The Real Scandal Behind the Pentagon Leaks

A deep secret, like a glass of water, can be easily controlled and contained. But when you build vast structures to hold them — a national security apparatus in the case of secrets and canyon-spanning dams when it comes to water — the pressures can exceed thousands of pounds per square inch. Unless adequately monitored and maintained, secrets and water can breach their restraints and flood everything downhill for miles.

The Pentagon just suffered such a dramatic breach as upward of 100 documents leaked. These files contained a grab-bag of national security secrets including about the conduct of the war in Ukraine; U.S. success in penetrating the Russian war machine; insights on the clandestine maneuverings of Israel and South Korea; hints about a previously unknown satellite surveillance technology; the attempted shoot-down of a British spy plane by the Russians; a pending arms deal between Egypt and Russia and one between Turkish contacts and the Wagner group; a Russian effort to hack Canadian gas fields; and intelligence sources and methods, all of which flowed onto online sites, drenching the Pentagon in embarrassment and endangering secret missions around the world.

As national security disasters go, the Pentagon leaks were complete. But as great a scandal as the secrets deluge might be, the greater scandal is how lax the Pentagon appears to be with such monumentally confidential information that it could be purloined and posted on freeform internet sites 4Chan and Discord. Squawking from Congress has ensued, of course, and the Pentagon has muttered about how “serious” the damage is. There is talk that some of the documents have been altered to exaggerate the number of Russian dead. But the government is mostly ostriching the calamity right now. President Joe Biden has been silent on the issue. And on Monday, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby, counseled the press to look away. Declining to confirm the provenance of the documents, Kirby said, “It has no business — if you don’t mind me saying — on the front pages of newspapers or on television. It is not intended for public consumption, and it should not be out there.”

Yes, yes! If the press and the public will only take a deep breath and ignore the rising floodwaters, the Russians and the Turks and the Israelis will ignore the tidal wave, too, and dryness will be restored to the land. Good work, Kirby!

The Pentagon — and Kirby, who previously worked as a military and diplomatic affairs analyst for CNN — have enough egg on their faces to start an omelet factory. They don’t know how these secrets escaped their cage, they don’t know who engineered the breakout, they don’t know if additional secrets were snagged. They seem to know nothing and to be engaged in the magical thinking that if we turn away the problem will disappear.

According to press reports, the stash of classified documents appears to have been printed and photographed before being posted online and were likely printed from a secure printer by an authorized user. One unnamed U.S. official told the New York Times that hundreds, if not thousands, of military and U.S. officials have security clearances that would permit them access to the documents. The Pentagon is going to need a wide dragnet if they hope to catch the leaker.

The paradox of the national security machine is that in order for the secrets it gathers to be of any practical use, they must be shared widely enough to be put to work. It’s vital for hundreds if not thousands of policymakers and military officials to know, for example, the burn rate on Ukrainian and Russian artillery shells and anti-aircraft missiles. Or the content of the Russian government’s plans. Or what the Wagner Group is up to. But the secrets lose their fizz the minute the Russians know what the American forces know. Worse than that, the Russians can use the spilled secrets to determine how the secrets got spilled in the first place, blinding future attempts by the American apparatus.

Finding a balance between holding secrets too tightly and handling them like easily lost pocket change would make a good thesis topic for George Smiley. Judging the debts and assets of the intelligence breach can’t be fully ascertained without access to additional secrets about how the Russians and others are responding. The Pentagon has gone on record saying that the leaks “could lead to people losing their lives,” which is the standard official comment when secrets leak and the implied reason flacks like Kirby don’t want the press to report on them. These claims of “lost lives” are always contested, as they were when the Wikileaks cables were unspooled in 2010, and when Edward Snowden shared top-secret documents in 2013, with the admonitions often being downgraded from “lives lost” to “caused harm.”

That said, it’s incontrovertible during wartime that unique “information” that’s freed up can be used by either side to launch deadly attacks. But in this case, some of the “secrets,” such as both Ukraine and Russia running short on munitions, have been previously reported in the press. Likewise, the Russians have known since the dawn of the Ukraine war that our spies were reading their mail because the Biden administration made it a tool of diplomacy to inform the world that we had learned Russia’s “secret” military plans. It’s hard at this point to see how the revelations about Egypt, Turkey, the Wagner Group and the attempted shoot-down of a British spy plane will directly lead to the loss of life. But I suppose John Kirby will take a stab at it when he brushes the omelet off his face.

Sarcasm aside, the leaks may prove disastrous for the United States, Ukraine and its NATO allies in the war. But until that is proven, we should feel free to interpret the government’s reaction to the breach as acts of deflection designed to escape blame for maintaining such a loose grip on these vital secrets. Bring on the coverage of the damage done by these leaks, but don’t forget the equally urgent story: On whose watch were the leaks allowed to happen and what is being done to prevent a new gusher?

******

I’ve got nothing against John Kirby, who answered my single query to him at the beginning of the war. I’m just against Kirbyism. Send secrets to Shafer.Politico@gmail.com“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”mailto:shafer.politico@gmail.com”,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f890012″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f890013″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>Shafer.Politico@gmail.com. No new email alert subscriptions are being honored at this time. My Twitter“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”https://twitter.com/jackshafer”,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0000″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0001″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>Twitter feed has a Discord account. My Mastodon“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”http://journa.host/@jackshafer”,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0002″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0003″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>Mastodon and Post“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”https://post.news/jackshafer”,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0004″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0005″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>Post accounts are jealous because I joined Substack Notes. My RSS“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”https://t.co/tfg9KzdCxq”,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0006″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1f8a0007″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>RSS feed shoots down spy planes before breakfast.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/04/11/scandal-behind-pentagon-leaks-00091438

4 dead, including 2 kids, in Easter shooting at Florida home

A Florida man shot and killed his young son, his girlfriend’s mother, and her teenage granddaughter before being gunned down by police on Easter Sunday, authorities said.

https://nypost.com/2023/04/11/4-dead-including-2-kids-in-easter-shooting-at-orlando-home/

Shakira begs for sons to be left alone after enduring ‘incessant harassment’

Shakira is leveling with the public, asking not as an artist, but as a mother, to please leave her young sons alone.

In an emotional statement shared to her social media, the Colombian singer implored “respected friends, journalists and media outlets” to stay away from her children as interest in the pop-star continues to amass. 

“In this period of change in my life as a public figure, it’s understandable that there is a permanent curiosity on behalf of the press around me and my family. However, my children, Milan and Sasha, have endured a very difficult year, suffering incessant harassment and persecution without relief by the paparazzi and several media outlets in Barcelona,” she wrote, referencing their recent move from Spain to the United States.

“Now that they are beginning a new life I implore the media on behalf of my children to please respect their right to privacy. I beg you to abstain from following them to the entrance and exit of their school, wait for them at the door of our home, or follow them to their extracurricular and recreational actives as the media did in Barcelona with the intent of capturing photos or boosting ratings,” she shared of her wishes for the family’s new life in Miami.

SHAKIRA’S EX GERARD PIQUÉ BREAKS SILENCE ON CHEATING ACCUSATIONS: ‘I KEEP DOING WHAT I WANT’

She continued: “I trust that the journalists and photographers here will be sensitive to the situation that Milan and Sasha are facing and can behave in the most humane way possible with them, keeping in my that this is about the physical and emotional health and safety of two minors just 8 and 10 years of age, who only want to be able to go out in public and attend school feeling safe and tranquil that they aren’t being followed or subjected to the constant scrutiny of cameras.”

The boys’ parents are both internationally recognized: global artist Shakira and former FC-Barcelona player Gerard Piqué. 

Following the couple’s announcement in June that they would be separating after 12 years together, as well as rumblings of infidelity on Piqué’s part, Shakira and her family were inundated with media attention.

According to Page Six, fans noticed that Piqué’s now girlfriend, Clara Chia Marti, was in the background of a Zoom he had done back in 2021, prior to the couples split. A source close to Shakira told the outlet that the Grammy Award-winning singer had been “devastated to learn that this woman clearly felt at home in the house they shared with their children.”

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Continuing her message to the public, Shakira wrote, “I extend this petition not as an artist, but as a mother who wishes to protect and care for the psychological and emotional well-being of my children so they may live a happy and healthy life, as all children deserve to do.” 

“Thanking you in advance for your understanding and support, Shakira,” she concluded.

She shared the same statement in both Spanish and English to her Twitter account, as well as Instagram and Facebook, only in Spanish.

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Just a week ago, Shakira announced she and her sons had moved to Miami to begin their new adventure. 

“I settled in Barcelona to give my children stability, the same that we are now looking for in another corner of the world near family, friends and the sea. Today we begin a new chapter in pursuit of their happiness,” she wrote in a post translated to English from Spanish. “Thank you to everyone who surfed alongside my many waves in Barcelona, the city where I learned without doubt that friendship is more lasting than love.”

In November, Shakira and Piqué reached a custody agreement, allowing the “Waka Waka” singer to move to the States with her children.

“Our sole objective is to provide our children with the utmost security and protection and hope that they can continue with their lives in a safe and calm environment. We appreciate that their privacy will be respected,” the former couple said in a statement provided to Fox News Digital.

Piqué’s lawyer, Ramón Tamborero, said his client made “a very important sacrifice” in agreeing to the move. “Gerard has finally agreed to allow his children to live in the U.S. for their well-being, a primary reason and one that was always in the first place… A judicial decision would only have brought pain. In reality, no one has won here except the children.”

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/shakira-begs-sons-left-alone-enduring-incessant-harassment

New York’s mayor wants you to know how much he loves police robots

Former cop and self-declared “geek” Eric Adams held a press conference in Times Square today to let the city know how much he loves police robots. New York City’s mayor presided over a press conference alongside police officials to discuss a pair of pilots designed to increase the city’s surveillance.

“I’ve stated this from day one, even when I was on the campaign trail: I’m a computer geek. I believe that technology is here,” the mayor said at the top of his remarks. “We can’t be afraid of it, and as [NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell] stated, transparency is the key.”

At the top of the list is Digidog — a pet name the police gave to a Boston Dynamics Spot robot. The system was greeted with a fierce public backlash when it was unveiled back in 2021, following its deployment at public housing in Manhattan. “People had figured out the catchphrases and the language to somehow make this evil,” NYPD Deputy Commissioner John Miller said at the time.

The pilot was ultimately pulled after a couple of months, over fears of profiling and increased surveillance. “It was something that was introduced previously, under a previous administration and a few loud people were opposed to it, and we took a step back,” Adams noted at today’s event. “That is not how I operate. I operate on looking at what’s best for the city.”

Spot will be joined by K5, Knightscope’s egg-shaped robot, which you’ve probably seen at shopping malls. The well-funded robotics firm has aggressively been targeting law enforcement with its products, and a nod from New York City is obviously a big vote of confidence (though, again, this is currently a pilot). Also included in the announcement is StarChase’s GPS system, which can be used to track vehicles remotely.

The Spot robots run $75,000 a piece, while K5 is generally quoted at between $60,000-70,000 a year to lease. The news comes roughly a week after Adams announced massive pay raises for officers. The raises of 2.25-4% will be retroactively applied back to August 1, 2017. A week prior, the Mayor announced sweeping cuts to the New York Public Library system amounting to $36.2 million.

These moves come amid media criticism over New York City’s crime rate. According to a recent study, NYC currently ranks as the fifth-safest city in the U.S. with a population over 300,000.

Late last year, the San Francisco Police Department drew national scrutiny for a clause allowing their police robots to use “justified” deadly force. The section reads, “Robots will only be used as a deadly force option when risk of loss of life to members of the public or officers is imminent and outweighs any other force option available to SFPD.” That move was reversed the following week.

As with the robots being rolled out by the NYPD, none of the SFPD’s robots were designed to kill. However, in 2016, Dallas became the first U.S. police department to kill a suspect with a robot, by planting an explosive to a bomb detecting system.

A month prior to the initial San Francisco news, Boston Dynamics joined four other leading firms in signing a pledge to not allow for the weaponization of their general-purpose robots. The open letter noted:

We believe that adding weapons to robots that are remotely or autonomously operated, widely available to the public, and capable of navigating to previously inaccessible locations where people live and work, raises new risks of harm and serious ethical issues. Weaponized applications of these newly-capable robots will also harm public trust in the technology in ways that damage the tremendous benefits they will bring to society.

New York’s Mayor is, however, certainly bullish on their use as surveillance systems. Adams cited pushback to fingerprinting, post-9/11 policing measures and the CompStat to vocal concerns around the implementation of these new robotic policing systems. He explained, “This is the beginning of a series of rollouts we were going to do to show how public safety has transformed itself,” noting that Spot and K5 are “just the beginning.”

Addressing a question from the audience, Adams added, “Digidog is now out of the pound.”

New York’s mayor wants you to know how much he loves police robots by Brian Heater originally published on TechCrunch

https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/11/new-yorks-mayor-wants-you-to-know-how-much-he-loves-police-robots/

Manhattan DA Bragg sues Jim Jordan, Judiciary panel over Pomerantz subpoena

Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg sued the House Judiciary Committee and its chairman, Rep. Jim Jordan in an effort to block the panel from subpoenaing an attorney who worked on Bragg’s investigation of former President Donald Trump.

https://nypost.com/2023/04/11/manhattan-da-sues-jim-jordan-judiciary-panel-over-pomerantz-subpoena/

Los Angeles and other major cities could face huge water cuts in feds’ proposed plan to save the Colorado River

• EPA preparing to release strict vehicle emissions rules
• Record warmth in areas with a record snowpack may cause hazardous flooding this week

https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/11/us/colorado-river-water-cuts-federal-analysis-climate/index.html

Biden wants to sell Americans on electric cars. And some are eager to buy.

President Joe Biden wants Americans to go big on electric cars — ousting the internal combustion engine from its centurylong reign over the nation’s roads.

Crucially, consumers may be ready to follow.

People analyzing the small but growing market for electric cars and trucks say changing tastes among U.S. motorists are smoothing the way for Biden’s efforts to speed up the switch to battery-powered vehicles. Several automakers are pushing their own big shift to electric vehicles — a trend that the Environmental Protection Agency could accelerate with a new auto-pollution rule expected as soon as Wednesday.

Republican lawmakers are predicting a consumer backlash to the latest mandate from Washington. But industry analysts say car buyers are showing a growing appetite for vehicles that can be refueled with an electric cord rather than a gas pump.

“Honestly, the vehicles being delivered by automakers are a lot better — people are willing to sit on waiting lists for two or three years,” said Chris Harto, senior policy analyst at Consumer Reports. “There’s a huge amount of pent-up demand for EVs right now, and automakers aren’t delivering.”

Just two years ago, Biden said he wanted electric vehicles to make up half of new car and truck sales by the end of the decade. The EPA proposal could push electric vehicles even further.

Electric vehicles made up about 5.6 percent of cars and trucks sold in 2022 — not nearly enough to achieve the large emissions reductions that scientists say are needed to avoid debilitating impacts of climate change. That was up from 1.8 percent in 2020 and 3.1 percent in 2021, according to data from S&P Global Mobility.

The EPA rules will only reinforce automakers’ move toward electric vehicles, said Mike Ramsey, an automotive analyst at the consultancy Gartner. “These rules would really just take away any sort of safety net or ability to turn back,” he said, adding that automakers will likely also press EPA for loopholes “to give wriggle room to the market.”

The upcoming regulations come as the federal government is pouring billions of dollars into the construction of charging stations along highways and incentives for people who buy EVs. But they also come as the Biden administration is potentially raising the cost of electric cars by requiring manufacturers to make the vehicles in the U.S., while using battery minerals from the United States or its closest trading partners — not China.

So far, the popularity of EVs is on the rise, and that could increase if the EPA rules lead to more models, some advocates said.

“Every single state in the union continued to see steady growth in electric vehicle sales in the last decade,” said Lisa Frank, who heads the Washington, D.C., legislative office at Environment America.

On the other hand, it’s unknown if automakers will be able to produce EVs for the mass market while also overcoming the tremendous expense of bringing a new kind of vehicle to scale. For that reason, today’s EVs carry a higher price tag than traditional models. (Prices for the cheapest model from Tesla, the nation’s top electric carmaker, start at just under $42,000.)

“The challenge is that as of now, the vehicles aren’t affordable enough that there’ll be a big enough buying base for them to be bought in these numbers,” said John Gartner, who leads EV and charging infrastructure research at the Center for Sustainable Energy, a California nonprofit.

When contacted by POLITICO’s E&E News, no automakers wanted to comment on the forthcoming rule. Some pointed to a statement put out last week by an industry lobbying group, the Alliance for Automotive Innovation.

“The question isn’t whether it can be done, it’s how fast it can be done,” the Alliance for Automotive Innovation said of the transition to electric vehicles, adding that it “will depend almost exclusively on having the right policies and market conditions.”

The rules come as state officials, and Congress, race ahead with their own efforts to transition away from gasoline-powered transportation.

California approved a rule that would require all new vehicles sold in the state to be emissions-free by 2035, including plug-in hybrids.

Congress included billions of dollars to build public EV charging stations in the 2021 infrastructure law. Last year’s Inflation Reduction Act dedicated billions more to tax credits and other incentives for people who buy the cars and a broad array of carmakers and parts suppliers.

The rules have been shaped in part by EPA tests of cars and components at the agency’s lab in Ann Arbor, Mich., and also by technical research and input from carmakers.

“As they consider all of those things, they think, what is the maximum they can push the industry?” said Dave Cooke, senior vehicles analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

The proposed rule will cover greenhouse gas emissions for cars built in 2027 and future model years. Current EPA regulations, which cover cars built through 2026, are expected to push EV adoption to 17 percent of new car sales by the time they expire.

Bloomberg first reported that the rules could exceed Biden’s goal of making half of all new cars carbon-free by 2030. The New York Times reported separately that EPA’s tailpipe rule could push EVs to as much as 67 percent of new cars sales.

Separately, EPA is also planning to roll out greenhouse gas limits on heavy-duty trucks starting in model year 2027, following up on its rules that were finalized last year to limit soot and smog-forming pollution like nitrogen oxides from the trucking industry.

Historically, EPA hasn’t told carmakers what kinds of vehicles to produce when it sets greenhouse gas standards. Instead, it has set a limit — a certain number of grams of carbon dioxide per mile driven — that each company has to meet over the entire fleet of vehicles it sells each year.

Companies that exceed the goal can build up credits to use in future years and can trade credits among themselves.

Major carmakers including General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Corp. have already set their own goals to produce more electric vehicles. The EPA proposal “is kind of saying, ‘All right, put your money where your mouth is,'” said Simon Mui, director of clean vehicles and fuels at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The rules are already attracting scrutiny. Environmental advocacy and consumer groups have argued that EPA should push for even more emissions reductions, particularly given the demand for electric cars and trucks.

Lawmakers are also beginning to push back by criticizing the regulations as a threat to blue-collar Americans.

“The EPA needs to explain to the constituents in my district that they should be driving some puny electric car instead of their pickup trucks,” Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) said Monday on Twitter, linking to a photo of an electric-powered Smart car“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”https://twitter.com/RepEricBurlison/status/1645459457684406275″,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1fa70002″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1fa70003″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>linking to a photo of an electric-powered Smart car from Europe.

Beyond the rhetoric, conservatives in Congress may have a chance to block the latest emissions rules. Republicans in the Senate and House, for instance, have introduced a proposal under the Congressional Review Act to roll back the EPA rules on soot and smog from heavy-duty trucks.

Timothy Cama contributed to this report.

A version of this report first ran in E&E News’ Climatewire. Get access to more comprehensive and in-depth reporting“,”link”:{“target”:”NEW”,”attributes”:[],”url”:”https://www.eenews.net/?utm_source=politico.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=reprint-articles”,”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1fa70004″,”_type”:”33ac701a-72c1-316a-a3a5-13918cf384df”},”_id”:”00000187-71ed-d462-a9ff-71fd1fa70005″,”_type”:”02ec1f82-5e56-3b8c-af6e-6fc7c8772266″}’>Get access to more comprehensive and in-depth reporting on the energy transition, natural resources, climate change and more in E&E News.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/11/electric-vehicles-america-biden-00091310

Oilers vs. Avalanche prediction: NHL pick Tuesday as best in the West face off

The Edmonton Oilers and Colorado Avalanche are now neck and neck on the oddsboard.

https://nypost.com/2023/04/11/oilers-vs-avalanche-prediction-nhl-odds-picks-for-tuesday/

NYPD boss sexually assaulted, threatened underling while seeking threesomes: suit

Right before they split, the boss also invited the victim on a trip to the Dominican Republic, where she discovered – after they landed – that he had brought three other women on the getaway and proceeded to largely ignore her, the filing alleges.

https://nypost.com/2023/04/11/nypd-boss-sexually-assaults-underling-while-seeking-threesomes-suit/

Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg sues Rep. Jim Jordan over Trump indictment subpoenas

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg on Tuesday filed a federal lawsuit against Rep. Jim Jordan, alleging that the Republican lawmaker is trying to wage a campaign of intimidation over his prosecution of former President Donald Trump. 

In his lawsuit, the Democratic D.A. said 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 former President Donald J. Trump.”

Bragg 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.

“Chairman Jordan’s subpoena is an unconstitutional attempt to undermine an ongoing New York felony criminal prosecution and investigation,” Bragg said. “As our complaint details, this is an unprecedented, illegitimate interference by Congress that lacks any legal merit and defies basic principles of federalism.” 

“The Manhattan D.A.’s Office focuses on the law and the evidence, not political gamesmanship or threats. We look forward to presenting our case in court to enjoin enforcement of the subpoena.” 

The case is assigned to U.S. District Mary Kay Vyskocil, a Trump appointee who previously served as a federal bankruptcy court judge.

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 TAKES FIGHT TO ALVIN BRAGG, PLANS NYC HEARING ON HIS ‘PRO-CRIME’ POLICIES

Reached for comment, Jordan’s office directed Fox News Digital to the Republican’s Twitter post in which he accused Bragg of indicting Trump for “no crime.” 

“Then, they sue to block congressional oversight when we ask questions about the federal funds they say they used to it,” Jordan wrote. 

Trump was indicted late last month on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to hush-money payments made during the 2016 presidential campaign to bury allegations that he had extramarital sexual encounters. The 2024 presidential contender has denied wrongdoing and pleaded not guilty at an arraignment in Manhattan last week. 

The House Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing in Manhattan on Monday on crime in New York City and what it alleges are Bragg’s “pro-crime, anti-victim” policies. The D.A.’s office, however, points to statistics showing that violent crime in Manhattan has dropped since Bragg took office in January 2022.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/manhattan-da-alvin-bragg-sues-rep-jim-jordan-trump-indictment-subpoena