Indictment supposedly looms for former President Donald Trump, who expects he will be arrested Tuesday in Manhattan, the jurisdiction of Soros-tied district attorney Alvin Bragg, over his alleged "hush money" payments to porn star Stormy Daniels.
While Trump was on the 2016 presidential campaign trail, Daniels allegedly received $130,000 through then-Trump attorney Michael Cohen, who was sentenced to three years in prison upon pleading guilty to violating federal campaign finance laws. The payoff was arguably offered to protect Trump's candidacy, but he also had motive as a married man and a famed TV celebrity.
What does this have to do with Bragg's probe? That's a question the public is waiting with bated breath for the answer to.
After all, local prosecutors are not responsible for policing campaign finance violations—the feds are. Plus, the two-to-five-year statute of limitations in New York for bookkeeping fraud, depending on the charging status, has long expired, Mr. Bragg.
Bragg's bank shot, it seems, is based on how the Trump Organization recorded the reimbursements made to Cohen. If the records list the installments as "legal expenses," an Article 175 misdemeanor charge of falsifying business records could transpire under New York Penal Law Code. Furthermore, if the falsification was in service of "concealing" another crime, for instance, a campaign finance charge, the charge could be upgraded to a Class E felony. Again, that's at the state level, not federal territory.
Even the former Clinton-nominated Federal Election Commission (FEC) chair threw shade at the dubious theory of attempting to shoehorn a federal offense into a state claim; prosecutors under Bragg's predecessor reportedly rejected its viability as well.
None of this has seemingly stopped Bragg from resuscitating a dead issue, as we'll soon find out, or so we're told.
While we're speaking of shadowy transactions, if Bragg wants to probe the usage of big bucks to influence elections, he should look no further than what appears to be his top benefactor: dark-money godfather George Soros, the notorious financier of left-wing causes, whose bottomless wallet has bankrolled the often-successful campaigns of soft-on-crime Democrat prosecutors in crime-ridden cities. The liberal mega-donor is known for using super PACs as pass-through funding vehicles to funnel cash into crucial DA face-offs across America, as opposed to pockets-to-politician election spending, which Soros is no stranger to either.
Soros donated a monstrous $1 million to the Color of Change PAC in May 2021 ahead of Bragg's packed, eight-way Democratic primary, according to the New York State Board of Elections campaign-finance database. (Thanks to the FEC filing, we have Soros's itemized receipt here.) That same month, the political action committee pledged more than $1 million to Bragg's 2021 campaign, a press release issued by the hybrid PAC's black-voter mobilization project Voting While Black announced.
Soros's 2021 donations | New York State Board of Elections
Color of Change PAC, whose ringing endorsements boosted the congressional bids of defund-the-police Squad members Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Cori Bush (D-MO), and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), also "proudly" endorsed Bragg in the New York County race.
Bragg's interests aligned with the PAC's "criminal justice reform" agenda like other ultra-progressive candidates.
During the destructive height of the violent Black Lives Matter riots in the summer of 2020, the anti-law enforcement lobbying group had referred to police unions as "killer cop organizations." They demanded that elected officials everywhere commit to cutting all ties with the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), which the Color of Change PAC labeled the "deadliest frat in the world."
But, Bragg apparently botched the sponsorship, and the generous funding was cut in half when the Color of Change PAC quietly withdrew $500,000 in the spring of 2021 following a "disturbing" allegation made via text message against Bragg by an unnamed woman on the group's contact list of New York City voters. However, the accusation was never publicly disclosed, nor was the female accuser's identity. Still, the "serious" claim spread among volunteers that discussed it in private group chats.
"Color of Change Political Action Committee ceased our independent expenditure on this electoral campaign after receiving this information," a Color of Change PAC source with firsthand knowledge of the situation exclusively told the Daily Mail last February.
The schism was deepened by Bragg's initial delay in following through on dropping murder charges against Tracy McCarter, who stabbed her estranged husband, James Murray, to death. Pre-primary victory, Bragg had tweeted support for the defendant, posting "I #StandWithTracy," which Color of Change, a vocal advocate of McCarter's release, perceived as a campaign "promise" he, at first, failed to keep. The slain man's family later felt betrayed by Bragg and asserted to the New York Post that the remaining $500,000 contribution was "100%" behind Bragg's decision to reverse course on prosecuting the accused murderer.
This you, @AlvinBraggNYC?
— ColorOfChange (@ColorOfChange) August 18, 2022
Let’s remind DA Alvin Bragg that the issues elected officials campaign on MUST be addressed once they’re in office.
If you believe in protecting survivors, #DropHerCharges.#StandWithTracy ➡️ https://t.co/DdgjL7O7VY. pic.twitter.com/1ZeuVAPQpD
The court found "no compelling reason to dismiss the indictment, but for the District Attorney's unwillingness to proceed," Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Diane Kiesel wrote of Bragg's "recommendation for dismissal," noting that "the public could perceive this dismissal as bought and paid for with campaign contributions and political capital." Court documents cited the Color of Change pressuring Bragg to use his prosecutorial discretion in favor of the PAC's stance on the McCarter murder case.
In addition, Bragg also reportedly received tens of thousands in campaign cash from the New York Justice & Public Safety PAC—the New York branch of the sprawling Soros-funded Safety and Justice network—after Soros contributed a sizeable $72,000 to the state-level PAC in April 2021, according to research published by the non-profit Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund.
Beyond the influence of PACs, Bragg was the direct beneficiary of Soros's family money.
Jonathan Soros, the third child of George Soros, and his wife Jennifer Allan Soros, the daughter of a former Planned Parenthood director, spent $20,650 on Bragg's run for Manhattan DA. Jonathan Soros was once involved in the daily operations of Soros Fund Management (SFM) as its co-deputy chairman. SFM is the principal asset manager for the Open Society Foundations, a major grantmaker that has become the main hub of George Soros's web of national and regional foundations.
Soros family donations | New York State Board of Election
Bragg's insatiable bloodlust for locating any possible route to charging Trump on the road to 2024 is driven partly by his ambition to be the first prosecutor ever in U.S. history to bring criminal charges against a former American president.
In a November radio interview on WNYC, Bragg gloated about the political prosecution: "I think I'm probably the only lawyer in the country who can say, we are right now, prosecuting a criminal case against the Trump Organization." Alongside other candidates pitching why they're the ones who should inherit the outgoing DA's high-profile cases, Bragg bragged to Spectrum News in March 2021 that he's the most qualified contender to take down Trump because of numerous legal attacks he has launched against him.
But in his hellbent crusade to throw the book at Trump and put the GOP's presidential frontrunner behind bars on an inflated charge, Bragg has let violent criminals walk free on New York's streets. Since taking the oath of office, Bragg has earned a reputation as a squishy DA who rolls over for hardened offenders as crime runs rampant and ravages the lawless Big Apple. Before Bragg backtracked in response to the immense backlash, the prosecutor's "Day One" memo sent to staffers had sought to downgrade certain felonies and avoid pursuing jail time in many cases involving robbery, assault, and gun possession.