Russia Probe: Robert Mueller Seeks September Sentencing For George Papadopoulos

Special Counsel Robert Mueller is asking U.S. District Court Judge Randy Moss to set George Papadopoulos’ sentencing for September, Politico reports.

A court filling obtained by Politico states the following.

“The parties respectfully request that the Court set a date for sentencing in this case. The parties are available on September 7, 2018. Because of defense counsel’s trial schedule in September, the parties are next available on October 1, 2018 and thereafter.”

In May, as CNN reported, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team signaled readiness to move forward with Papadopoulos, asking the judge overseeing Papadopoulos’ guilty plea to begin preparations for sentencing.

George Papadopoulos, a former member of the foreign policy advisory panel to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, had previously pleaded guilty to a charge of making false statements to the FBI about his contact with three individuals responsible to set up a meeting between then-presidential candidate Donald Trump and Kremlin officials.

If the hearing goes forward as planned, Papadopoulos could become the second defendant sentenced in the Russia probe. The first person to serve time in the Mueller probe was the Belgian-born Dutch attorney, Alexander van der Zwaan. As the Inquisitr previously reported, the attorney pleaded guilty to one count of lying to the FBI about his contacts with a former Trump campaign aide, Rick Gates, and former campaign chair, Paul Manafort.

Van der Zwaan served 30 days in prison and paid a $20,000 fine. Although van der Zwan had hoped to leave the United States voluntarily, he was, in fact, deported and subsequently turned over to Dutch authorities.

Papadopoulos, Politico notes, played a pivotal role in the launching of the Mueller probe, having told an Australian diplomat, Alexander Downer, that the Russians had access to damaging information on Hillary Clinton, Trump’s political opponent. The proposed timing of Papadopoulos’ sentencing, according to Politico, suggests that he is either highly likely to receive a light sentence, or that he will not be called to witness in other cases related to Mueller’s probe into Russian election interference.

As the Russia Probe progresses, Bloomberg recently noted, some of President Donald Trump’s confidants are urging the president to end the probe by simply firing Robert Mueller.

“Time to fire Sessions. End the Mueller investigation. You can’t obstruct something that was phony against you,” Trump’s campaign manager Brad Parscale tweeted.

According to a recently published national poll from NBC News and the Wall Street Journal, 53 percent of voters have at least “some” confidence that Special Counsel Robert Mueller is conducting a fair investigation. According to the same poll, 37 percent of voters believe that Trump colluded with Russia, while 34 percent believe that he did not. Twenty eight percent of American voters said they don’t know enough to have an opinion.