Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort walks around the convention floor before the opening session of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Monday, July 18, 2016. (Credit: AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) More information has come out highlighting Donald Trump’s troubling connections to the Vladimir Putin regime. According to The New York Post, former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and ex-”core” aide Rick Gates have financial ties to a biometric security company that lobbied the Putin administration on behalf of technology that would help it spy on its own citizens. Manafort was a major early investor for EyeLock — and owned up to 10 percent in the company, the Post reported — while Gates was an independent contractor hired to build business for them in Middle Eastern countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. EyeLock uses iris-scanning technology to identify individuals, according to its website.