By Elena Chin
While the number of murders and shootings in New York City has dropped, the number of robberies, burglaries, and other serious crimes has risen by 22% according to sources such as the New York Post and The New York Times. Despite these statistics, instead of dedicating himself to keeping the streets of New York safe, Soros-backed Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has chosen to squander our tax dollars and weaponize the criminal justice system against former President Trump, to fulfill a campaign promise and increase his chances of getting re-elected.
Both the US Justice Department and his own predecessor, Cyrus Vance, declined to bring a case against Trump. Bragg, however, justified his decision to indict Trump by proclaiming, “As this office has done time and time again, we today, uphold our solemn responsibility to ensure that everyone stands equal before the law”. He also proclaimed, “We cannot, and will not, normalize serious criminal conduct.”
According to Bragg, “everyone stands equal before the law”, that is, everyone except the dangerous recidivist criminals he refuses to hold accountable. Apparently, the same laws do not apply to dangerous criminals in Bragg’s system of justice. Since he took office in 2022, he has downgraded 52% of felonies and his conviction rate hovers around 50%. Days after being sworn in, he issued a memo saying he would not prosecute crimes such as resisting arrest, prostitution, trespassing, and most other misdemeanors (Newsweek Bond, 2023). His soft on crime policies have led to lawlessness which has caused businesses to close, and New Yorkers to leave the state in droves. At the heels of this progressive criminal justice reform, 65 of Bragg’s assistant district attorneys resigned, only to be replaced by less experienced ones. The scenario is essentially the same in both the Brooklyn and Bronx district attorney offices as well.
Amidst the loss of more than 3,700 NYPD officers in the past year alone, which is more officers than it has lost in the last twenty years, 35,000 officers were put on standby during Trump’s indictment as reported by an online Fox News source (Colton, 2023). To compensate for a diminished police force, plain clothes officers were instructed to report to work in uniform, and many were required to work overtime on that day. The police commissioner has not revealed the exact number of officers who were deployed to Manhattan for the indictment, and the overall cost of the proceedings to the taxpayers remains unknown.
Treating the falsification of business records as a federal felony for which Trump is potentially facing four years imprisonment, rather than as a misdemeanor, has degraded the criminal justice system. Whether you are a Trump supporter or not, a conviction in this case would not be a cause for celebration. Convicting a former president would set a very dangerous precedent. No American should find comfort in knowing that our justice department can be weaponized against a former president. Punishing political opponents is something that happens in countries like China and Russia where leaders have unrestricted power, not in America. It is our duty as citizens to protect our sovereignty. “We the People” must preserve our right to elect leaders and hold others accountable by using the ballot box. Furthermore, neither a Trump conviction nor the re-election of Bragg will make New Yorkers safer.
