Dem Gov Threatens Far-Left NYC DA in Private Meeting, Reminded Him She Can Pull Him Off the Job
Shortly after new Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg issued his controversial “day one” soft-on-crime agenda, conservative outlet City Journal described his plan as being based “on similar policy missives from Los Angeles’s George Gascón, Philadelphia’s Larry Krasner, and San Francisco’s Chesa Boudin — leading figures in the ‘progressive prosecutor’ movement.”
There’s one significant difference, which City Journal did not note: All of those DAs have indulgent Democrat governors.
After a high-profile smash-and-grab robbery in Manhattan, a police shooting suspect let out on bail and the widow of another stricken New York Police Department officer very publicly lambasting Bragg during her eulogy, New York Democrat Gov. Kathy Hochul decided her indulgence had already run out.
In a Friday afternoon meeting with Bragg, the New York Post reported, Hochul emphasized that “safety and justice must go hand-in-hand” in New York City — two days after she implicitly threatened to use the powers of her office to remove him.
Bragg’s policies have been tried and failed in other cities — something we’ve been chronicling exhaustively here at The Western Journal. (You can help us bring America the truth by subscribing.)
Just in case you’re unfamiliar with Bragg’s agenda, here’s a description from City Journal’s Thomas Hogan:
“He will not charge defendants for resisting arrest,” Hogan wrote. “The NYPD now can expect every arrest to be a brawl, in which the only person likely to be charged with a crime is a police officer. … Bragg has directed that armed robberies of businesses no longer be charged as robberies, but only as larcenies. If a gun-wielding robber gets away with less than $1,000, which is typically the case in a store robbery, the defendant will be charged solely with petty larceny, a misdemeanor. Felons in possession of a firearm will be charged only with misdemeanor offenses for the equivalent of unlicensed possession.”
“Who goes to jail on Bragg’s watch? Virtually no one,” Hogan noted. “The only people Bragg recommends for pretrial detention and later prison sentences are murderers, shooters who actually cause serious injuries — firing 50 shots down a crowded street won’t get you locked up if you don’t hit anybody—sex offenders, and perpetrators of specific offenses such as domestic violence or public corruption. Burglars, robbers, drug traffickers, armed felons, gang offenders, and all the other categories of dangerous criminals in Manhattan won’t see the inside of a jail cell.”
These are just some of the initiatives Bragg has pursued since “day one,” with predictable results. Hochul — who replaced Andrew Cuomo as governor after he stepped down in August after an array of scandals — sounds as if she’s already seen enough.
“My highest priority is protecting the safety of New Yorkers,” Hochul said in a prepared statement after the meeting, according to the Post.
“I reiterated my belief that safety and justice must go hand-in-hand,” the statement continued.
The meeting came two days after Hochul suggested removing Bragg was on the table, telling the New York Post’s editorial board “I have options, but I will be monitoring the situation very closely.”
New York governors have the power to remove lower elected officials from office.
After Friday’s meeting, Hochul added she would “continue to work with all of our District Attorneys, Mayor [Eric] Adams, the NYPD and every New Yorker who is working to restore our sense of security and enforce our laws,” according to the Post.
New York City Mayor Adams, for the unfamiliar, is a former NYPD officer who ran on a law-and-order platform and managed to dispense with a field of left-technocrats, former Maor Bill de Blasio flunkies and acolytes of leftist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
His victory was taken by pundits as a sign Gotham’s residents had tired of the city’s increasing crime rates and de Blasio’s progressive methods of dealing with it — although, in fairness, de Blasio has nothing on Bragg when it comes to outrageous leniency.
A source in a New York City business advocacy group told the Post that some in Bragg’s orbit had said he was “rethinking” the “day one” strategy, although it sounds a bit more like it’s being rethought for him.
During a virtual meeting with roughly 75 corporate leaders on Jan. 20, Bragg was grilled about a spate of lawlessness since he took office.
“Joe Ucuzogly, CEO of Deloitte USA, said his company’s employees are shaken after senior manager Michelle Go was killed when she was randomly pushed into the path of an oncoming subway train in Times Square less than a week ago,” the Post reported.
“A retailer also told Bragg that crime is so bad in New York City that he’s installing the same type of security here that is used in his stores in violence-wracked Caracas, Venezuela, sources said.”
“The tone is [New York City] is lawless, and his memo empowers lawlessness,” one caller said, according to the Post. Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman said he was having trouble getting people to come back to work in person “unless they feel safe, and they don’t feel safe,” according to the Post.
Adams has pushed hard to get employees working back in person to get the economy on track:
“We have to open up,” he told CNN in early January. “I need my city to open.”
Then, a brazen daylight shoplifting in a New York City Rite-Aid, reminiscent of incidents we’ve seen in cities like San Francisco, went viral after liberal actor Michael Rapaport caught it on video.
WARNING: The following video contains graphic language that some viewers will find offensive.
Michael Rapaport caught a shoplifter in the act today in a NYC Rite Aid ? pic.twitter.com/rQKvG4R9Nk
— Libs of Tik Tok (@libsoftiktok) January 26, 2022
On Friday, the widow of slain New York Police Department officer Jason Rivera delivered a eulogy in which she slammed Bragg for his agenda.
Officer Rivera’s widow, Dominique Luzuriaga: “You have the whole nation on gridlock…The system continues to fail us. We are not safe anymore, not even the [NYPD]…You were tired of these laws, especially the ones from the new DA. I hope he is watching you speak through me” pic.twitter.com/lnKO17azaW
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) January 28, 2022
“The system continues to fail us,” she said. “We are not safe anymore, not even the members of the service [NYPD]. I know you were tired of these laws, especially the ones from the new DA. I hope he is watching you speak through me right now,” she said, drawing a prolonged standing ovation during the funeral Mass in St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
The same day, it was first reported that a 16-year-old who allegedly shot a police officer in the back was released on bail.
Camrin Williams, an aspiring rapper who goes by the moniker “C Blu,” was released from a juvenile facility late the previous day on $250,000 bond, according to the Daily Caller.
If that perfect storm doesn’t convince Bragg, Gov. Hochul might. After all, as she said Wednesday, she has “options” — her powers as governor allow her to remove individuals from office — and is “monitoring the situation very closely.”
“Everyone goes right to removal [but] this individual has only been on the job a very short time. I’m not prepared to undo the will of the people,” she said.
Still, she made it clear that “I know full well the powers that the governor has — I’ll be having a conversation very shortly to convey, to let him tell me what his plans are and make sure that we’re all in alignment.”
Anyone with half a brain can read between those very wide lines. Hochul is campaigning for a full term this November, and it would help in both the Democratic primary and the general election if New York City weren’t following San Francisco and Los Angeles down a time-warp to the begrimed, felonious “Dirty Harry”/Abe Beame days of the 1970s. That’s how Eric Adams got elected, after all — to ensure that doesn’t happen.
Bragg isn’t “in alignment” with either Hochul or Adams — or any of the other stakeholders here, like the NYPD, businesses and “every New Yorker who is working to restore our sense of security and enforce our laws.”
The message is blunt: Get “in alignment” or you could be getting a new gig faster than you think. Even with a Democratic governor and mayor, Alvin Bragg’s Chesa Boudin act isn’t going to fly.
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