A $1 million donation from liberal billionaire George Soros to a political action committee that backed Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has come under the spotlight as the Democrat weighs indicting former President Donald Trump.
Trump may soon face an indictment in connection to alleged hush money payments he made in 2016 to porn star Stormy Daniels, who has said the two had a sexual relationship. Soros donated $1 million in May 2021 to Color of Change, a racial justice PAC that later used the money to support Bragg in his successful district attorney bid against Republican Thomas Kenniff, a criminal defense attorney.
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"I’ve seen rumors swirl. I have not seen any facts yet, and so I don’t know what’s going to happen," Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), who has polled second to Trump in recent 2024 presidential primary surveys and is widely expected to run, said on Monday. "But I do know this: The Manhattan district attorney is a Soros-funded prosecutor, and so he, like other Soros-funded prosecutors, they weaponize their office to impose a political agenda on society at the expense of the rule of law and public safety."
Color of Change notably called for defunding the police amid the summer 2020 social justice riots after George Floyd's murder. Soros has backed Bragg along with 74 other prosecutors in recent years who have been slammed for their soft-on-crime policies.
In February 2022, the Daily Mail reported that Color of Change was pulling a $500,000 donation to Bragg over an anonymous woman's allegation against the then-candidate. It's unclear what that allegation was, and the outlet did not speak directly to the woman in question.
"Color of Change Political Action Committee ceased our independent expenditure on this electoral campaign after receiving this information," a source close to the PAC told the Daily Mail.
Color of Change's support for Bragg came around the same time Soros's family poured money into Bragg's campaign. Jonathan Soros, the son of George Soros, donated $10,000 on April 26, 2021, to the Democrat's campaign, records show. Then, on April 29, 2021, Jonathan Soros's wife, Jennifer Allan Soros, donated $10,000 to Bragg's campaign.
Now, Bragg is at the center of national media attention as Republican lawmakers call his potential Trump-indictment decision "politically motivated." House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY), and House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil (R-WI) demanded records from Bragg on Monday in connection to the expected indictment.
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"You are reportedly about to engage in an unprecedented abuse of prosecutorial authority: the indictment of a former President of the United States and current declared candidate for that office," wrote the Republicans. "This indictment comes after years of your office searching for a basis — any basis — on which to bring charges, ultimately settling on a novel legal theory untested anywhere in the country and one that federal authorities declined to pursue."
The Manhattan grand jury investigating the Trump-Daniels payments delayed an indictment decision on Wednesday, which comes after Trump claimed he would be arrested on Tuesday. The expected indictment stems from $130,000 that then-Trump lawyer Michael Cohen allegedly paid to Daniels before the 2016 election to keep her quiet about her 2006 sexual encounter with Trump.