After defeating Republican Thomas Kenniff, Democrat Alvin Bragg was elected on Tuesday as Manhattan’s first black district attorney. Now he will be in charge of overseeing the investigations involving former President Donald Trump.
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Bragg, who is a 48-year-old civil rights attorney and former federal prosecutor, will replace current district attorney Cyrus Vance Jr, who is retiring in January.
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The next Manhattan prosecutor and Trump have a history. As a senior deputy to the New York attorney general in 2018, Bragg helped oversee a lawsuit that led to the closure of Trump’s charitable foundation over allegations that he used the nonprofit to further his political and business interests.
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Bragg celebrated his victory in Harlem, near where he grew up, at a party attended by his former boss, former US Attorney Preet Bharara, and Lt. Governor Brian Benjamin.
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“Tonight we have received deep confidence,” he said. “The fundamental role of the district attorney is to guarantee both justice and safety. That is the trust that has been given to me in the vote, but that has been given to all of us – for which we have worked – to show the city and country a model of association, which combines equity and security in one. “
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Kenniff, a defense attorney who was previously a prosecutor and army judge general, had faced insurmountable obstacles in the race. Democrats vastly outnumber Republicans in Manhattan.
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Historically White Run Office
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Since its founding, the Manhattan district attorney’s office has been run exclusively by white men, and its current and most recent former leaders are the sons of prominent American statesmen.
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Vance’s father was Secretary of State to former President Jimmy Carter. His predecessor’s father, Robert Morgenthau, was Secretary of the Treasury to President Franklin Roosevelt.
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Bragg, for his part, grew up in Harlem during the crack epidemic of the 1980s. At age 15, a police officer put a gun to his face and wrongly accused him of being a drug dealer when he went shopping for food. for his father. Bragg filed a complaint at the urging of his parents, sparking his interest in the law.
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“Those are my stories, but the important thing is that they are our stories,” says Bragg. “They are the stories of many people, and I think that bringing those stories and, metaphorically, those people, with me to the prosecutor’s office is important in a symbolic way, but also deeply meaningful in a very practical way.”
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Bragg campaigned in part on a promise to change the culture of the prosecutor’s office. He said he wants to “reduce the system”, giving up on prosecuting many low-level crimes and looking for alternatives to the prosecution of small “crimes of poverty.”
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Why did the Latino community support Eric Adams in his run for mayor of New York?
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