Left: Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, shakes hands with President Donald Trump as he arrives at Lima Allen County Airport, Wednesday, March 20, 2019, in Lima, Ohio (AP Photo/Evan Vucci). Right: Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg steps away after speaking to the media after a jury found former President Donald Trump guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, Thursday, May 30, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig.)
In a tersely-worded letter, Assistant U.S. Attorney General Carlos Uriate unequivocally denied and sharply rejected the “conspiratorial speculation” and “completely baseless” allegations Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee have made about the prosecution of Donald Trump by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, a longtime Trump darling and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to the Justice Department on April 30 regarding Trump’s criminal hush-money and election interference trial. In the letter, Jordan made unsupported and sweeping claims of prosecutorial misconduct and further asserted that the 34-count indictment Trump faced was a “politicized prosecution” by way of President Joe Biden’s administration since the lead prosecutor in New York working under Bragg was Matthew Colangelo, a former Justice Department lawyer.
Jordan also demanded the DOJ turn over “all documents and communications” from January 2021 through December 2022 between Colangelo and “any employee” at the New York County District Attorney’s Office as well as the state’s attorney’s general office, the DOJ’s special counsel’s office and the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office.
“The Committee has demanded information from the Department because of what you describe as a ‘perception that the Justice Department’ is behind the District Attorney’s so-called ‘politicized prosecution’ and a ‘perception that the Biden Justice Department is politicized and weaponized to that end,”” Uriate wrote. [Emphasis original] “The Department does not generally make extensive efforts to rebut conspiratorial speculation, including to avoid the risk of lending it credibility. However, consistent with the Attorney General’s commitment to transparency, the Department has taken extraordinary steps to confirm what was already clear: there is no basis for these false claims.”
As Law&Crime previously reported, Jordan’s letter came one day before Trump — flanked by Republican lawmakers including Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida — appeared outside of the Manhattan courthouse in May to heap criticism on “a lead person from the Department of Justice [who] is running the trial.”
“So Biden’s office is running the trial,” Trump declared.
Trump, teetering on the verge of triggering a gag order violation with his remarks, did not mention Colangelo by name, but there was little doubt that was who he was referring to.
Uriate wrote in his letter to Jordan this week that the department did a “comprehensive search” from January 2021 through the date of Trump’s guilty verdict as the committee had requested, including a search for emails between DOJ leaders and the District Attorney’s Office in New York.
“We found none,” Uriate wrote. “This is unsurprising. The District Attorney’s Office is a separate entity from the Department.”
Breaking down the chain of command for Jordan, he underlined that the DOJ “does not supervise” the District Attorney’s office nor does it approve charging decisions or try 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,” Uriate wrote.
The assistant attorney general said the department specifically searched Colangelo’s email account to address the “numerous unfounded questions” Jordan posed in April’s letter.
There were no instances at all of emails between Colangelo and the District Attorney’s office while Colangelo was at the DOJ.
“This is also unsurprising,” Uriate wrote.
As a matter of fact, Colangelo’s job was to oversee civil litigation for the department’s civil division as well as its litigation for the department’s antitrust and environmental and natural resources divisions, respectfully. When Colangelo left the department in December 2022, he wasn’t suddenly dispatched to Bragg’s office, Uriate contends.
The department “was unaware” of his work on the investigation and the prosecution of Trump until it was publicly reported.
In his pointed close, Uriate called the committee’s “self-justifying ‘perception’” of the prosecution of the former president “completely baseless.”
And yet, “the committee continues to traffic it widely,” he added.
The conspiracy theory peddled by elected lawmakers around the jury’s verdict — Trump was found guilty on all 34 felony counts — and specifically, that it was the hidden hand of the department which controlled the outcome and not jurors or prosecutors carrying out their sworn duties “is not only false, it is irresponsible,” the letter states.
“Indeed, accusations of wrongdoing made without — and in fact contrary to — evidence undermine confidence in the justice system and have contributed to increased threats of violence and attacks on career law enforcement officials and prosecutor,” he wrote.
A spokesperson for Jordan did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday.
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