Vin Weber resigns from lobbying firm after scrutiny over Ukraine work with Manafort

Vin Weber, a former Republican congressman who went on to become a prominent lobbyist, has resigned from his lobbying firm, citing the ongoing scrutiny of his work years ago with Paul Manafort on behalf of Ukrainian interests.

Weber decided to leave Mercury, the lobbying and public affairs firm where he was a partner, “to remove the distraction for Mercury’s clients and to focus my time and energy on protecting my reputation,” he wrote in a letter to Kieran Mahoney, Mercury’s chief executive.

“As you know, there has been recent publicity relating to work that I did a number of years ago on behalf of a former client,” Weber wrote. “This publicity has become a distraction for me and for the important work that Mercury is doing for its clients.”

“We respect Vin's decision to resign from Mercury to focus his time and energy on protecting his reputation,” Michael McKeon, a Mercury partner, said in a statement. “He is an honorable man, a good friend and we wish him well.

Weber’s resignation, which was first reported by The Washington Post, comes nearly two years after Manafort was charged with failing to register as a foreign agent, among other crimes, in connection with his work for Viktor Yanukovych, the former president of Ukraine. Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chairman, was sentenced to more than seven years in prison earlier this year.

As part of his work for Yanukovych, Manafort arranged in 2012 for a think tank, the European Centre for a Modern Ukraine, to hire Mercury and another lobbying firm, the Podesta Group. The think tank was ostensibly independent, but Manafort and his deputy, Rick Gates, later admittedto Mueller’s prosecutors that it was controlled by Yanukovych and his government.

Mercury and the Podesta Group registered to lobby for the think tank at the time but didn’t register as foreign agents, which is required by law for lobbying done on behalf of foreign governments and political parties. Both firms retroactively registered for the work in 2017 after Manafort came under investigation, and neither has been charged with any wrongdoing.

Mercury has said it didn’t register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act on the advice of its lawyers, and Gates admitted to lying to Mercury’s law firm as part of the plea deal he struck with Mueller last year.

The Podesta Group collapsed under pressure shortly after Manafort’s arrest in 2017, but Mercury and Weber appeared to have emerged relatively unscathed. Weber continued to lobby for clients such as Gallaudet University and the government of Qatar, according to disclosure filings.

But Gates testified last week in the trial of Greg Craig, a former White House counsel in the Obama administration charged with lying to the Justice Department about his own work for Ukraine’s government, that he’d told Tony Podesta and Weber the client they represented was actually the Ukrainian government.

Bob Trout, a lawyer for Weber, said in a statement to POLITICO last week that Gates’ testimony wasn’t true.

“During Vin Weber’s work for the ECFMU, Rick Gates never told Mr. Weber that the real client was the government of Ukraine,” Trout said.

Article originally published on POLITICO Magazine