What to know about the senior counsel to Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg
Fox News legal editor Kerri Kupec Urbahn weighs in on the first day of testimony in NY v. Trump on 'The Story.'
EXCLUSIVE: The Democratic National Committee paid Trump prosecutor Matthew Colangelo thousands of dollars for "political consulting" in 2018, Fox News Digital has learned.
Colangelo delivered opening statements in the unprecedented criminal trial of former President Trump and currently serves as a top prosecutor with Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's Office on the case.
Colangelo joined Bragg’s office in December 2022 after the resignations of Mark Pomerantz and Carey Dunne — prosecutors who were investigating Trump and resigned in protest of Bragg’s initial unwillingness to indict the former president. Colangelo left a senior role at the Biden Justice Department to join Bragg's team. Bragg afterward brought charges against the former president in April 2023, raising questions among some in the GOP about alleged politicization of the case.
House Republicans are investigating Colangelo and his past work as he prosecutes Trump.
NY V. TRUMP: HOUSE JUDICIARY INVESTIGATES BRAGG PROSECUTOR WHO HELD SENIOR ROLE IN BIDEN DOJ
Former President Trump, right, exits Trump Tower in New York City on Monday, April 15, 2024. Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo speaks in a DOJ video. (Fox News Digital/DOJ?)
According to Federal Election Commission records reviewed by Fox News Digital, DNC Services Corp/Democratic National Committee paid Colangelo twice on Jan. 31, 2018. Colangelo was given two payments of $6,000, for a total of $12,000.
The "description" for the purpose of payment is labeled "Political Consulting."
Neither the Manhattan District Attorney's Office nor the DNC immediately responded to Fox News Digital's request for comment.
At the time, Colangelo was serving in then-New York Attorney General Eric Scheiderman’s office as the deputy attorney general for social justice, assuming the role from Bragg. Bragg, at the time, was appointed as chief deputy attorney general.
Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo, right, makes opening statements as former President Trump watches with his attorney Todd Blanche before Justice Juan Merchan during Trump's criminal trial on charges that he falsified business records to conceal money paid to silence porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016, in Manhattan state court in New York City on April 22, 2024 in this courtroom sketch. (REUTERS/Jane Rosenberg)
Schneiderman resigned in May 2018 amid allegations of sexual assault. Barbara Underwood replaced him as New York attorney general.
Just months after Colangelo received the payments from the DNC, in June 2018, Underwood, with Colangelo as executive deputy attorney general, filed a lawsuit against the Trump Foundation. The lawsuit claimed that Trump used the foundation’s charitable assets to pay off his legal obligations. The Trump Foundation ultimately agreed to dissolve in December 2018.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg speaks during a news conference on Thursday, March 7, 2024, in Manhattan, New York. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
BRAGG 'ALLOWED POLITICAL MOTIVATIONS' TO 'INFECT' PROSECUTION OF TRUMP, HOUSE JUDICIARY GOP SAYS
Colangelo stayed in the New York Attorney General’s Office after Underwood’s tenure, and under the leadership of current Attorney General Letitia James, who took over in 2018, when he continued to work on Trump lawsuits and investigations.
However, on Jan. 20, 2021, the first day of the Biden administration, Colangelo began serving as acting associate attorney general in the Justice Department.
Colangelo then became the principal deputy associate attorney general at the Biden Justice Department. Colangelo helped to oversee multiple departments, including the Civil, Civil Rights, Antitrust and Tax Divisions.
Colangelo joined Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office in December 2022.
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DNC Chair Tom Perez speaks to a Democratic Party gathering in New Hampshire ahead of the 2020 New Hampshire presidential primary.
Prior to his work in New York and in the Biden Justice Department, Colangelo worked in the Obama administration, serving in a number of different roles. Colangelo worked in the DOJ's civil rights division and served as the chief of staff to then-Labor Secretary Tom Perez, who later served as chair of the DNC in 2017.
Perez was DNC chairman at the time Colangelo was paid for "political consulting."
Colangelo also worked as a deputy assistant to then-President Obama and as the deputy director of the White House Economic Council.
President Biden, left, and former President Obama. (Getty Images)
The House Judiciary Committee, led by Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, is demanding that Attorney General Merrick Garland turn over records related to Colangelo’s employment at the Justice Department as it conducts "oversight of politically motivated prosecutions by state and local officials."
Bragg charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree.
Trump pleaded not guilty to all counts.
A charge of falsifying business records typically is a misdemeanor, but Bragg, Colangelo and New York prosecutors must convince the jury that Trump allegedly falsified those records in the furtherance of "another crime."
Former President Trump attends the first day of his criminal trial, at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York City on April 15, 2024. (Angela Weiss/AFP via AP Pool)
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Prosecutors suggest that the other crime was in violation of New York State law — to prevent or promote election. On its face, as a stand-alone offense, that charge is also typically a misdemeanor.
Coupling the alleged falsification of business records with alleged prevention or promotion of election becomes a felony crime, according to Bragg.
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