Joint Statement from National Urban League President Marc Morial, former NYS Governor David Paterson, former NYS Comptroller H. Carl McCall and NYS NAACP President Hazel Dukes ON MARK POMERANTZ BOOK

We all have served in government for years, and observed politics for many more. Over that time, we’ve seen great progress for Black elected officials – including the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States.

However, we continue to be disturbed by the lack of respect for Black officials, and by the weaponization of tired racial tropes to undermine and disparage them. This divisive pattern has reared its ugly head once again with false attacks against Alvin Bragg, the first Black elected Manhattan District Attorney, in a new book by former prosecutor turned author Mark Pomerantz.

There are many problems with the misleading claims in the book: It appears to blatantly violate ethical and conflicts of interest rules governing attorneys and possibly jeopardizes the very investigation into Donald Trump now being led by District Attorney Bragg by revealing key pieces of the probes, and legal strategies of the prosecution, providing assistance to Trump. And it hypocritically attacks D.A. Bragg for not indicting Trump in his first six weeks in office, even though Pomerantz himself failed to secure an indictment during the three-year investigation under Cy Vance.

But as bad as all of that is, it's how Pomerantz writes to and about Alvin Bragg, the duly-elected Manhattan District Attorney that is most troubling, and rings too uncomfortably close to language we each have been forced to endure. In his book, he quotes an email he wrote to newly elected D.A. Bragg saying, “You need to respect our judgment” – effectively telling the highly experienced first Black Manhattan D.A. that Bragg “needs” to “respect” him. This is not an email he would send to or a tone he would use with his predecessors.

Furthermore, Pomerantz’s stereotyped-riddled attacks on Bragg -- that he was “disengaged”, “lazy”, “not qualified” – recall attacks that each of us have heard used against us, and have been used to denigrate every Black elected - official including President Obama.

Alvin Bragg is a respected, courageous, ethical and thoughtful lawyer. Over a distinguished 20+ year career as both a state and federal prosecutor, Alvin brought many tough, high-profile cases against powerful people, including a sitting D.A., the leader of the NYS legislature, a mayor, and an FBI agent.

And Bragg has generated far more success than the Vance - Pomerantz regime in holding Donald Trump accountable: as Chief Deputy NYS Attorney General, Bragg sued Donald Trump and the Trump Foundation, and won. Early this year, he won a maximum sentence against The Trump Corporation, and The Trump Payroll Corp., the first-ever criminal conviction of former President Trump’s companies.

D.A. Bragg has said for months that his investigation into Donald Trump is active and ongoing, and public reporting shows it to be moving forward rapidly. He should be allowed to proceed without distractions from Pomerantz’s media tour.

Pomerantz failed to bring a case under D.A. Vance, and there were many problems with the case he assembled. Pomerantz would be wiser to look inward as to why his case, riddled with flaws, wasn’t ready for primetime, than assail the one person – Alvin Bragg – who is actually moving the ball forward.

With his reckless, self-serving decision to write a book about an ongoing prosecution, Mark Pomerantz has done nothing but distract and disrupt the Manhattan D.A.’s office from its important work and harm a case that’s incredibly important for the Manhattan D.A.’s office and the nation.