By Joseph Ax
(Reuters) – A crowded field of Democrats were vying on Tuesday to become the next Manhattan district attorney, a job that in normal times is already considered one of the most important and scrutinized prosecutorial positions in the country.
This year, however, the winner of the primary election will likely inherit the office’s ongoing criminal probe into former President Donald Trump’s business empire, which was initiated in 2018 under the retiring Cyrus Vance Jr.
The contest also arrives amid a national debate over criminal justice, race and civil rights, even as the city faces an upswing in crime that has put public safety at the center of Tuesday’s mayoral election.
Sparse public polling suggests the two leading contenders are Alvin Bragg, a Black former federal prosecutor and civil rights lawyer, and Tali Farhadian Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor and former Justice Department official who most recently served as the general counsel for the Brooklyn district attorney’s office.
Weinstein, who is seen as more moderate than most of the other candidates, has the backing of former presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. She has raised far more than any other candidate, thanks to her ties to Wall Street via her husband, the hedge fund manager Boaz Weinstein.
Bragg, who has won endorsements from progressives such as Rachael Rollins, Boston’s district attorney, has tried to strike a balance between preserving civil liberties and protecting public safety.
Tuesday’s victor will be heavily favored to win November’s general election in Manhattan, where Democrats far outnumber Republicans.
A win for either Bragg or Weinstein would mark a historic first: there has never been a Black or a female Manhattan district attorney.
Turnover in the office is unusual; the next district attorney will be only the third in nearly 50 years. The Manhattan district attorney’s office employs 500 lawyers and has an annual budget of around $125 million; thanks to Wall Street’s location in Manhattan, the office oversees a wide range of financial crimes.
Unlike the mayoral election, voters will not use a ranked-choice voting system, which allows them to rank multiple candidates in order of preference.
TRUMP PROBE
The candidates have largely refrained from offering specific thoughts on the Trump investigation. But Bragg has often reminded voters on the campaign trail that he helped sue the Trump administration “more than a hundred times” as a deputy in the New York state attorney general’s office.
In an interview with Reuters earlier this year, Weinstein said, “Nobody is above the law, no matter who you are or what office you went on to occupy.”
Whoever prevails is likely to become a target for Trump, who has dismissed the probe as a “witch hunt” and attacked Vance personally.
The winner will also have the opportunity to alter prosecutorial policies in the country’s biggest city, following last year’s widespread protests over policing and racial injustice.
Most of the candidates have vowed to prosecute fewer low-level crimes as part of a broader effort to address racial bias.
Bragg told Reuters earlier this year that more than 80% of the city’s criminal docket consists of misdemeanors or lesser crimes.
“We need to drastically shrink that footprint,” he said. “Many of those cases have absolutely nothing to do with public safety.”
Weinstein also said she would shrink the number of cases by declining to prosecute those that do not advance public safety. But she also said she would use resources to ensure New Yorkers are safe.
Thomas Kenniff, a former Westchester County prosecutor and Iraq War veteran who is now a criminal defense lawyer, is running unopposed for the Republican nomination.
(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Aurora Ellis)
