Elie Honig — a former federal prosecutor, CNN legal analyst, and associate of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg — says the hush money prosecution of former President Donald J. Trump “was an ill-conceived, unjustified mess.” While the former prosecutor turned corporate media pundit claims the jury’s verdict should be respected, he acknowledged that the legal theory behind Bragg’s prosecution “contorted the law in an unprecedented manner.”
In a lengthy essay for New York Magazine‘s Intelligencer, Honig blasts Bragg and Democrat-aligned Judge Juan Merchan for what he contends was a politically motivated and dubious prosecution. The CNN legal analyst also criticized Judge Merchan for not properly addressing his political conflicts with the case.
MERCHAN’S CONFLICTS.
“The judge donated money… in plain violation of a rule prohibiting New York judges from making political donations of any kind — to a pro-Biden, anti-Trump political operation,” Honig writes, adding that the funds were explicitly “earmarked for ‘resisting the Republican Party and Donald Trump’s radical right-wing legacy.'”
The National Pulse has reported extensively on the personal and political conflicts of Judge Merchan, who refused to recuse himself from presiding over the case. Merchan’s daughter, Loren Merchan, a political fundraiser, has taken millions of dollars from national Democrats who raised campaign funds off of the prosecution. Additionally, Representative Daniel Goldman, a client of Loren Merchan, helped prepare the prosecution’s star witness, Michael Cohen, for his cross-examination.
‘ENTIRELY UNPRECEDENTED.’
Honig additionally writes that “[t]he charges against Trump are obscure, and nearly entirely unprecedented.” He contends that Bragg overreached in using a federal campaign finance violation as a predicate crime to resurrect the falsifying business record charges, which were beyond the statute of limitations.
“In fact, no state prosecutor — in New York, or Wyoming, or anywhere — has ever charged federal election laws as a direct or predicate state crime, against anyone, for anything. None. Ever,” Honig argues, adding: “Even putting aside the specifics of election law, the Manhattan DA itself almost never brings any case in which falsification of business records is the only charge.”
