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‘Weaponization’: Nadler Blasts Jordan for Doing Trump’s ‘Bidding’ With NYC Field Trip Targeting DA Bragg (Live Video)
House Judiciary Ranking Member Jerry Nadler Monday morning blasted House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan‘s partisan field trip to New York City to attack Alvin Bragg in retribution for the Manhattan District Attorney’s grand jury indictment of Donald Trump on 34 felony violations.
Chairman Jordan’s unusual hearing in Manhattan, which began Monday morning, is expected to highlight victims of crime in attempt to paint New York City as dangerous and DA Bragg as not doing his job, despite statistics that show the nation’s largest city is also one of its safest.
Jordan has no oversight authority over an elected state or county official.
“Let me be very clear,” said Nadler, a Democrat who represents New York City, as he began his opening statement (video below). “We are here today in lower Manhattan for one reason and one reason only: The chairman is doing the bidding of Donald Trump.”
“Committee Republicans designed this hearing to intimidate and deter the duly-elected District Attorney of Manhattan from doing the work his constituents elected him to do. They have demanded access to the inner workings of an ongoing criminal case, information to which they know that they are not entitled. They have subpoenaed a witness who used to work for the district attorney whom they know cannot answer their questions, and they have earned a lawsuit they risks future congressional oversight.”
Nadler said Republicans on the committee have “perpetuated the anti-semitic and racist tropes that Mr. Trump has directed at both the prosecutor and the judge in this case, they are using their public offices and the resources of this committee to protect their political patron Donald Trump. It is an outrageous abuse of power. It is to use the chairman’s favorite term, a weaponization of the House Judiciary Committee.”
Nadler also accused Jordan of using his committee “to undermine” the judicial “process as it unfolds,” calling the chairman’ actions “cynical, unethical, and given the violence unleashed on the capital by the former president, just plain dangerous.”
“Now we grieve for the victims of violent crime here in Manhattan and everywhere. But it is shameful that the Republicans of this committee would use the pretext of violent crime as an excuse to play tourists in New York and bully the district attorney and it is particularly disgraceful that they would use this pretext after doing nothing, nothing to stop the gun violence that terrorizes our nation.”
READ MORE: Everything Ron DeSantis Did Yesterday Is Wrong – And Many People Are Noticing
Nadler noted there have been “at least 146 mass shootings this year alone,” more “than days so far this year.”
“Three people were shot dead and five others injured at Michigan State University. Three children and three teachers were shot and killed at a private school in Nashville, Tennessee. Five people are dead and eight others including two police officers are injured after a mass shooting at a bank in Louisville, Kentucky. These tragedies have taken place in nearly every corner of our nation.”
“Unlike our Republican colleagues, Democrats have consistently advanced policies that make all of our communities including New York, safer places to live, to work, to worship, and to go to school. Last Congress over the objection of every Republican here today, we passed the first gun violence prevention package in decades. We can and must do more. We must pass universal background checks. We must implement red flag laws to keep guns away from those who are a danger to themselves and others and we must reinstate the assault weapons ban. Each of these proposals are overwhelmingly popular with the American public and each is opposed by House Republicans.”
Before the hearing began, Manhattan Borough President Mark D. Levine noted, “Jim Jordan could have done today’s sham hearing near his home in Columbus (murder rate 3x NYC) Or Jacksonville (3.5x NYC) Or Ft. Worth (2x NYc) But he’s holding it in Manhattan. Because it’s not really about public safety. It’s about undermining the prosecution of Trump.”
Early Monday morning, CNN’s Daniel Dale published a deep dive into NYC crime statistics amid Jordan’s claims. In part, Dale writes, “Violent crime in Manhattan and New York City is far below record levels,” “Most categories of major crime in Manhattan, though not all, are down so far in 2023.” He also lists dozens of big cities where the murder rate is far higher than New York City’s.
Watch the full live or the hearing below or at this link.
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
