FLASH
Shkruar nga Josh Appel
This week, a sensational article in the Washington Post defended progressive district attorneys who were elevated to office thanks to campaign money from billionaire George Soros, portraying these prosecutors as well-meaning reformers surrounded by racist Republicans.
But while Soros' left-wing supporters are thrilled by the way his funding has radically transformed criminal justice across America, what they fail to acknowledge are the disastrous results.
Through direct and indirect donations, Soros has poured money into a dizzying number of DA races across the country.
By 2023, progressive prosecutors had jurisdiction over at least 20% of the US population and half of Americans living in its largest cities, Matt Palumbo reports in his book "The Heir."
Soros-funded district attorneys have won in Tampa Bay, Denver, Orlando, Northern Virginia, Portland, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Dallas and many others; 126 of them have held office at some point, according to the Media Research Center.
Over the past decade, Soros's Justice and Public Safety PAC alone has spent money in at least 62 primary and general elections, according to the WaPo report, winning 77% of the time, without having to spend much to hurt those local elections that typically have low spending.
But the key point is not the size of Soros' investment in each race; it is the frequency of his involvement and its reach across the country.
In 2016, Politico wrote about Soros’s “quiet reorganization of the US justice system,” describing how he recognized the DA’s races as an untapped opportunity to remake cities according to his progressive ideology.
Soros understood that these races are particularly vulnerable to outside influence: Few voters know who their district attorney is, despite the Attorney General's outsized role in shaping law enforcement against crime.
As Soros spokesman Michael Vachon acknowledged, “we started a movement, the philosophy of so-called ‘tough on crime’ has been discredited in many communities.”
He is right and the results are disastrous.
The fundamental belief these progressive DAs share is that systemic social change, not aggressive prosecution, is the answer to crime.
This ideology aligned perfectly with the rise of smart politics, which blamed systems for problems and focused above all on identity.
That is why the core of their radical reform of criminal justice included eliminating parole, refusing to prosecute minor criminal offenses, and drastically limiting the use of sentencing enhancements, such as "three strikes."
This meant effectively eliminating criminal justice, putting more criminals, even repeat offenders, back on the streets.
Last week in Chicago, Lawrence Reed, a man with a record of 72 arrests and eight felony convictions, set a young woman on fire on the CTA's Blue Line.
In Denver last month, repeat offender Charles Cooley broke into the home of Kevin and Sarah Root. After posting a $500 bond, Cooley is back on the streets ("awaiting trial").
And these chilling stories are not random; they reflect the data that shows how Soros-backed prosecutors exacerbated crime.
In 2021, Philadelphia, under Soros' attorney general Larry Krasner, broke its all-time homicide record, as did 12 other cities with progressive attorneys general.
In Chicago, under Attorney General Kim Foxx, overall reported crime increased by 369% between 2019 and 2023, driven largely by large increases in property crimes, such as auto theft.
Other major cities saw similar growth.
In Oregon, under Soros-funded DA Mike Schmidt, drug decriminalization policies coincided with a sharp increase in drug overdose deaths, which tripled from 280 in 2019 to 956 in 2022.
And, as Rafael Mangual has pointed out, in countries where violent crime has fallen, it is largely due to the deterrent effect of increased policing.
Many voters are beginning to recognize the extraordinary role their DA plays in public safety and are turning against criminal justice reform.
George Gascón, the Los Angeles district attorney who survived several impeachment attempts, was finally fired in 2024, and at least 21 other Soros-linked prosecutors have been replaced by tough-on-crime counterparts since 2022.
Simply put, Soros' "movement" has failed.
The question is how long communities will have to suffer before progressive prosecutors accept this. /Adapted from New York Post/
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