Ex-DNI John Ratcliffe: 'Imposter' Alvin Bragg indicting Donald Trump is 'election interference'

Fox News anchor Maria Bartiromo hosted ex-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on this weekend's edition of Sunday Morning Futures and asked him to remark on the nearly three-dozen charges that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg filed against former President Donald Trump last week.

Bartiromo teed up the conversation:

Well, look, I wanna get your take on, on sort of the talk out there and a lot of people are saying, 'oh, this is only gonna strengthen Trump.' I mean, look. He was able to raise $4 million after this indictment just from individuals in a very sh – couple days – and you look at the polls and you see he is the number one candidate. We have not heard from Ron DeSantis in terms of whether or not he's running, and that's one thing to watch. But at this point, you've got Trump at the top of the lineup here in terms of where we are ahead of this presidential election. Talk about the point of how long this takes to play out when we are four months away from the first GOP primary debate. That's in August. Then you've got, you know, in eight or nine months, the Iowa caucus. I mean, the 2024 presidential season has begun.

Ratcliffe accused Bragg of meddling in next year's contest and that Trump is a victim of Bragg's vendetta:

Well, Maria, I mean, the point is this is election interference. We don't know how – no one really knows how this is going to play out. We just know that it is going to be a factor. We have crossed the Rubicon from people saying, you know, on the left, President Trump should be indicted to the discussion is going to be President Trump was indicted. And however long this case takes, and very clearly, it's not going to play out throughout the court system in less than the year that it's going to take to, you know, to, you know, reach a Republican nominee. And so this action, this political persecution is going to influence our politics every single day for the next year until a Republican nominee is chosen, and that is, by definition, election interference.

This is wholly inappropriate, you know, a complete perversion of our political system, and I think people need to, hopefully, understand and see what's going on here through these imposter DAs like Alvin Bragg. But this is coast to coast, you know? This is Kim Foxx in Chicago, this is George Gascon in California, this is George Soros funding all of these people where we've put socialists in charge of the American judicial system. We've put people who don't understand or appreciate or stand up for American values in charge of our legal system to distort it intentionally and deliberately and, unfortunately, Donald Trump is the first but won't be the last person to be persecuted under that system.

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Bartiromo responded:

Well, this is a really good point that you're making because George Soros makes no apology for it. In fact, he wrote an op-ed in 'The Wall Street Journal' just a couple of weeks ago. You're talking about the $40 million that he has donated to get these D.A.s in place. He says I've done it transparently. I've no intention of stopping. The funds I provide enable sensible, reform-minded candidates to receive a hearing from the public. Judging by the results, the public likes what it's hearing. I'm not sure which public he's talking to because these DAs are using bail reform to put criminals back on the street except if it's Donald Trump.

The Soros editorial that Bartiromo referenced – Why I Support Reform Prosecutors – was published on July 31st, 2022, not "a couple of weeks ago." Soros also told Steve Clemons of SEMAFOR on Friday, March 31st, 2023 that "I didn't fund him and I don't know him," referring to Soros.

But Ratcliffe stuck to that talking point anyway:

Maria, they're not D.A.s, they're imposter D.A.s. These are political plants. These are people who are only being supported with, you know, $40 million – in the case of Alvin Bragg a million dollars from George Soros – only because of a promise that you're in this position, you will pursue political prosecution of our opponents, those on the right. And that is, again, happening coast to coast, and that's really what's at stake. This should be a clarion call to Americans who otherwise don't tune in to politics or don't think that it affects them. It absolutely has, and the bedrock principles of our justice system are clearly under assault where, again, we have socialists who are anathema to, you know, American values in charge largely of our judicial system, you know, through these state DAs and prosecutors.

Watch below via Media Matters for America or at this link.

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