted court filing that Mueller’s prosecutors had questioned Manafort about the sharing of polling data with Kilimnik.L.P.