Democrats to participate in NY Judiciary Committee hearing

The Judiciary Committee’s top Democrat wants everyone to know that surging Big Apple crime is only an illusion manufactured by the party’s political enemies.

Manhattan Congressman Jerry Nadler said he will come out swinging in defense of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg during the panel’s Monday hearing in New York.

The hearing will focus on the victims of Bragg’s soft-on-crime policies.

“We will show the essentially fraudulent nature of what [committee chair] Jim Jordan and company are claiming about the crime rates in New York and compared to other cities, including Republican-led cities,” Nadler told The Post.

“And we will talk about how this whole hearing is part of Jim Jordan and the Republicans’ general attempts to obstruct justice and to attack the DA in Manhattan and to obstruct justice in the Trump case,” he added, referring to the president’s indictment in Manhattan last month.

The GOP-controlled committee will set the tone of the proceedings with four announced witnesses, while Democrats will only be able to call one, Nadler said. Democrats have so far not announced who they will invite to speak.

City crime statistics belie Nadler’s rosy assessment. Overall violent crime surged in Manhattan South by 34% and Manhattan North by 14.5% in 2022 — Bragg’s first year in office — compared to 2021.

“I dare Jerry Nadler to ask me or [crime victims] to our faces … and tell us why the lives that are being destroyed here in New York City don’t matter [just] because it’s happening elsewhere,” said Jennifer Harrison, a victims-rights advocate who has been called by Republicans to testify at the Monday hearing.