US President Donald Trump had praised Paul Manafort, the man convicted and jailed for tax crimes and bank fraud as a “good man” who has been treated unfairly.
Manafort is one of six top advisers and associates of Trump’s 2016 presidential election campaign to be charged in the Mueller investigation.
He was sentenced to 47 months in prison on Thursday for tax crimes and bank fraud in the highest profile case yet stemming from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.
Another Trump adviser, Roger Stone, awaits trial.
Trump has repeatedly denied any election collusion with Moscow and denounced the probe by Mueller, a former FBI director, as a “political witch hunt.”
Manafort has been charged in Washington with money laundering, witness tampering and other offenses and faces separate sentencing in that case on March 13.
Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen is to begin serving a three-year prison sentence on May 6 for fraud, tax evasion, illegal campaign contributions and lying to Congress.
George Papadopoulos, a foreign policy advisor to the Trump campaign, pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI and was sentenced to two weeks in prison.