Congress

Manhattan DA Bragg to House Republicans: Back Off, You Have No Authority Here

Donald Trump is the first current or former president in U.S. history to face a criminal indictment

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Fresh off securing an indictment of Donald Trump, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is blasting congressional Republicans trying to force him to testify about his investigation into the former president.

On March 20, three Republican committee chairmen -- House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer and House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil -- sent Bragg a letter accusing him of "an unprecedented abuse of prosecutorial authority" and requesting he testify about the grand jury probe into Trump.

The DA's office blasted the request as inappropriate, and the two sides have been in a letter-writing back-and-forth ever since about whether Congress even has the right to request the DA's testimony in the first place.

On Friday Bragg's staff doubled down, writing the three chairmen to tell them that Trump had been indicted and would have an opportunity to defend himself in court.

"What neither Mr. Trump nor Congress may do is interfere with the ordinary course of proceedings in New York State," the letter from the DA's general counsel Leslie Dubeck reads.

It goes on to make various legal arguments about states' sovereign powers and limits on congressional incursion into those authorities.

"The Committees' attempted interference with an ongoing state criminal investigation - and now prosecution - is an unprecedented and illegitimate incursion on New York's sovereign interests," the letter adds.

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