Overview
- U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly imposed the sentence in Washington, D.C., following Michel’s 2023 jury conviction on 10 counts including conspiracy and acting as an unregistered foreign agent.
- Michel was previously ordered to forfeit roughly $64–65 million tied to the scheme, and multiple reports note three years of supervised release after his prison term.
- Prosecutors said he routed millions from Malaysian financier Jho Low into Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign via straw donors and later tried to influence the Trump-era Justice Department to drop probes and aid a China-linked extradition effort.
- The trial featured testimony from Leonardo DiCaprio and former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and Low remains a fugitive accused in the 1MDB scandal.
- A motion for a new trial citing an attorney’s AI-written closing was denied, and that former lawyer later pleaded guilty to misdemeanor criminal contempt; Michel is expected to surrender on January 27, 2026.