Graham slams soft-on-crime Bragg for targeting Trump while New Yorkers ‘lucky’ not to get ‘mugged’

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., spoke out Saturday in opposition to a potential indictment of former President Donald Trump from the Manhattan District Lawyer’s workplace, urging the 2024 GOP presidential candidate to struggle again and “take this all the way in which to the rattling Supreme Court docket.”

“The prosecutor in New York has achieved extra to assist Donald Trump get elected president than any single particular person in America immediately,” mentioned Graham, talking from Charleston, South Carolina, on the Palmetto Household Council’s Imaginative and prescient ’24 Discussion board, a distinguished conservative Christian occasion.

In New York Metropolis, “you are fortunate if you aren’t getting mugged on the way in which to the place you are going. Is that this actually crucial factor occurring in Manhattan?” Graham questioned. “I feel that is an effort that is ongoing, by no means ending to destroy Donald Trump, the whole lot round Donald Trump.”

MCCARTHY DIRECTS COMMITTEES TO PROBE WHETHER FEDERAL FUNDS WERE USED IN POTENTIAL TRUMP INDICTMENT

Graham additionally questioned the authorized reasoning behind the potential indictment, quoting a New York Occasions report that mentioned the potential prices rested on an “untested and due to this fact dangerous authorized principle.”

“They’re making stuff up that they’ve by no means used in opposition to anyone as a result of they hate Trump. That is what that is. They’re brewing a authorized cocktail, to attempt to provide you with some weird principle,” Graham mentioned. “The legislation by no means utilized by anyone in New York, simply because they hate Trump. You already know why they’re doing this? As a result of they’re afraid of Trump. That is why they’re doing it.”

Graham referred to the concentrating on of Trump as “selective prosecution” and mentioned that if he had been Trump, he would “take this all the way in which to the rattling Supreme Court docket.”

The feedback from Graham, who has endorsed Trump within the 2024 race for president, observe reviews that the Manhattan District Lawyer’s workplace could also be making ready to problem an indictment for alleged hush cash funds Trump made as a presidential candidate in 2016.

A courtroom supply instructed Fox Information Digital that Manhattan District Lawyer Alvin Bragg’s workplace will meet with legislation enforcement to “focus on logistics for a while subsequent week, which might imply that they’re anticipating an indictment subsequent week.”

The potential indictment would doubtless stem from the years-long investigation surrounding Trump’s alleged hush cash scandal involving porn actress Stormy Daniels. In the direction of the tip of the 2016 presidential marketing campaign, Trump’s then-lawyer Michael Cohen despatched $130,000 to Daniels to stop her from disclosing her 2006 affair with Trump. Trump reimbursed Cohen by way of installments.

TRUMP GEARS UP FOR 2024 RALLY IN WACO, TEXAS AMID ONGOING FEDERAL INVESTIGATION, POSSIBLE NY INDICTMENT

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., proper, speaks on the Imaginative and prescient ’24 convention on March 18, 2023, in North Charleston, S.C., as Palmetto Household board chairman Tony Beam seems on. (AP Photograph/Meg Kinnard)

Like Graham, different Republican lawmakers are additionally pushing again in opposition to the potential Trump indictment, together with Home Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., who mentioned Saturday he’s directing Home committees to research whether or not federal funds are getting used for “politically motivated prosecutions” like that of Trump.

“Right here we go once more — an outrageous abuse of energy by a radical DA who lets violent criminals stroll as he pursues political vengeance in opposition to President Trump,” McCarthy wrote in a tweet.

Bragg has been criticized for downgrading half of all felony prices in Manhattan final 12 months, together with armed robberies of business companies, and for different progressive crime insurance policies.

Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., mentioned Bragg “permits violent criminals to stroll the streets, but abuses the rule of legislation & powers of his workplace to focus on political opponents in partisan witchhunts. He’s unfit for workplace.”

Reached for remark Friday, the Manhattan District Lawyer’s workplace would neither “affirm or remark” on the upcoming indictment.

PELOSI, DEMS CALLS TRUMP’S ARREST WARNING ‘RECKLESS,’ ACCUSE HIM OF FOMENTING ‘UNREST’

South Carolina GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham speaks as former President Donald Trump, left, and Henry McMaster, South Carolina’s governor, hear throughout a marketing campaign occasion in Columbia, South Carolina, on Jan. 28, 2023. (Sam Wolfe/Bloomberg through Getty Photos)

Trump lashed out on the reviews, saying they point out he can be arrested subsequent week on his Fact Social app Saturday morning, telling his supporters to “PROTEST, TAKE BACK OUR NATION.”

“NOW ILLEGAL LEAKS FROM A CORRUPT & HIGHLY POLITICAL MANHATTAN DISTRICT ATTORNEYS OFFICE, WHICH HAS ALLOWED NEW RECORDS TO BE SET IN VIOLENT CRIME & WHOSE LEADER IS FUNDED BY GEORGE SOROS, INDICATE THAT, WITH NO CRIME BEING ABLE TO BE PROVEN, & BASED ON AN OLD & FULLY DEBUNKED (BY NUMEROUS OTHER PROSECUTORS!) FAIRYTALE, THE FAR & AWAY LEADING REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE & FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK. PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK!,” Trump wrote.

Amid a potential indictment, Trump is planning to journey to Waco, Texas, subsequent weekend for what would be the first main rally of his 2024 presidential marketing campaign.

Fox Information’ Adam Shaw, Marta Dhanis, Adam Sabes, and Brandon Gillespie contributed to this report.