Manafort juror says one female holdout kept him from being convicted on all 18 counts

President Trump, like The Federalist, is looking on the bright side of his former campaign chairman's conviction on eight of 18 charges of federal financial crimes.

It turns out, he can thank one lone female juror for preventing Paul Manafort from being convicted on all 18 counts, juror Paula Duncan told Fox News on Wednesday night.

Duncan, who described herself as an avid Trump supporter — "Every day when I drove, I had my Make America Great Again hat in the backseat," she told Fox News — was not the holdout. "Finding Mr. Manafort guilty was hard for me, I wanted him to be innocent, I really wanted him to be innocent, but he wasn't," she said. But she was sympathetic to the defense's closing argument. "Certainly Mr. Manafort got caught breaking the law, but he wouldn't have gotten caught if they weren't after President Trump," Duncan said, describing Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation as a "witch hunt to try to find Russian collusion."

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.

Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.

Sign up