Paul Manafort's attorneys filed Friday to delay and move one of his two criminal trials away from Hillary Clinton-friendly Alexandria, Virginia, to an area "more balanced" politically, Law & Crime reported.
It would be "impossible" for Manafort to get a fair trial in Alexandria, a part of the Washington, D.C., media market, vs. Roanoke, Virginia, according to filings to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
"This may be the rare case where a juror's predisposition may directly tie to their vote in the last presidential election," according to Manafort's filing, per Law & Crime. "It is not a stretch to expect that voters who supported Secretary Clinton would be predisposed against Mr. Manafort or that voters who supported President Trump would be less inclined toward the Special Counsel.
"Notably, however, voters in the Alexandria Division voted 2-to-1 in favor of Secretary Clinton (66 percent Clinton; 34 percent Trump). This split is more balanced in other places in Roanoke, Virginia, located in the Western District of Virginia."
It is closer, but merely by a few percentage points. The argument of "more balanced" is technically correct, but the balance swings heavily to the Republican side — as Roanoke went 61 percent for Trump and 33 percent for Clinton in the 2016 election — according to the report.
Roanoke is about 240 miles southwest of Alexandria and belongs to a much smaller media market, which would permit a jury pool less likely tainted by "unrelenting news coverage," per the report of the filing.