BLUMENTHAL STATEMENT ON THE INDICTMENT OF NEW YORK ATTORNEY GENERAL TISH JAMES

[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) released the statement below following the indictment of New York Attorney General Letitia James.

“Donald Trump is perverting our justice system by indictments on demand— directing prosecutions based on vengeance and vanity.”

“I am leading legislation to install safeguards against this spiraling crisis, but what our country really needs right now is for Republicans in power to admit this threat and take action. Two days ago, Attorney General Bondi appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee and flatly refused to answer my questions about abusive political prosecutions while my Republican colleagues sat in silence like lapdogs. The complicity of the Republican Party in Trump’s abuses is shameful and disgusting.”

“Last month, it was Comey; today it was James; tomorrow it could be you.”

Last month, President Trump posted on Truth Social, instructing Attorney General Pam Bondi to move forward with cases against James, U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA), and former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director James Comey, saying “[t]hey’re all guilty as hell.”

Comey and James were only indicted after Trump replaced the non-partisan, career prosecutor supervising their cases with one of his own personal attorneys, who had no criminal law experience, because the career prosecutor concluded there was insufficient evidence to bring a case. The newly installed U.S. Attorney presented the Comey case and reportedly presented the James case to the grand jury herself, a departure from typical practice and an indication that other career prosecutors in the office may have refused to present the indictment.

The New York Times has also reported that a senior official at the Justice Department instructed several U.S. attorney’s offices to begin plans to investigate an organization – the Open Society Foundations – affiliated with progressive causes and funded by a major Democratic donor whom Trump has said “should be put in jail.”

Blumenthal and U.S. Representative Dan Goldman (D-NY) have announced a framework for new legislation to enact guardrails to prevent the Trump Administration and future Administrations from misusing the justice system to target political opponents.

The Preventing Political Prosecutions Act would:

0. Create a right of action against federal officials—prosecutors, agents, and DOJ and FBI leadership—who engage in selective or malicious prosecution or investigation based on political or partisan considerations;
1. Enact grand jury reforms, including:
0. Require prosecutors to present exculpatory evidence to the Grand Jury;
1. Require disclosure of grand jury vote tally to the defendant as part of discovery;
2. Strengthen judges’ ability to scrutinize the evidence presented to grand juries where improper political considerations are credibly alleged;
2. Codify the Justice Manual’s rules on impermissible political considerations in the decision to bring or decline to bring a case;
3. Prohibit direct or indirect White House instructions to the Department of Justice concerning investigative or charging decisions in individual criminal cases;
4. Require all line prosecutors and U.S. Attorneys to certify under penalty of perjury that:
0. the indictment did not rely on impermissible political considerations;
1. the evidence in support of the indictment is sufficient to prove the defendant’s guilt at trial beyond a reasonable doubt; and
5. Require all DOJ employees to report to the Office of Professional Responsibility and the Office of the Inspector General any instance where partisanship, politics or personal opinions about the target were considered in an investigative or charging decision and require OPR and OIG to disclose any such reports, including specific communications, to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees.

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