Does anyone know anything about the legality of this?
Manafort currently has three US passports, each under a different number. He has submitted 10 passport applications in roughly as many years, prosecutors said.
by DougJ| 89 Comments
This post is in: Assholes
Does anyone know anything about the legality of this?
Manafort currently has three US passports, each under a different number. He has submitted 10 passport applications in roughly as many years, prosecutors said.
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Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I can’t see how it could be.
Trentrunner
I don’t know, but I do know he’ll be slicing see-through-thin garlic with a razor blade in minimum security before this is all over.
Wag
We don’t even know his real name.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
@Trentrunner: No, that was another guy named Pauly.
Mai.naem.mobile
Does not sound legal. I know if you say you your passport got lost/stolen you have to send in a police report to get a new one. Also the last time I renewed my passport I could swear I had to send the old one in. Ofcourse,Dolt45 is decreasing the value of an American passport daily.
Doug!
@Wag:
Not often that that song applies
Raoul
Chris Hayes was just asking this, too.
ETA: Huh. You can.
Which is interesting, because I was kinda sweating when I applied for a Brazil tourist visa and it took a while to process, and I had a trip coming to Europe and worried I’d be passportless on departure day (it worked out). This would have been an interesting option.
*Yeah, I know, tough life.
Mai.naem.mobile
@Trentrunner: you’re assuming Vlad won’t get some polonium into him before then.
BlueNC
You can get two if you travel a ton and need to send one off for visa processing while traveling on the other one.
Never heard of three but as long as the Dept of State knows about them, I think it’s probably ok.
Tom Hamill
As a US gov’t employee, I have an official work passport as well as my personal passport. Manafort was never a gov’t employee though.
Major Major Major Major
Love that song.
randy khan
The State Department will issue a second passport if you have a good reason. Apparently one possible reason is that certain countries want your passport while they’re processing a visa application, so if you can’t travel during that time unless you have another passport.
ETA: I see that everybody was looking it up at the same time.
Barbara
When you apply for a passport you have to disclose what happened to existing passports. The only way I can think of for why you would get more than one passport is if you falsely disclosed that the first one had been stolen (lost or destroyed). In the U.S. they have scanners so they would figure out that the old one had been replaced. If, however, you were trying to hide that you had entered a given country, you could use the old one to enter countries that would examine but not scan the passport. Hence, you could have your “live” current U.S. passport free of signs of entry to inconvenient places that you would like to deny you had visited at given times or ever. At a minimum, it would be illegal to make a false statement under penalty of perjury that you no longer had your original passport. These people make me ill. They are common criminals masquerading as James Bond.
Or maybe what others have said, but still, highly unusual.
J R in WV
I wonder how many passports he has from those little island nations that issue a passport to anyone who buys a place big enough they have to hire help.
Or just have a big enough local bank account. Seychelles? Malta? Cyprus? who knows?
Peale
@BlueNC: Yep and he travels a lot. Not certain if he was applying for a new passport because he was perhaps out of pages and not all countries will accept a person if the pages are full. I am almost out of room in my passport and I have two years to go. I looked into going to china recently and you need at least two blank pages on your passport in order for them to give you a visa.
So I’m going with, yeah, kind of suspicious, but then he’s a globalist of sorts.
laura
@Doug!: I don’t know, I’ve considered it apt for almost a year now.
https://youtu.be/OVHNwBbkSj4
Wag
@Doug!: True, but I fear that we have more “opportunity” going forward if Trump goes loco.
sharl
Cheryl retweeted this former State Dept. person – first of an 8-tweet thread – that basically says it is legally doable. It doesn’t address why Manafort did this, just that it is a thing that can be done, isn’t rare, and isn’t necessarily suspicious
edited for clarity
Barbara
@Peale: Wouldn’t the USG ask for the original document back and alter it to make it clear that a subsequent document had been issued? They do that even with passports that have expired.
different-church-lady
Facts continue to change their shape.
Omnes Omnibus
What good are notebooks?
Calouste
@Raoul: That link says that a second passport is only valid for two years. So having three passports of which two are only valid for two years would indeed mean that you renew one every year. So that all seems to be legal, although still somewhat suspicious.
Gates “frequently changed banks and opened and closed bank accounts,” sounds like it should have set off a few anti money laundering alarm bells.
Major Major Major Major
@Peale: you can just get more pages. Maybe that’s only up to a point.
But would your multiple legal passports all have different numbers??
Mike J
Personal and govt employee. State has their own, and dependents also get dip passports.
Adam L Silverman
Here you go:
https://www.outsideonline.com/1979201/can-i-really-have-two-us-passports
Adam L Silverman
@Tom Hamill: I’ve had the same set up as well.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
This may be because we work for the Giant Evil Corporation, but the turnaround time to get my boss’s passport to and from the Chinese consulate was about three business days.
Plus they granted her a 10-year business visa a couple of years ago, so she doesn’t have to get a new one for quite a while.
Origuy
I met a guy in the JFK departure lounge who had three passports. He said he was a military attache at the embassy in Vienna. He had his regular blue one, a military one, and a diplomatic one. That was in the days when hijackers would target diplomats or military types. He flashed his diplomatic one to the gate agent and got an upgrade.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman:
Not precisely true. My son got a visa to Nagorno-Karabakh when he visited there a while back, and with that passport would have been denied entry to Azerbaijan (not that he was planning to go there.) Azerbaijan and Armenia currently are in a 20+ year-old “frozen conflict” over Nagorno-Karabakh.
Emma
@Mai.naem.mobile: I just renewed mine. I had to send the old one in. It was returned separately from the new one but the cover had been punctured– defaced, I guess.
Chris/TX
Lurker here – When I use to live in the Middle East, I could have up to three passports. It related to if I needed to go to Israel and some other situations. There was some situations if I had visited one country, I might not be able to be admitted into another. Can’t remember the exact details but at one time my company was going to get me a second passport to circumvent any problems.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: I’m familiar with the dispute. Not sure why the article writer decided to try to limit to the Middle East.
Mnemosyne
@Emma:
My boss’s 10-year visa to China is in her old passport. Apparently what she’ll have to do is carry both passports with her because the visa is still valid but the passport isn’t, and the visa can’t be transferred to the new passport.
Steve in the ATL
“Sleep on the loveseat”
Also works here.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: I’m sure you are. That comment was directed more at those who may not be.
trollhattan
Why go to college?
Why go to night school?
Gonna be different this time
Legal, don’t know. Is he white?
Then legal.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: Tracking. You get the email I sent?
hugely
“packed up and ready to go…” …to jail that is
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve in the ATL: Beck?
Steve in the ATL
@Omnes Omnibus: yup. My favorite Scientologist.
Lulymay
@Raoul: YEAH! I’m Canadian and wanted to go on the river cruise between St. Petersburg and Moscow and had to apply for a Visa through the Russian Embassy. It was fairly rigorous, and costly (everything in Canada is expensive) and if they turned us down — they didn’t have to give a reason and there was no refund of the application fee. However, in the end everything worked out very well (except for Delta’s computer problem!) and we did get to enjoy one of my “must” have vacations. Met many wonderful American folks (like lots) and learned so much about what is happening in Russia that we don’t get to hear about at home.
I just have to wonder, though, how do these folks trying to evade the “gendarmes” in their respective countries get to have several passports??? We almost have to draw blood on the bloody thing before we get one issued. How in he– do some of these people obtain several?
Mike J
@Steve in the ATL: Oh, it’s Robert Pollard’s birthday.
Oh, Scientologist, not scientist. Nevermind.
Steve in the ATL
@Lulymay:
Prescription drugs? Timbits?
Steve in the ATL
@Mike J: also River Phoenix died on Halloween. Though he was neither scientist nor Scientologist so just forget I typed that.
?BillinGlendaleCA
OT: Got home from my walk and my light is flashing white-red-green-blue. I may have get the ladder out and reset it.
Steve in the ATL
@Lulymay:
Hint: it might not be entirely legal….
Steve in the ATL
@?BillinGlendaleCA: dude, you were told not to take the brown acid.
amygdala
@Adam L Silverman: Yeah, this. The couple of people I know with two US passports go in and out of the Middle East, and use them to manage the issue raised in the first part of that snippet.
Viva BrisVegas
@Gin & Tonic: I imagine it would also be handy to have multiple passports if you needed to visit Ukraine without lots of Russian visa stamps on view, and vice versa.
It might give some people the wrong idea about who is paying who and for what.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Steve in the ATL: I have hi-tech light bulbs that can change color, I think the bulb is on brown acid.
Mary G
Dodgers WIN! I still love Sandy Koufax and glad to see him again. Tomorrow is going to be a boss battle. Dodger Stadium has never had a game 7 before. Can’t wait.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve in the ATL: Eh, that song is good. I interacted with him not long later and found him to be a d-bag. It has influenced my view of his subsequent music.
Steve in the ATL
@Omnes Omnibus: I can see that. I can replace “Beck” with “Jenna Elfman’s cleavage” then.
Steve in the ATL
@Mary G: blue state over red state—hell yeah!
Gin & Tonic
@Viva BrisVegas: I can assure you that Ukrainian border control agents are quite familiar with Paul Manafort, his travels, his contacts and his sources of funding.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve in the ATL: Hubba-hubba.
Steve in the ATL
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Freakin’ one percenter.
Ruckus
@Mai.naem.mobile:
I just renewed mine and yes I had to send in the old one. They sent it back, it had expired. You don’t have to renew before it expires but there is a time limit, 15 yrs from the date of the last issue. They expire in 12 yrs.
smintheus
@BlueNC: You also might be able to have a second passport if you travel to a country that has bad relations with another country you travel to (esp. in the Middle East), or being a shady arms dealer was your profession. But it’s hard to say what excuse you could offer for 3 passports.
ETA I see that Adam already noted this.
Steve in the ATL
The even more rapid than usual decline in my posts suggests that the codeine cough syrup has kicked in. Bon nuit, tout le monde!
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Just saw it. That’s my throw-away e-mail, so I don’t check it as often.
I liked the hed of last week’s Economist: “A tsar is born.” Vladimir Vladimirovich has a long memory and a long reach.
Amaranthine RBG
You can have multiple passports issued because some countries do not allow you to ender if you have travelled to other countries that are on their shitlist.
Also
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Steve in the ATL: Nah, as I told Baud, I just spend any dough I have on tech and cigs.
ETA: I’ve removed the bulb from the fixture and now it time to reset it.
Steve in the ATL
@?BillinGlendaleCA: I’ll bet you even have a curtain rod on which to cook your sparrow, moneybags.
SWMBO
@Tom Hamill: Well for our government anyway.
divF
@?BillinGlendaleCA: So you’re rebooting your lightbulb ? The IoT has gone too far.
ETA: I know, you believe that it’s not on the internet. But are you really sure ?
Davebo
Not at all unusual to have multiple passports. Working in Ukraine and need a visa for China? You need to send in a passport to the embassy or consulate but still need your passport while in Ukraine.
Davebo
Also for those who travel extensively it’s useful to have a “dirty” passport with stamps from evil countries and a “clean” one for coming into the US, UK, etc.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Anyway, just sent you a reply.
trollhattan
@divF:
Does a lightbulb even have ctrl+alt+del buttons?
Calouste
@Davebo: Need to be careful with that. You’re going to get asked some questions if you use a different passport on your return than you did on your departure.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@divF:
It’s connected to a hub(that’s what the app talks to) that is connected to the internet.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: Yes! Not buttons, but you turn it on and off 5 times at 3 second intervals to reset it.
ExpatDanBKK
@Major Major Major Major: No extra pages any longer. They killed that in 2015. You have to get a new passport now if your old one gets filled up.
divF
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Sorry, I had missed that there was an app involved.
Felanius Kootea
I have a passport book and a passport card (which I can use to enter the US from Mexico, Canada and Bermuda while a visa is being processed in the passport book for another country) but didn’t know that you could legitimately have multiple passport books. I’ve learned quite a bit from this thread.
fuckwit
@Wag: What good are notebooks?
fuckwit
@Trentrunner: I am of the opinion that, as Obama was our first Asian President (born and grew up in the undeniably Asian Hawaii and Indonesia, even-tempered, logical, big picture long-term thinker, governed Asian style), Troll is our first Sicilian President. He’s foul-mouthed, short-tempered, violently angry, has a YOOOOGE ego, can’t keep his dick in his pants or his hands off the ladies, short attention span, impetuous, flashy, loud-mouthed, viciously petty and vindictive, and trusts only his family. It’s like we somehow ended up with Joe Pesci from Goodfellas inthe White House.
mike in dc
I think Manafort will finally flip roughly 30 days after state charges are filed in NY. Because by then he will have been under house arrest for a while, will realize a pardon won’t save him from prison, and his family will have been putting pressure on him to do it.
Ken
@Adam L Silverman: you can get an online visa for Vietnam. Just FYI if you’re planning a trip.
MikeifromArlington
I’ve held both a Blue and Red passport at the same time. There are black ones as well as well as others I think so it’s possible.
Bruce K
Huh. I knew from the Top Gear Middle East Special that “clean” and “dirty” passports were a thing, but I didn’t realize that there was a non-underhanded way to do it. Today I learned.
If Manafort had passports issued by other countries, now that would be eyebrow-raising.
Full disclosure: as a dual US/Greek national, I’m entitled to hold passports from both countries, and I have a sneaking suspicion that when I go through passport control at Venizelos International Arrivals, and I hand them both my US passport and my Greek national ID card, the official might not always put an entry record on file. I know they sometimes skip the stamp.
Currants
@BlueNC: {deleted because Adam answered and I hadn’t read the thread}
ExpatDanBKK
@Ken: @Ken: You actually get a “permission letter” to obtain a visa upon arrival. It sounds like a scam, but that’s how they do it. Look up “myvietnamvisa” for instance.
Unfortunately, a recent rule change in Vietnam makes us Yanks get an expensive one-year visa (even if just staying for just a weekend) as opposed to everyone else who can get a cheap short-term visa.
PaulWartenberg
I only got the one.
Christ. Having multiple passports suggest multiple fake identities. Multiple fake identities suggest criminal fraud. This also suggests the SOB could well have MORE fake passports, any one of which can get him out of the country before the feds realize he’s fled house arrest.
This crook shouldn’t be under house arrest. He should be in solitary confinement in a supermax facility.
John Steed
Unless they’re under a fake name, I’m sure there’s no big deal in having multiple passports. If you travelled both to Israel and some Arab nations, at one time, you needed a passport without the Israeli stamps to get into the Arab nations. Not sure if that’s still true.
infovore
@Major Major Major Major: But would your multiple legal passports all have different numbers??
I think the number identifies the document, not its bearer, so the passports would indeed have different numbers. If anything, having multiple passports with the same number would be suspicious.
Boatboy_srq
He thinks he’s Fletch. Chevy Chase would not approve.
The count only works if the Passports are Hondas and the Visas are Citroens. ,-)
mellowjohn
This ain’t no Mudd Club, or C.B.G.B
I ain’t got time for that now