Television star Judge Judy Sheindlin on Friday harshly criticized Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg for prosecuting former President Donald Trump over what she considers “nonsense.”
The Manhattan jury in Bragg’s case convicted Trump in late May of 34 felony counts of falsifying business documents to conceal a payment to porn star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election for her to be silent about an alleged affair. Sheindlin told host Chris Wallace in an episode of Max’s “Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace” that Bragg should be focused on prosecuting criminals who make New York unsafe rather than the former president, who she said the district attorney targeted for personal reasons. (RELATED: Manhattan DA Bragg Threatens Trump With Jail Time For Gag Order Violations, Urges Judge To Hold Him In Contempt)
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Judge Judy Unloads On Alvin Bragg For Trying Trump Over ‘Nonsense’ Instead Of Keeping Criminals ‘Off The Street’ pic.twitter.com/cf9HivYFuo
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) June 21, 2024
“I would be happier, as someone who owns property in Manhattan, if the district attorney of New York County would take care of criminals who were making it impossible for citizens to walk in the streets and use the subway, to use his efforts to keep those people off the street, than to spend $5 million or $10 million of taxpayers’ money trying Donald Trump on this nonsense,” Sheindlin said. “That’s my view. But I, as a taxpayer in this country, resent using the system for your own personal self-aggrandizement.”
Bragg’s office on Thursday dropped charges against most of the protesters arrested for occupying several campus buildings and participating in an encampment at Columbia University in April, attributing the decision to lack of evidence. Since taking office, Bragg has downgraded 52% of felonies to misdemeanors and only convicted slightly over half of the defendants he prosecuted for felonies, the New York Post reported in November 2022.
“You had to twist yourself into a pretzel to figure out what the crime was,” she added, later saying she thinks Trump “was a good businessman.”
To charge Trump with a felony, Bragg alleged the purpose of the falsification of records was to cover up or commit another crime, but the district attorney did not specify the aggravating offense in his 2023 indictment.
Trump has consistently alleged that President Joe Biden’s administration played a key role in Bragg’s prosecution, referencing it as a “Biden witch hunt” and the “Biden Case.”
MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin on Thursday accused Trump of engaging in “perniciously racist” rhetoric through these allegations.
“For a variety of reasons, that narrative makes no sense, it is factually false and it’s also dangerously and perniciously racist because it assumes that DA Alvin Bragg, who is black, could not have executed this prosecution on his own without the supervision of a bunch of white elders,” Rubin said.
Rubin acknowledged Trump’s claim is based on Matthew Colangelo, who was Biden’s acting associate attorney general and spent two years in his Department of Justice, joining Bragg’s office as senior counsel in December 2022. However, she minimized his role in the case.
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