Republicans Scorch Alvin Bragg for Soft-on-Crime Policies After Trump Indictment

Alvin Bragg
John Minchillo/AP, Mary Altaffer/AP

House Republicans released a scorching video Monday morning highlighting Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s soft-on-crime policies as soaring crime grips New York City.

Just before the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on crime in the Big Apple, the committee released a video underscoring Bragg’s soft-on-crime policies, contrasting his recent charges against former President Donald Trump that many legal experts have cast doubt upon as purely political.

The video shows multiple attacks, news clippings, and local news reports of violent crime, such as stabbings in the metro and violence against women and children.

“No neighborhood is safe in New York City right now,” says a clip that captures a violent attack. “With just days on the job, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is changing how some crimes will be prosecuted,” another clip says. “He says he’ll stop seeking prison sentences for some criminal charges and will downgrade some felony charges.”

Crime is a major problem in the Big Apple. According to the New York City Domestic Violence Fatality Review Committee, “from 2010 through 2021, in New York City there were 730 domestic violence homicide incidents involving 783 victims; these victims accounted for 16.7% of all homicides (783 of 4,687) that occurred in New York City.”

Overall crime soared 22 percent in New York City last year.

As crime soars, Bragg focuses on successfully prosecuting President Joe Biden’s political opponent. Bragg’s indictment was historic, as no president or former president has ever been indicted, much less one campaigning for reelection.

A recent survey from YouGov/Yahoo found that most Americans do not think the New York grand jury’s actions will have a negative effect on Trump. Meanwhile, the former president took the lead over Biden in a hypothetical general election match-up after the indictment.

Additional polling shows the partisan nature of the indictment, according to legal experts, has not been lost on the electorate. Seventy-six percent of U.S. adult respondents believe politics influenced “the decision to indict Trump,” a CNN-commissioned poll found.

Bragg’s case has not been off to a good start. A federal court on Tuesday denied his request for a temporary restraining order to prevent House Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) from questioning a former prosecutor about Bragg’s case against Trump.

Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.

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