Manhattan’s Democrat District Attorney Alvin Bragg has been called to testify before the House Judiciary Committee regarding his so-called “hush money” case against President Donald Trump.
Bragg has now been slated to appear along with one of his prosecutors on July 12.
This means the George Soros-funded prosecutor will testify on the day after Trump’s sentencing hearing on July 11, Axios reported.
Due to the highly partisan nature of the trial, it is widely expected that Democrat Judge Juan Merchan, a Biden donor, will throw the book at Trump.
The GOP-led committee has called Bragg, along with lead prosecutor Matthew Colangelo, to testify about Trump’s felony conviction on 34 counts.
The committee is chaired by Trump ally GOP Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH).
Jordan sent letters to Bragg and Colangelo, compelling them to answer to the committee.
“This hearing will examine actions by state and local prosecutors to engage politically motivated prosecutions of federal officials, in particular the recent political prosecution of President Donald Trump by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office,” Jordan said in his letter.
Republicans are alleging collusion between President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice (DOJ) and Bragg’s office in bringing the case.
The administration has countered by calling it baseless.
In April, Jordan sent a letter to Biden’s Attorney General Merrick Garland demanding records and correspondence between the DOJ and Bragg’s office.
He called the New York case “politicized prosecution” of the former president headed by Bragg and Colangelo.
In addition, Colangelo was a former senior official at the Justice Department who left Biden’s DOJ to join Braggs’ team for the anti-Trump case.
“Mr. Colangelo’s recent employment history demonstrates his obsession with investigating a person rather than prosecuting a crime,” Jordan wrote.
“At the New York Attorney General’s Office, Mr. Colangelo ran investigations into President Trump, leading ‘a wave of state litigation against Trump administration policies.’
“Bragg hired Mr. Colangelo to ‘jump-start’ his office’s investigation of President Trump, reportedly due to Mr. Colangelo’s ‘history of taking on Donald J. Trump and his family business.’
“Mr. Colangelo is now a lead prosecutor in President Trump’s trial,” he later added.
Jordan went on to lay out the actions Bragg took against Trump.
He said the charges were based on “federal subject matter identical to a matter that the Justice Department closed in 2018, raising concerns that a state-level prosecutor is seeking to relitigate an issue on which the federal government previously declined prosecution.”
“As the Committee has previously explained, Bragg’s politicized prosecution of President Trump has serious consequences for federal interests,” Jordan charged.
“That a former senior Biden Justice Department official is now leading the prosecution of President Biden’s chief political rival only adds to the perception that the Biden Justice Department is politicized and weaponized.”
Despite Jordan’s ability to draw clear lines between the Justice Department and Bragg’s prosecution, the administration believes this is just a conspiracy theory cooked up by the GOP, The Hill reported.
The DOJ rebutted Jordan’s claims in a letter Tuesday.
Carlos Uriarte, Justice Department legislative affairs head, claimed that the committee’s accusations were thoroughly vetted to find any connection between the federal government and Manhattan DA’s office.
“We found none,” Uriante wrote.
“This is unsurprising. The District Attorney’s office is a separate entity from the Department…The Committee knows this,” Uriante wrote.
Later, Uriarte admonished Jordan for the undertaking and said his letter responding to the accusations was unprecedented but necessary.
“The Department does not generally make extensive efforts to rebut conspiratorial speculation, including to avoid the risk of lending it credibility,” he wrote.
“However, consistent with the Attorney General’s commitment to transparency, the Department has taken extraordinary steps to confirm what was already clear: there is no basis for these false claims,” Uriarte charged.
Even if there’s no proverbial smoking gun, the ties between the Justice Department and Bragg’s office are undeniable.
There’s also a clear motive since Trump is a formidable rival against Biden in the upcoming presidential election.
