President Donald Trump called former campaign chairman Paul Manafort a "very good person" on Friday and said his ongoing fraud and tax evasion trial in Virginia was "very sad."
Addressing reporters outside the White House, Trump also said Manafort, who is facing a de facto life sentence if convicted on all charges, only worked for him for a "very short period of time."
"I think the whole Manafort trial is very sad," he said. "When you look at what's going on there, I think it's a very sad day for our country. He worked for me for a very short period of time, but you know what? He happens to be a very good person, and I think it's very sad what they've done to Paul Manafort."
Trump previously compared the charges against Manafort to the tax evasion charges that brought down notorious mobster Al Capone. He joined Trump's campaign in March of 2016 and served as campaign chairman from June until August of that year. He's credited with helping Trump secure the Republican nomination.
Manafort faces 18 counts of tax evasion, bank fraud and hiding foreign bank accounts. The jury is in the second day of deliberations.
Regardless of his Virginia trial's outcome, he still has to go to federal court on foreign lobbying and money laundering charges, where Special Counsel Robert Mueller has three times as much evidence. That trial is set to begin Sept. 17 in DC federal court and last longer than his Virginia case, CNN reports.