James Comer defends oversight of Manhattan DA’s Trump probe
Jack Birle
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House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) defended House Republican calls for Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg to testify before the House regarding his inquiry of former President Donald Trump.
Comer said Bragg’s investigation into Trump allegedly falsifying business records for a hush money payment is not a “local investigation,” saying instead that Bragg’s probe is a federal investigation that “has no business being litigated in a local district attorney’s office,” while speaking on CNN’s State of the Union.
HOUSE REPUBLICANS HIT BACK AT ALVIN BRAGG’S REFUSAL TO TESTIFY IN TRUMP CASE
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“Well, what the DA is trying to say is what you just quoted, he said, stay out of local investigations. The problem with that is this is not a local investigation. This is a federal investigation. He’s investigating a presidential candidate, not to mention former president of the United States for a federal election crime that has no business being litigated in a local district attorney’s office,” Comer said.
“And when he says he’s not going to cooperate with Congress, unfortunately for Mr. Bragg, he doesn’t have the luxury of determining whether or not he can comply with congressional requests because he crossed over two levels of government from the local level to the federal level to try to prosecute something that clearly if there was a reason for prosecution, it should be done by the Department of Justice on the federal level,” Comer continued.
The House Oversight Committee chairman also warned about the bad precedent that prosecution against Trump could set up, saying it could open up other federal office candidates to frivolous charges.
“if you open a can of worms here. Here’s what’s gonna happen. You’re going to have county attorneys in red areas, in parts of Kentucky, rural Kentucky, where I am, that are going to start trying to overreach into the federal elections. This is something that if it needs to be investigated or prosecuted. It should be done on the federal level by the Department of Justice. This is a presidential candidate,” Comer said.
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Comer would not say if he and other House Republican leaders, including House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), will subpoena Bragg if he does not cooperate but reiterated calls for him to testify. The Kentucky Republican says the House GOP wants to understand whether the probe on Trump is political or if it holds merit.
Prosecutors in New York City have been investigating to see if Trump falsified business records by listing a $130,000 reimbursement of his then-lawyer Michael Cohen for paying off porn star Stormy Daniels to stay silent as a legal expense in 2016 when he was running for president.