Three of New York’s top elected officials appeared surprised Thursday when pressed about a House Judiciary Committee report alleging local prosecutors intentionally downgraded charges against noncitizens to protect them from deportation.
During a Manhattan press conference, New York Attorney General Letitia James, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz and Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez faced questions regarding claims that city prosecutors altered or reduced charges to help noncitizens avoid convictions that would trigger removal.
"Did any of you order prosecutors to downgrade gun charges to keep illegal immigrants in the U. S., per the Judiciary Committee report?" a reporter asked.
Katz threw her hands up and shrugged in response, the New York Post reported.
"Our answer couldn’t help it," Katz said, before a speaker redirected the room, asking for "any other on-topic questions" and moving the news conference along.
"We charge any defendant with an illegal firearm with the highest possible charge under the law," a spokesperson for Katz's office told Fox News Digital.
The news conference exchange followed the release of a 22-page congressional report detailing widespread practices across New York City prosecutors' offices.
According to the document, Katz's office employs an "Immigration Specialist" to help negotiate "immigration-safe" plea deals and reduce past convictions.
The report also cited a 2022 memorandum from Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg allegedly instructing prosecutors to seek dispositions that avoid deportation consequences for all misdemeanors and non-carceral felonies.
In addition, the report states that the office of Bronx DA Darcel Clark trains prosecutors in "Immigration-Conscious Plea Bargaining." That includes offering non-deportable offenses, avoiding aggravated felony charges and using hypothetical or "legally impossible" charges, such as "attempted reckless assault," which lack legal intent requirements.
Prosecutors were also allegedly instructed to omit critical details from official conviction records, such as gun involvement, domestic relationships or the age of minor victims, to prevent federal immigration authorities from using them as grounds for removal.
After the news conference, a spokesperson for Katz reached out to the Post to deny that leniency is ever shown in weapons cases.
"We charge any defendant with an illegal firearm with the highest possible charge under the law," the spokesperson said.
We have come to expect sanctimony mixed with hypocrisy from Barack Obama. But his latest endeavor turns out to be a doozy.
Preaching his usual moral superiority, the former president recently took to social media to inveigh against the current president for targeting Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota with a criminal investigation. He called it "appalling."
Obama should have sat this one out at his luxurious spread on Martha’s Vineyard.
Lo and behold, he did the same thing when he was president. And Omar was the target. But, of course, the probe was kept under wraps. Until now.
Reporting by The New York Times reveals that Obama’s Department of Homeland Security and the FBI did a deep dive in the summer of 2016 into whether Omar entered into a sham marriage with her alleged brother, Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, to enable him to secure a green card.
Brace yourself for the result. That investigation "found some evidence that it was fraudulent," according to the Times.
Accusations of marriage fraud have long dogged Omar, who has consistently dismissed them as politically driven and a right-wing conspiracy. So much for that argument.
The latest investigation that culminated in a judicially ordered search of Omar’s home on October 12, 2026, reportedly encompasses not only the suspect marriage but troubling questions over whether she ran afoul of the law by using a fake name and false birth date to obtain citizenship. A separate investigation is examining her financial transactions.
The Obama-era inquiry did not end because of insufficient evidence. Instead, the Times divulges that it was shelved "because prosecutors concluded that the potential crime, a felony, fell outside a five-year statute of limitations." The newspaper’s story relied on statements by current and former officials with knowledge of the first case.
That decision to mothball any legal action against Omar makes little sense, unless one factors in political favoritism by Obama and his prosecutorial cohorts.
It is true that marriage fraud is a federal felony governed by a five-year statute of limitations under 8 U.S.C. § 1325(c). However, the clock runs from the last overt act of fraud or submission of false documents, not the date of the wedding ceremony itself in 2009.
Taking steps to later obtain a green card would qualify as an overt act, as would document fraud (18 U.S.C. § 1546). So, too, would any act to cover up a sham marriage or efforts to conceal it. Indeed, it would constitute additional crimes such as conspiracy (18 U.S.C. § 371) and obstruction of justice or obstruction of proceedings (18 U.S.C. §§ 1505 and 1512).
Elmi abandoned his quest for a green card and left the U.S. for London sometime in 2011 when disturbing questions reportedly arose over his application. His actions and any misrepresentations associated with Omar might have brought the case within the permissible statute of limitations.
Obama’s DHS and DOJ could have pursued a simpler approach under civil (not criminal) immigration fraud. Orchestrating a scheme to illegally obtain U.S. immigration status or benefits carries severe legal consequences. There is no statute of limitations.
If the Obama administration had chosen this logical course, it could have led to Omar’s denaturalization and subsequent deportation. The standard of proof is "clear and convincing evidence," much lower than in criminal prosecutions.
It is unclear, but curious, why this legal road was never taken. We only know that authorities under Obama shuttered the case and buried the investigation. Preferential treatment? Political cronyism? It has the unmistakable stench.
This makes Obama’s social media screed against President Trump even more outlandish. Trump is doing what Obama did, except that Trump’s administration has expanded the Omar inquiry into areas where the former president’s prosecutors refused to go.
They should have gone there.
Obama’s harangue on X accused Trump of selectively targeting Omar without ever disclosing that his own administration investigated her first. That was dishonesty by omission. A mere oversight? Doubtful.
Obama also pronounced as true certain facts about Omar’s age that may not be true at all. He declared with absolute confidence that she was 17 years old when she applied as a minor for derivative citizenship based on her father’s citizenship.
But her age and birth date are still very much in dispute. Her autobiography and other documents undermine Obama’s claim, indicating that Omar may have been an adult of 18 years and legally ineligible for the type of citizenship that she procured. If she or her father made false statements or committed fraud, it would nullify her citizenship and could lead to removal from the U.S.
This is not an "unsubstantiated theory," as Obama asserts in his social media post.
The former president accuses Trump of "intimidation" and laments that he is deploying "the full weight of the federal government" to bring down "a law-abiding elected official because she has dared to criticize the president." Spare us the duplicitous pearl-clutching.
Obama expressed no moral outrage when his successor, Joe Biden, targeted his political opponent with criminal indictments. Going back further to his own presidency, Obama’s dirty fingerprints were all over the initial stages of the government’s damaging investigation of Trump in the phony collusion scandal.
Obama seems to think that Americans are simpletons with anterograde amnesia. It resembles contempt.
The New York Times report exposes Obama’s glaring double standard for what it is — a transparently insincere attack based on shallow evidence. This comes as no surprise.
Obama always seems confident in his righteousness in an irritatingly pious way. Ever the charlatan, he pretends to be holier-than-thou. Sometimes the truth catches up with him.
But don’t expect Obama to change now that his hypocrisy has been revealed. That would require earnest introspection.
Nearly 40 House Democrats appear to have shunned an effort by their colleagues to end the federal probe into Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn.
House Democrats led by Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., sent a letter to the Trump administration earlier this week demanding a stop to the investigation into Omar's immigration paperwork, arguing it was a bid to sway her re-election campaign ahead of Tuesday's midterm Election Day.
The letter was backed by some 175 House Democrats, more than two-thirds of the caucus — though some notable names were left off.
Two of three of House Democrats' previous senior leadership did not sign the letter. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and former House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., did not sign on. Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., who previously served as House majority whip, was among the signatories, along with all three current members of House Democratic leadership.
Both Pelosi and Hoyer are retiring, but it's worth noting that nearing the exit did not stop other outgoing members like Rep. Nydia Velazquez, D-N.Y., from signing the letter.
Democrats running in tight races also kept their distance from the public condemnation of the probe. Reps. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wash., and Don Davis, D-N.C., are among the names left off the letter as well.
Fox News Digital reached out to each of them for comment but did not immediately hear back.
"Congresswoman Omar is seeking reelection in Minnesota’s 5th congressional district in just one week. News of the search warrant, whether properly predicated or not, could affect voters’ decisions, which is exactly why federal law enforcement should not engage in such conduct when voters are casting their ballots. This type of interference strips Minnesotans of their right to a free and fair election guaranteed to them under the Constitution," the letter said.
"We stand with Congresswoman Omar and condemn the weaponization of law enforcement against her. You have already disgraced the offices you hold, and we demand you refrain from taking any further actions that could affect the outcome of the upcoming election."
Omar is under federal investigation over allegations she or her father lied about her birth year on immigration paperwork to obtain her citizenship when her family fled Somalia in the late 1990s. If she was 17 when her father obtained citizenship, as previously thought, she would have automatically qualified along with him. If she was 18 or older, which federal officials now suspect, she would have had to make her own application.
Her fellow House Democrats recounted the allegations in their letter, saying, "Your probe into the congresswoman reportedly concerns her late father’s filing of immigration paperwork after she fled Somalia’s civil war at age eight, making her a U.S. citizen at age seventeen."
But they argued it does not justify "a pre-dawn raid on her home for paperwork her father filed when she was a minor."
Federal agents executed a judicially authorized search warrant on Omar's home on Oct. 12, seizing multiple phones and notebooks, among other items.
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