“Paul Manafort’s resignation is a clear admission that the disturbing connections between Donald Trump’s team and pro-Kremlin elements in Russian Federation and Ukraine are untenable”, said campaign Manager Robby Mook in a statement.
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Stephen Bannon of Breitbart News is now serving as chief executive of the campaign and pollster Kellyanne Conway is campaign manager. But in recent days, details have emerged about Manafort’s connections to foreign authoritarian leaders, in particular his work for Ukraine’s pro-Russian leader Viktor Yanukovych.
He first took control of Mr Trump’s campaign after former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski was sacked in June.
“This morning, Paul Manafort offered, and I accepted, his resignation from the campaign”, said Trump in a statement released by his campaign.
Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort.
Manafort denied receiving untaxed, under-the-table payments from Yanukovych or his allies but did say his political consulting firm has done work for overseas clients in the past. “I think it’s as simple as that”, she said in the interview, first reported by Buzzfeed.
Despite years of experience in managing Republican nominating conventions in the past, Manafort was never officially chosen as Lewandowski’s successor and the position remained empty until this week.
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign has previously said that the allegations against Mr Manafort were evidence of “more troubling connections between Donald Trump’s team and pro-Kremlin elements in Ukraine”. But the Trump campaign pulled off an outright victory by casting Cruz’s efforts as part of a “rigged” system that allowed the Texas senator to walk away with the lion’s share of delegates in states that did not hold primaries or caucuses.
“You can get rid of Manafort, but that doesn’t end the odd bromance Trump has with Putin”, Robby Mook, Clinton’s campaign manager, said in a statement.
Caputo said the increased scrutiny over Manafort’s ties to Russian Federation and Ukraine helped lead to his ouster.
“And I do regret it, particularly where it may have caused personal pain”, he added.
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But Manafort had run-ins with Jared Kushner, the New Jersey-bred real estate developer who is Trump’s son-in-law and a top adviser, according to a report by the New York Times.
