The lawyers for the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee as well as the chairman of the committee, Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, are urging a court to toss out the federal litigation that was filed by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
Bragg is seeking to block a congressional subpoena issued to a former prosecutor who investigated former President Donald Trump, who was indicted last month by a Manhattan grand jury.
“In a 35-page filing, attorneys for Jordan said Bragg’s lawsuit should be dismissed. They argued the suit violates the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause, which can insulate members of Congress from some litigation related to legislative activity. Jordan and the Judiciary Committee launched an investigation of Bragg’s office in the weeks before Trump was indicted on March 30,” CBS News reported.
“There can be no question that the subpoena to Pomerantz was issued in furtherance of the Committee’s investigation,” they wrote in Monday’s filing. Pomerantz led the Manhattan investigation into Trump for about a year before resigning in February 2022, weeks after Bragg assumed office, and composing a memoir about the case.
In the lawsuit filed by Bragg, he alleges that Jordan and the committee are conducting a campaign of intimidation in relation to the indictments against him and his associates.
As a result, the DA announced he’s taking legal action “in response to an unprecedently brazen and unconstitutional attack by members of Congress on an ongoing New York State criminal prosecution and investigation of” Trump, Fox News reported.
In addition, Fox News noted:
Bragg, a Democrat, is asking a judge to invalidate subpoenas that Jordan, the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, has or plans to issue as part of an investigation of Bragg’s handling of the Trump case.
In recent weeks, the Judiciary Committee issued a subpoena seeking testimony from a former prosecutor, Mark Pomerantz, who previously oversaw the Trump investigation. The committee has also sought documents and testimony about the case from Bragg and his office. Bragg has rejected those requests.
Jordan requested that Bragg cease “interfering” with local prosecutions.
As soon as Bragg filed his petition, the judge for the Southern District of New York refused to issue even a temporary restraining order due to the action against Congressman Jordan.
“Soros-funded Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s (frivolous) lawsuit against House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan is already off to a bad start for Bragg: The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York declined to even enter a temporary restraining order,” Mike Davis of the Federalist Society reported.
“Summary of Soros-funded Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s (frivolous) legal argument: Congress is interfering in Bragg’s misuse of federal funds and misuse of federal law to politically interfere in the next presidential election,” Davis added.
Soros-funded Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg's (frivolous) lawsuit against House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan is already off to a bad start for Bragg:
The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York declined to even enter a temporary restraining order.
— 🇺🇸 Mike Davis 🇺🇸 (@mrddmia) April 12, 2023
Bragg’s case has been labeled exceptional weak by a multiplicity of legal experts since Trump’s indictment.
“The question to ask yourself in a case like this [is], ‘Would a case like this be brought against anybody else, whether he or she be president, former president or a regular citizen?’ The answer is… no,” Former Whitewater deputy counsel Sol Wisenberg said.
“You can debate all day long whether or not… Trump should be indicted related to the records at Mar-a-Lago, whether or not he should be indicted with respect to Jan. 6 incitement of lawless activity… Those are real crimes if they occurred, and he committed them,” he said. “This is preposterous.”
According to Ian Millhiser, a senior reporter at Vox, “There is something painfully anticlimactic about Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s indictment of former President Trump. It concerns not Trump’s efforts to overthrow the duly elected government of the United States, but his alleged effort to cover up a possible extramarital affair with a porn star. And there’s a very real risk that this indictment will end in an even bigger anticlimax. It is unclear that the felony statute that Trump is accused of violating actually applies to him.”