Manhattan DA assails GOP hearing on N.Y. crime as ‘political stunt’

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is denouncing an upcoming GOP hearing on crime in New York as a “political stunt,” the latest in an ongoing showdown between House Republicans and the office that criminally charged former president Donald Trump last week.

Early Monday, Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee announced they would be holding a “field hearing” in Manhattan next week to examine how Bragg’s “pro-crime, anti-victim policies have led to an increase in violent crime and a dangerous community for New York City residents.”

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and other House GOP allies of former president Donald Trump have rallied to Trump’s defense ever since Trump indicated that criminal charges were imminent from Bragg’s office. They have also echoed Trump’s false accusations that Democrats are engaged in a “witch hunt” and that Bragg has ignored violent crime in his own jurisdiction to go after Trump.

“Don’t be fooled, the House GOP is coming to the safest big city in America for a political stunt,” Bragg’s office said in a statement. “This hearing won’t engage in actual efforts to increase public safety, such as supporting national gun legislation and shutting down the iron pipeline,” a reference to illegally trafficked firearms make their way to states with strict gun laws.

Bragg also cited recently released data from the New York City Police Department showing shootings and homicides are down in the city for the first quarter of 2023. His office also noted that in Bragg’s first year in office, New York City’s murder rate was nearly three times lower than that of Columbus, Ohio — a ding at Jordan, whose district is adjacent to the Columbus metropolitan area.

“If Chairman Jordan truly cared about public safety, he could take a short drive to Columbus, Dayton, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Akron, or Toledo in his home state, instead of using taxpayer dollars to travel hundreds of miles out of his way,” Bragg’s office stated Monday.

Trump was charged on April 4 with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. The charges are centered on checks Trump wrote to reimburse his lawyer Michael Cohen for $130,000 paid to adult-film actress Stormy Daniels before the 2016 presidential election. He pleaded not guilty.

Even before Trump was charged, Jordan demanded materials related to the district attorney’s investigation into Trump’s hush money payments to Daniels. Bragg’s office has repeatedly rebuffed Jordan’s and other GOP lawmakers’ demands and accused them of “unlawful political interference” with a criminal investigation.

On Thursday, Jordan issued a subpoena for Mark Pomerantz, a former prosecutor in Bragg’s office. Jordan accused Pomerantz of being biased and said that his resignation — amid criticism of Bragg for not prosecuting Trump on available evidence — suggested the case against Trump was politically motivated.

Bragg slammed Jordan’s subpoena of Pomerantz as another attempt to interfere with his office’s case against Trump.

“Repeated efforts to weaken state and local law enforcement actions are an abuse of power and will not deter us from our duty to uphold the law,” Bragg said in a statement he posted to Twitter in response to a House Judiciary GOP tweet about Jordan’s subpoena.

Last year, Jordan ignored a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. The Jan. 6 committee later voted to refer Jordan and other GOP lawmakers who had also defied its subpoenas to the House Ethics Committee.

Though Jordan has also threatened to subpoena Bragg, he has not done so yet. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) also made it clear last Tuesday, after Trump’s arraignment, that the House GOP, now in the majority, would go after Bragg.

“Bragg’s weaponization of the federal justice process will be held accountable by Congress,” McCarthy wrote on Twitter.

As The Washington Post’s Philip Bump reported last month, five of seven of the most severe categories of crime — all but auto theft and felony assault — have gone down in New York City so far this year. In Manhattan specifically, violent crime overall is down so far this year compared to last year. While violent crime is up in New York relative to a decade ago, such crime of all kinds is dramatically lower relative to 1993.