House Judiciary Committee members on each side of the aisle are anticipated to incorporate their New York colleagues for a listening to in Manhattan Monday targeted on town’s hovering crime, in opposition to a backdrop of scrutinizing Democratic District Attorney Alvin Bragg and his prosecution of former President Donald Trump.
According to metropolis statistics launched in February, over 170,000 felony crimes have been reported in New York City final 12 months, essentially the most since 2006, when the NYPD started making these numbers publicly accessible.
The committee, led by Chairman Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican, is predicted to incorporate GOP Conference Chair Rep. Elise Stefanik and Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman, who represents the tenth Congressional Manhattan-Brooklyn District, the place the listening to might be. Neither lawmaker presently serves on the Judiciary committee.
Mr. Goldman, a multimillionaire inheritor to the Levi Strauss fortune, was the lead counsel throughout former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment. He’s anticipated to run interference for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg as GOP lawmakers go after Mr. Bragg for refusing to prosecute most violent crimes within the borough of Manhattan, however lately indicted Mr. Trump on 34 felony counts of falsifying enterprise data.
Mr. Goldman voted in opposition to a decision of disapproval signed by President Biden to dam the D.C. crime invoice, which critics stated was weak on crime. In 2022, he supported rising social employees and psychological well being consultants to reply to home violence disputes, relatively than having police intervene.
Mr. Goldman endorsed Mr. Bragg in 2021 for the district legal professional’s job, contributed $7,500 to his marketing campaign, and hosted a fundraiser for the longer term Manhattan DA at his multi-million greenback Tribeca residence.
The New York Democrat denied in a current interview with City and State NY that the fundraiser was ever about “getting Trump.”
“I worked with Alvin in the (U.S. Attorney’s Office for the) Southern District of New York and have been friends with him for 15 years,” he stated. “And I think Alvin was very careful to talk about his past experience related to Donald Trump, but making no promises, no assertions about what he would do, in part because he had no idea what the investigation had uncovered, what the evidence was.”
Ms. Stefanik represents a district that’s a number of hours north of New York City by automobile. Still, she is the one New York Republican from GOP management who might be collaborating within the listening to.
“I look forward to holding Democrats accountable for their failure to prosecute crimes and instead engage in illegal political witch-hunts against their political opponents,” Ms. Stefanik stated in a press release.
Top Democrat on the committee, Rep. Jerry Nadler, who is predicted on the listening to, derided the listening to from the start and accused GOP lawmakers of “bullying” Mr. Bragg.
“Using a congressional committee to bully a state DA sounds like…the weaponization of the federal government,” he stated when the panel’s location and topic was first introduced.
The listening to will happen on Monday at 10 am on the Javits Federal Building, the place the panel will hear witness testimony from Jose Alba, a former Manhattan bodega clerk who was charged with second-degree homicide by Mr. Bragg after Mr. Alba stabbed a person in self-defense. The fees have been later dropped.
The panel may even hear from Madeline Brame, chairwoman of the Victims Rights Reform Council and mom of a murder sufferer, and Jennifer Harrison, founding father of Victims Rights NY.
Content Source: www.washingtontimes.com