Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg on Saturday night accused a trio of House Republicans of trying to interfere in his office, amid an escalating standoff over an investigation into former President Donald Trump.
Bragg, in a brief statement, said that it was “not appropriate for Congress to interfere with pending local investigations,” after Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), James Comer (R-Ky.) and Bryan Steil (R-Wis.) — the chairs of the Judiciary, Oversight and Administration Committees, respectively — doubled down on their request for information in their own letter on Saturday.
The volleys are the latest in a days-long back and forth between the prosecutor and House Republicans that started earlier this month when Trump teased on social media that he could imminently be arrested. The statement sparked a rallying cry from House Republicans with Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) vowing an investigation.
Jordan, Comer and Steil, in their Saturday letter, set a new deadline of March 31 for a swath of documents they are requesting regarding Bragg’s office, including any related to potential federal funding of or involvement in his work. They also doubled down on their request for Bragg to provide testimony behind closed doors.
Those requests are currently voluntary since Republicans haven’t issued a subpoena for either the documents or an interview with Bragg. The GOP chairs haven’t ruled out trying to compel him and, in their letter, they appear to briefly argue that a subpoena would meet the bar for having legal legs.
“Your reply letter did not dispute the central allegations at issue—that you, under political pressure from left-wing activists and former prosecutors in your office, are reportedly planning to use an alleged federal campaign finance violation … [to] indict for the first time in history a former President of the United States,” Jordan, Comer and Steil wrote in their letter.
Bragg is reportedly preparing for the possibility that the former president will be indicted on charges related to alleged hush money payment to Stormy Daniels. Bragg, in his statement on Saturday night, hit back at the accusation of playing politics, saying that his office evaluates “cases in our jurisdiction based on the facts, the law and the evidence.”
“This unprecedented inquiry by federal elected officials into an ongoing matter serves only to hinder, disrupt and undermine the legitimate work of our dedicated prosecutors. As always, we will continue to follow the facts and be guided by the rule of law in everything we do,” Bragg added.
Bragg's office didn't immediately respond to questions about if they would be sending a separate, formal response to House Republicans responding to their latest letter.
The investigation by House Republicans is raising questions about the scope of Congress’ jurisdiction over state and local criminal matters. Leslie Dubeck, Bragg’s general counsel, wrote in a letter to House Republicans earlier this week that Bragg’s office would submit a letter describing its use of federal funds, while emphasizing that questions about the office’s use of federal funds does not justify a congressional attempt to unearth nonpublic information about the ongoing probe.
The GOP lawmakers, in their letter, argued that they weren’t overstepping jurisdictional boundaries because they could use Bragg’s testimony and the documents to pass potential legislation. The letter provides new details on what House Republicans could pursue in response to the investigation into Trump, including legislation to “insulate current and former presidents from such improper state and local prosecutions,” reforms to special counsel authorities, changes to the Federal Election Campaign Act and to how Congress dishes out public safety funds.
“We believe that we now must consider whether Congress should take legislative action to protect former and/or current Presidents from politically motivated prosecutions by state and local officials, and if so, how those protections should be structured,” the GOP chairs added.
WACO, Texas — It was Donald Trump’s first formal rally of the 2024 campaign. But the former president spent the evening sticking with the usual hits, emphasizing personal grievances and going after his nearest targets: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Manhattan district attorney who is poised to indict him.
Appearing before a crowd of cheering supporters, Trump offered up the type of political bravado and bulldog mentality that he is known for, mocking DeSantis, who is widely seen as his strongest rival for the Republican nomination, for not doing better in the polls.
“Man, he’s dropping like a rock,” Trump said of the Florida governor. “They keep saying ‘DeSanctus’ could do well with farmers. I don’t think so. Based on polls, he’s not doing well with anything.”
Trump went on to do a dramatic re-enactment of DeSantis pleading for his endorsement in the 2018 Florida governor’s race. The former president said that after he grudgingly backed DeSantis, the candidate “became like a rocket ship” and prevailed in the primary and general election — and argued that had he not backed him, DeSantis would have never won.
The audience seemed game to stand for hours under the central Texas sun and listen to Trump’s litany of complaints. They and the event itself offered a vivid illustration of the fault lines that have quickly opened up in the very early GOP primary: in which fealty to Trump appears to be one of the main litmus tests for those running.
Indeed, rallygoers here in Waco expressed disappointment that DeSantis had not gone further in his defense of Trump as he stares down a possible indictment from the Manhattan district attorney.
Louise Negry from Lometa, Tex., said DeSantis “might be a traitor.”
Her friend, Renee Alaniz, agreed, referencing the Florida governor’s implicit mocking of Trump for being involved in an alleged hush money payment to a porn star (which has been the central issue in his potential indictment).
“His statement about the possible Trump arrest was a little questionable — quite a bit questionable. His choice to be so lax about it and not support Trump in any way,” Alaniz said.
Chris Blunt, who wore a t-shirt with an image of the Trump NFT he purchased last year, called DeSantis a “Trump clone,” and said the governor should be “dropping the Covid stuff and moving past it.”
“Trump likes to attack the person and not their character, but DeSantis is attacking Trump’s character and credibility,” Blunt said. “He needs to stop playing games because Trump is going to trounce you.”
DeSantis was not the lone object of scorn in Waco on Saturday night. Trump also railed against Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, who is investigating the $130,000 hush money payments to adult entertainer Stormy Daniels on Trump’s behalf. The jury in Manhattan had appeared to be wrapping up with the case and a decision on charges against Trump was widely expected to come last week. Now it does not appear any decision will come until at least early next week.
Trump framed the investigations into him and the “weaponization of our justice system” as “the central issue of our time.” And he claimed the “biggest threat” to the U.S. isn’t China or Russia but “high level politicians that work in the U.S. government like McConnell, Pelosi, Schumer and Biden.”
“You will be vindicated and proud the thugs and criminals who are corrupting our justice system will be defeated, discredited and totally disgraced,” Trump said.
Trump’s first 2024 presidential campaign rally came at a pivotal time. While Bragg closes in on a likely indictment — which would be a first for a sitting or former president — Trump is also facing legal scrutiny over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election as well as his handling of classified White House documents.
Trump, on Saturday, appeared to bet that he could turn the investigations into a political asset, casting himself once more as a victim of a federal government that was aligned against him.
“Our opponents have done everything they can to crush our spirit and to break our will. But they failed. They’ve only made us stronger,” he said.
The campaign and city of Waco had expected at least 15,000 people to attend Saturday’s rally. Wearing MAGA hats and Trump t-shirts, some waved official campaign signs saying “WITCH HUNT” and the entire crowd stood, hand to heart along with Trump, as a rendition of the “Star Spangled Banner” sung by the “J6 Choir” played, set to a video of protesters storming the U.S. Capitol.
Trump ticked through a list of campaign promises that included mandating term limits, keeping “men out of women’s sports” and ending “the invasion at the Southern border.” And he once again vowed, without articulating how, that he would end the war in Ukraine and prevent “World War 3.”
But the focus wasn’t primarily on the issues facing America, it was on the many issues facing him.
The Trump campaign rolled out its Texas leadership team and endorsements for 2024 that included Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and twelve members of Congress, including Reps. Pete Sessions, the former NRCC chairman, and Roger Williams, chairman of the small business committee. Rep. Ronny Jackson — Trump's former White House physician turned U.S. congressman from Texas — helped Trump's campaign nail down endorsements and Trump personally called each, according to a campaign adviser.
Notably, Gov. Greg Abbott and Sen. Ted Cruz weren’t included on the list, although the adviser said they expect more endorsements and Abbott and Cruz have both mulled 2024 runs of their own.
Capitol Hill Trump allies like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) warmed up the crowds with their own rally cries.
Greene told the crowd to stop letting people from “blue states” move into Texas, and — in what has been a major pivot for the GOP — told people to embrace ballot harvesting.
“We need to beat them at their own game and start harvesting ballots,” Greene said. “Except they’ll only come from legal registered voters who are U.S. citizens.”
Trump seemed pleased with Greene’s speech in particular, and on stage encouraged her to run for Senate.
Outside the venue, rallygoers wandered through a makeshift marketplace of Trump themed souvenirs that ranged from Trump and Melania Trump lifesize cutouts, MAGA bikinis and t-shirts with crude messages against President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. One vendor said he was close to selling out a t-shirt that read, “I was there, where were you? God, Guns, Trump, in Waco, Texas.”
Meridith McGraw reported from Waco, Texas; Alex Isenstadt reported from Washington, D.C.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell left inpatient physical therapy on Saturday after suffering a concussion, though it's still not clear exactly when the GOP leader will return to the Senate.
Because a two-week recess is approaching after next week's Senate session, the Kentucky Republican will work from home for the next few days, a McConnell aide said. The aide said that McConnell "will consult with his physical therapists on a return date to the Senate." The Senate will be back in session after that recess the week of April 17.
“I want to sincerely thank everyone for all the kind wishes. I’m happy to say I finished inpatient physical therapy earlier today and I’m glad to be home," McConnell said in a statement on Saturday. “I’m going to follow the advice of my physical therapists and spend the next few days working for Kentuckians and the Republican Conference from home."
McConnell fell on March 8 at a private dinner in D.C. and subsequently was hospitalized for a concussion; he also suffered a rib fracture. He was then moved to an inpatient rehab facility several days later. In the meantime, his condition and return has been the subject of immense interest in the Senate. In consultation with McConnell and his staff, Senate Minority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) has been helping run the Senate GOP during McConnnell's absence.
McConnell's GOP colleagues, including Thune, reported this week that they'd spoken to him on the phone, and McConnell has been texting with them about congressional business. He's also been keeping tabs on Senate races, texting with Gov. Jim Justice (R-W.Va.) about his possible entry into the West Virginia Senate race.
"I’m in frequent touch with my Senate colleagues and my staff. I look forward to returning in person to the Senate soon," McConnell, 81, said on Saturday.
The Republican leader also fell and fractured his shoulder in 2019.
JERUSALEM — Israel’s defense minister became the first ally in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition to break ranks on Saturday as he called for an immediate halt to the far-right government’s contentious plan to overhaul the country’s judiciary.
In a televised address, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant expressed concern over the turmoil within Israel’s military that he said posed a threat to the country’s security. Citing the need for dialogue with the opposition, Gallant asked that Netanyahu’s coalition wait until after Parliament reconvenes from its holiday break next month before pushing ahead with its divisive plan to weaken the Supreme Court.
“For the sake of Israel’s security, for the sake of our sons and daughters, the legislative process must be stopped at this time,” Gallant, a top official in Netanyahu’s Likud party, said.
The government’s plan to increase its control over the judiciary has sparked the largest protest movement in Israeli history and triggered a grave national crisis, including even warnings from the president of civil war.
On Saturday, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets as they
have every week since the start of the year — in many cases bringing parts of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv to a standstill. It has also raised the hackles of Israel’s closest allies, testing its ties with the United States.
Police unleashed water cannons on masses of protesters who whistled and waved Israeli flags as they marched down Ayalon highway in Tel Aviv on Saturday night. “Shame! Shame!” they chanted in Hebrew. As the protesters advanced, officers on horseback violently rammed into the crowds. “Haven’t the Jewish people suffered enough?” read one protester’s sign.
The judicial proposal has drawn intensifying criticism from across Israeli society — including from former prime ministers and defense officials, high-tech business leaders, Israel’s attorney general and American Jews.
In recent weeks, discontent over the overhaul has even surged from within Israel’s army — the country’s most popular and respected institution, which has historically been an apolitical unifier. A growing number of Israeli reservists have threatened to withdraw from voluntary duty in the past weeks, posing a broad challenge to Netanyahu as he defiantly plows ahead with the judicial changes while on trial for corruption.
"The events taking place in Israeli society do not spare the Israel Defense Forces — from all sides, feelings of anger, pain and disappointment arise, with an intensity I have never encountered before,” Gallant said. “I see how the source of our strength is being eroded.”
In security-minded Israel, the unrest has prompted concern about the Israeli military’s stability as it maintains its 55-year-old occupation of the West Bank and faces threats from Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group and from its archenemy Iran.
Violence both in Israel and the occupied West Bank has escalated over the past few weeks to heights unseen in years. On Saturday, a Palestinian shot and wounded two Israeli soldiers in the northern West Bank town of Hawara, the site of a violent settler rampage last month.
"This is a clear, immediate and tangible danger to the security of the state,” he said, referring to the judicial plans. “I will not take part in this.”
Gallant stopped short of saying what, if anything, he would do if Netanyahu ignored his plea. But his strong statement of concern for the polarized nation marked the first crack in Netanyahu’s coalition, the most right-wing and religiously conservative government in Israeli history.
Despite mounting dissent, the government passed a key part of the overhaul on Thursday, approving legislation that would protect the Israeli leader from being deemed unfit to rule because of his trial and claims of a conflict of interest. Critics say the law is tailor-made for Netanyahu and encourages corruption.
That day, Gallant met with Netanyahu, reportedly to voice concerns that protests by Israeli reservists and other security forces were hurting Israel’s international image and power of deterrence. After the meeting, Netanyahu nonetheless announced that he would become directly involved in the overhaul, declaring his hands “untied."
Israel’s attorney general issued a sharp rebuke on Friday, warning that Netanyahu had broken the law by announcing his direct involvement in the overhaul while facing criminal charges — a stern statement that raised the specter of a constitutional crisis.
Netanyahu is on trial for fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in a series of scandals involving wealthy associates and powerful media moguls. He denies wrongdoing and dismisses critics who say he could find an escape route from the charges through the legal overhaul his government is advancing.
Supporters of the judicial overhaul — which includes plans to increase the coalition’s control over judicial appointments and diminish the Supreme Court’s ability to strike down laws passed by Parliament — say it will restore power to elected legislators and make the courts less interventionist. Critics say the move upends Israel’s system of checks and balances and pushes it toward autocracy.
In spite of the backlash, Netanyahu has dismissed offers for a compromise, including from Israel’s mainly ceremonial president earlier this month.
“For the sake of our security, for the sake of our unity, it is our duty to return to the arena of dialogue,” Gallant said.
OTTAWA — All day long, it was “Justin” and “Joe.”
There were frequent back pats and nods of agreement. Multiple red carpet walks. The president regularly flashed his Joe Biden grin, drawing an eruption of laughter from Parliament after he cracked a joke about Canada’s Maple Leafs hockey team. And whoever was tasked with filling the joint press conference space Friday with as many U.S. and Canada flags as they could find — they understood the assignment.
It wasn’t quite the bromance Barack Obama shared with the Canadian prime minister, but Biden and Justin Trudeau still managed to check every box when it came to reaffirming their efforts to rebuild the U.S.-Canada relationship after four years of Donald Trump, who set fire to the cross-border partnership. The day was packed with pleasantries — from their hug as Biden arrived on Parliament Hill, telling the prime minister “good to see you man,” to the glitzy gala where Trudeau raised his glass to “allies, neighbors, and most importantly, true friends.”
The gala dinner at the Ottawa Aviation Museum concluded a busy day of meetings, photo-ops, speeches and a joint press conference. Biden’s visit marked the first true bilateral meeting in Canada between the two leaders since the Obama years.
“And today, I say to you, and to all the people of Canada, that you will always, always be able to count on the United States of America,” Biden said during his speech to Parliament. “I guarantee it.”
While the two leaders took advantage of the opportunities to lean into the imagery of a productive relationship, they discussed an array of complex topics behind closed doors.
The trip was not expected to produce much in terms of deliverables, but Biden and Trudeau made modest announcements on the North American Aerospace Defense Command, semiconductors, Haiti and climate issues. A deal they struck on migration drew the most headlines from the trip.
The two countries announced plans to apply the terms of the Safe Third Country Agreement to migrants between points of entry along the Canada-United States border, in an aim to deter illegal migration. The new policy was to go into effect at midnight Friday. Canada will also welcome an additional 15,000 migrants from countries such as Haiti, Colombia and Ecuador over the course of the year.
The agreement will allow Canada to turn away migrants from unofficial crossing points like Roxham Road, a small, well-traveled road that straddles the Canada-U.S. border between Quebec and New York. Quebec Premier François Legault has hammered Trudeau, calling on the prime minister to raise the issue with Biden. Roughly 40,000 asylum seekers entered Canada through this path last year.
“We couldn’t simply shut down Roxham Road and hope that everything would resolve itself because we would have had problems. The border is very long and people would have looked for other places to cross,” Trudeau said during Friday’s press conference. “And so that’s why we chose to modernize the Safe Third Country Agreement so that someone who attempts to cross between official crossings will be subject to the principle.”
The two leaders also fielded questions on Russia and China, in which Biden questioned the close ties of the authoritarian regimes. He noted that China hasn’t provided Russia with weapons in its war in Ukraine.
“I don’t take China lightly. I don’t take Russia lightly. But I think we vastly exaggerated. I’ve been hearing now for the past three months: China is going to provide significant weapons to Russia and they're going to go up and talk about that. They haven’t yet. Doesn't mean they won’t, but they haven’t yet,” Biden said.
He also defended the state of the economy amid the banking crisis, noting his administration did a “pretty damn good job” in its response. The president opened his remarks by addressing the U.S. military’s airstrikes in Syria after a suspected Iran-made drone killed a U.S. worker and wounded other troops.
“I’m also grateful for the professionalism of our service members who so ably carried out this response,” Biden said. “And to make no mistake, the United States does not — does not, emphasize — seek conflict with Iran. But be prepared for us to act forcefully to protect our people. That's exactly what happened last night.”
Even on the crisis in Haiti — one of the more challenging topics Biden and Trudeau had to broach — the two leaders presented a united front. The White House for months has suggested it wants Canada to take the lead in a multi-national military intervention to bring stability to the country, but standing next to Trudeau on Friday, Biden lowered the pressure.
The president told reporters he wasn’t disappointed in Trudeau’s reluctance to lead the effort, calling it “a very, very difficult circumstance.”
The prime minister nodded in agreement.
Kierra Frazer contributed to this report.
