Former President Donald Trump’s Manhattan trial was a “modern-day Salem witch trial” and sparked a wave of prosecutions of former presidents by district attorneys across the country, experts told Fox News Digital.
“Any way you twist the traditional role of a prosecutor, it’s always going to end badly. It’s not good for the justice system. And now we’re seeing two district attorneys — both Soros, both corrupt prosecutors — using their powers to go after someone who, if it weren’t for Trump, no district attorney would have looked at him.” [They are using] “They’re misapplying the law for purely political reasons,” Charles “Curry” Stimson, a legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox News Digital in a phone interview.
“It doesn’t even pass the laugh test,” he added.
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Former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump sits in court during his hush money trial in Manhattan Criminal Court, New York City, on May 21, 2024. After nearly five weeks, 19 witnesses, reams of documents, and some salacious testimony, the prosecution against Donald Trump closed its case on May 21, 2024, handing it over to the defense ahead of closing arguments scheduled for next week. (Michael M. Santiago/Pool AFP via Getty Images)
Bragg indicted former President Trump last year on 34 first-degree counts of falsifying business records, but Trump has pleaded not guilty and called the case a “scam.” A Manhattan jury convicted Bragg on May 30.
Trump has maintained his innocence since the verdict and is appealing the decision.
Prosecutors had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump falsified 34 business records to conceal a $130,000 payment to former porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election and to keep Daniels quiet about an alleged 2006 affair with Trump.
The House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, held a hearing on Trump’s prosecution on Thursday, hearing from four experts on the case, including Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey and Federal Election Commission Commissioner Trey Trainor. The committee plans to hold another hearing next month, the day after Trump’s sentencing, with Bragg himself and prosecutor and former Justice Department official Matthew Colangelo.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, listens as Attorney General Merrick Garland speaks during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
“With his unprecedented politically-charged indictment against President Trump, Manhattan District Attorney Bragg has paved the way for politically motivated prosecutions of federal officials by state and local prosecutors. Other ambitious state prosecutors are already following Bragg’s lead and pursuing politically motivated prosecutions against President Trump,” the committee’s Republicans said during Thursday’s hearing.
“On April 4, 2023, in response to intense pressure from left-wing activists after President Trump campaigned about his investigative experience, Mr. Bragg indicted President Trump on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. Falsifying business records is normally a misdemeanor subject to a two-year statute of limitations that should have expired long ago. While Mr. Bragg has systematically downgraded most felonies in Manhattan to misdemeanors, he has upgraded the charges against President Trump to felonies using a novel, untested legal theory that federal prosecutors had previously rejected. Mr. Bragg’s case against President Trump is plagued by due process and procedural irregularities,” they added.
Fox News Digital interviewed Stimson, author of “Rogue Prosecutors: How Radical Soros Lawyers are Destroying American Communities,” and Zach Smith, also a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, who explained that the district attorney’s role is to prosecute cases and keep communities safe. In separate interviews, they acknowledged that this was a case of weaponizing the justice system.
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“This is clearly, essentially, a weaponization of the justice system. And if we zoom out and take a 40,000-foot view, I think it becomes very clear that this lawsuit would never have been filed if the defendant had not been Donald Trump. And that’s especially clear when you look at other policies and actions that Alvin Bragg has taken since being elected district attorney,” Smith said.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg speaks to media after a jury found former President Donald Trump guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, Thursday, May 30, 2024, in New York. (AP/Seth Wenig)
Smith pointed to Bragg’s “first day memo” when he takes office in 2022, detailing that he will not prosecute those charged with minor misdemeanors or felonies.
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“They have pledged not to prosecute most other misdemeanors in Manhattan, they have pledged not to prosecute many misdemeanors and even many felonies. And when they do prosecute, they will not seek prison sentences in default and they will often seek very lenient sentences for individuals accused of very serious crimes,” Smith said.
“So I think any reasonable observer would look at this and say that if Donald Trump hadn’t been indicted, this case wouldn’t have been brought.”
Smith explained that while Bragg pursues his lengthy case against Trump, other violent crimes will likely continue to occur on New York’s streets and take their toll on the city.
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“I don’t think it’s surprising that violent crime continues to occur in New York City today. You just look at the news, you just look at the public conversation. You often see very violent offenders committing crimes and then reentering society,” he said.
People stand in front of buildings along Billionaire’s Row as the trees begin to change color in Central Park on October 29, 2023 in New York City. (Getty Images)
Stimson wrote this month with legal scholar John Yoo that New York v. Trump is, in effect, More than 2,300 people in the U.S. They selected a district attorney to handle the case against the former president.
“President Trump’s opponents were busy celebrating his conviction in New York last week, and seem unaware of the double-edged sword they have unleashed. Regardless of President Trump’s fate on appeal, one or more of the nation’s 2,300 district attorneys may now feel liberated. They can now go after former presidents, including President Biden, purely for political gain or retribution, regardless of the merits of their cases,” the two wrote in their op-ed.
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Stimson and Yu specifically pointed to Bragg and Fulton County, Georgia, District Attorney Fani Willis, noting that they opened the door for the district attorney’s prosecutors to pursue cases against other former presidents. Willis said: Election inference lawsuit against TrumpHe and 18 co-defendants were charged with fraud for attempting to overturn the 2020 election.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis watches a hearing in the case of State of Georgia v. Donald John Trump, March 1, 2024, at the Fulton County Courthouse in Atlanta. (Alex Slits Pool/Getty Images)
“We are not saying that just because Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis indicted Donald Trump, county prosecutors should retaliate against Biden, although we don’t know what else would stop rogue progressive prosecutors from continuing to indict a Republican president. Rather, we are saying that the likelihood of other county prosecutors indicting a former president has gone from zero to an indeterminate percentage,” they emphasized.
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The district attorneys speculated that they might launch an investigation into the Biden family into whether Hunter Biden and James Biden “received funds from foreign governments or companies to influence decisions of the United States government,” which would also implicate President Biden. “The district attorneys would already have evidence documented by congressional investigators and an Internal Revenue Service whistleblower,” they noted.
James Biden arrives at the federal courthouse to hear his sentence handed down, Tuesday, June 11, 2024, in Wilmington, Delaware. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
Or, they added, a “creative county prosecutor in Texas” could sue President Biden for “a number of crimes related to immigration policy at the border.”
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“Trump’s opponents can cheer all they want, but any short-term political gains that Bragg and his supporters may derive from this flawed and unusual prosecution may pale in comparison to the long-term damage to the stability of the White House,” they added.
