Experts have condemned the prosecution of former President Donald Trump by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. They tagged it a politically motivated “witch hunt” that sets a path for district attorneys nationwide to target political opponents.
The House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Rep. Jim Jordan, held a hearing on Trump’s prosecution, featuring experts who argued that Trump’s case was a weaponization of the legal system.
Bragg’s case against Trump resulted in a guilty verdict on 34 counts of falsifying business records. The case has been criticized for its unprecedented use of a novel legal theory.
The guilty verdict may open the floodgates for politically motivated prosecutions of federal officials by state and local prosecutors. Meanwhile, Trump has maintained his innocence and launched an appeal.
“While Bragg is systematically downgrading most felonies in Manhattan to misdemeanors, he used a novel and untested legal theory previously declined by federal prosecutors to upgrade the charges against President Trump to felonies,” the House Judiciary Committee stated in the hearing. “Bragg’s case against President Trump was beset by due process and procedural irregularities.”
The Committee Republicans pointed out that Bragg’s office has systematically downgraded most felonies in Manhattan to misdemeanors yet upgraded the charges against Trump to felonies using an untested legal theory.
Yale Law Professor Has Brilliant Plan for Trump Legal Team to Overturn 'Guilty' Verdict Before the Election
"Could Trump actually be put in jail? You bet he could."
"Each count of this 34 count indictment has a maximum penalty attached to it of four years. Well, that's four… pic.twitter.com/47neHaqPtB
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) June 6, 2024
Heritage Foundation legal fellow Charles “Cully” Stimson and senior fellow Zach Smith, authors of “Rogue Prosecutors: How Radical Soros Lawyers Are Destroying America’s Communities,” stated in an interview that the role of district attorneys is to prosecute cases and keep communities safe, not to pursue personal political agendas.
“This clearly is essentially a weaponization of the legal system. And I think if we zoom out and look at the 40,000-foot perspective, I think it quickly becomes clear that if the defendant weren’t named Donald Trump, this case never would have been brought,” Smith said.
Stimson and Smith warned that this prosecution could lead to district attorneys targeting other former presidents, including President Joe Biden, for political gain or retribution. They speculated that prosecutors could investigate the Biden family’s potential influence peddling or pursue cases against the president for his immigration policies.