Former Trump campaign aide asks to finish prison sentence at home, citing coronavirus

President Trump’s former deputy campaign chairman Richard Gates is asking to serve the remainder of his 45-day jail sentence at home due to the coronavirus pandemic, according to a court filing. 

Gates’s lawyer Thomas Green asked for the modification over a “change in circumstances” since Gates was sentenced on Dec. 17. 

Green cited fears that if Gates remains in prison, he would get the virus and bring it home to his wife, who is being treated for cancer. 

“The gravity of the virus and its potential impact on Mrs. Gates are substantial. If Mr. Gates were to return to his home carrying the virus, it could create serious ramifications for his wife. Due to her cancer treatment, her immune system is compromised, placing her at heightened risk for serious side effects or worse if she were to be infected with the coronavirus,” Green wrote in the filing. 

Gates was sentenced after pleading guilty to charges involving financial fraud and lying to investigators. It’s not clear how many days remain of his sentence.  

He avoided a significant prison sentence due to assistance he gave to prosecutors; federal sentencing guidelines would have recommended between 46 months and 57 months in prison based on Gates’s charges. 

Gates cooperated with former special counsel Robert Mueller’s office following his February 2018 guilty plea, and he later testified in the trials of Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Trump’s longtime associate Roger Stone. 

Manafort’s lawyers last week asked for Manafort to serve his term at home due to the coronavirus pandemic, as did lawyers for Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen.