Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (D) has agreed to appear before the House Judiciary Committee on July 12, the day after former President Trump’s sentencing following his conviction in New York.
One of the lead prosecutors in the case, Matthew Colangelo, will also appear before the panel.
The hearing will be an important moment for House GOP oversight of those responsible for bringing charges against Trump.
Bragg’s appearance after the silent trial makes him the first prosecutor to appear before the panel after others who have brought charges against Trump have largely rejected demands from President Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), saying the invitations amount to inadequate efforts to interfere with their ongoing investigations.
Bragg agreed to the invitation only after Trump’s trial concluded, delaying his appearance by about a month as he said it would be inappropriate to speak publicly about the case outside of a courtroom before a judge has fully weighed in on the former president’s punishment. .
Colangelo’s appearance is also notable, as the House Judiciary Committee required information about him from several entities, including the Department of Justice. Colangelo, who worked as a prosecutor in New York, including on cases involving the Trump family, worked at the Justice Department before returning to New York to work on Bragg’s team. Colangelo delivered opening arguments during Trump’s trial.
The agreement for their testimony comes hours after the Justice Department told the committee it had conducted a “comprehensive” search of its records. unable to find any communication between the department and Bragg’s office.
The letter obtained by The Hill seeks to quash what Attorney General Merrick Garland called a conspiracy theory circulated by Republican lawmakers that federal prosecutors were somehow involved in Bragg’s decision to bring charges against Trump.
“We found none,” Carlos Uriarte, the Justice Department’s chief of legislative affairs, wrote of the search’s results.
“This is not surprising. The Public Prosecutor’s Office is a separate entity from the Department. The Department does not supervise the work of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, does not approve its charging decisions and does not judge its cases. The Department has no control over the District Attorney, just as the District Attorney has no control over the Department. The Committee knows this.”
“Our extraordinary efforts to respond to your speculation must put an end to this,” he later added.
Although Trump’s allies complained about both the prosecutor and judge involved in his trial, it was a jury agreed upon by prosecutors and Trump’s legal team that found him guilty on each of the 34 charges brought by Bragg.
Jurors agreed that Trump falsified business records by hiding secret payments made to an adult film star before the 2016 election.
Updated at 11:40 am
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
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