House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (D) (Photos via AP — Jordan: John Minchillo; Bragg: Eduardo Munoz Alvarez)
A short walk away from an unusual field hearing derided by the Democratic minority as a "circus," House Republicans sent their lawyers across the street in lower Manhattan to fend off a federal lawsuit filed by District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
The split-screen between the House Judiciary Committee's hearing and the federal court docket was a study in contrasts.
During the hearing, the committee's Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, largely avoided discussing the prosecution of former President Donald Trump. Instead, Jordan and his fellow Trump loyalists focused on what he described as New York's supposed crime wave under the DA's watch. Statistics show New York City is one of the safest metropolises in the United States, a fact that the committee's Democratic members noted time and again.
Jordan repeatedly pounded his gavel throughout the hearing. In the gallery, one noisy spectator was ejected, and others wore T-shirts stating "Free Miles Guo," referring to Steve Bannon-aligned Chinese billionaire who's now indicted for a billion-dollar fraud. Republicans took turns vilifying Jewish philanthropist George Soros as the man behind failed prosecutorial policies that are making major U.S. cities uninhabitable.
Outside the Jacob Javits Federal Building, one antisemitic protester got the message, holding up a sign with the name "Soros" surrounded by dollar signs and a Star of David.
Rep. Dan Goldman shows antisemitic placard vilifying George Soros outside the committee's hearing. (Screenshot from House Judiciary)
Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., displayed a photograph of that placard to one of the GOP-called witnesses: Joseph Borgen, a Jewish man brutalized in an antisemitic attack near Times Square in 2021.
"That's 100 percent antisemitic, and that's disgusting," Borgen agreed.
For the Democratic minority on the committee, the hearing — far away from their traditional settings in Washington, D.C. — tragically transformed actual New York City crime victims into "MAGA Broadway props" for a "sham," a "political stunt" and a "circus."
On the other side of Foley Square, the site of the Daniel Patrick Moynihan federal courthouse, the atmosphere was more subdued. There were no cameras, and the attorneys for the House Judiciary Committee and Jordan appeared only to file papers. In this venue, Jordan made it clear that his counteroffensive was about protecting Trump, arguing that the federal government has "a substantial interest in the welfare of former Presidents."
"Congress may therefore examine whether former Presidents are being subject to politically motivated state investigations and prosecutions due to the policies they advanced as President, and, if so, what legislative remedies may be appropriate," the House GOP's attorney Matthew Berry wrote in a 35-page legal brief.
So far, Jordan's committee has issued only one subpoena to Bragg's former deputy Mark Pomerantz, who may have weakened his privilege claims by noisily resigning from the investigation into Trump. Fearing Bragg wouldn't prosecute the former president, Pomerantz quit in a letter that was leaked to the New York Times. He then wrote a book "People v. Trump," on the case he said he would have brought, and went on an extensive media tour about it.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's ex-assistant Mark Pomerantz speaks about why he resigned from the Trump probe on MSNBC. (Screenshot via YouTube)
In a sworn statement, Pomerantz now argues that is all history.
"According to published reports, the decision to recommend prosecution on the charges contained in the indictment took place long after my resignation," Pomerantz wrote. "I have had no conversations about prosecuting Mr. Trump with the District Attorney or any member of the prosecution team following my resignation."
The former Bragg deputy says he now finds himself trapped between a rock and a hard place.
"If I refuse to provide information to the Committee, I risk being held in contempt of Congress and referred to the Department of Justice for possible criminal prosecution," his declaration states. "If, on the other hand, I defy the District Attorney's instructions and answer questions, I face possible legal or ethical consequences, including criminal prosecution."
As court papers like these piled into court, Jordan and his fellow Republican lawmakers insisted that their focus on the Manhattan DA had nothing to do with Trump at all. It was about the victims, they claimed.
Other Republican-called witnesses included New York City bodega clerk Jose Alba, whose controversial second-degree murder prosecution for fatally stabbing a man inside his store became a tabloid-fueled sensation before the charges were dropped. Madeline Brame, chairwoman of the Victims Rights Reform Council, criticized the 20-year plea deal for the man who stabbed her son to death in Harlem in 2018.
Through the prism of the GOP lawmakers, these anecdotes were a sign of "pro-criminal" policies in a city descending into "anarchy." The New York City Police Department's statistics show a dramatically different story. Bragg noted that New York has nearly three times lower murder rates than cities much closer to home for Jordan, like Columbus, Ohio. Multiple witnesses at the committee's hearing testified the city feels more unsafe than it ever — even though it had five times as many homicides when it ranked as the murder capital of the world in 1990.
Trump's loyalists in the House Judiciary, however, did not interrogate whether those beliefs have any basis in reality.
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