Get Out of New York, If You Can

 William A. Jacobson (legalinsurrection.com

Rough politics has given way to the political weaponization of prosecutors’ offices. The price of living in and doing business in New York should not be that you have to be politically obedient.

"My parents’ parents were born and lived in New York. My parents were born and lived in New York. I was born and grew up in New York, went to college in New York, and returned to New York after law school for a decade. My children were born in New York. Some of my grandchildren were born in New York. I work in New York and live part of the year in New York.

"At one time, I even had an “I ♥ NY” t-shirt.

"Now I’m counting down the years until I retire from Cornell and can leave New York completely and for good, never to look back.

"It’s not ‘just’ the taxes, moribund bureaucracies, regulatory madness, weak economy, crime, sanctuary city policies, and embrace of de-policing and non-prosecution. That would be and is bad enough, and already is depopulating the state.

"It’s something more now. Rough politics has given way to the political weaponization of prosecutors’ offices. It’s dangerous and sets a tone for the entire state that political opponents of those in power are living – and operating their businesses – on borrowed time.

"I don’t care what you think of Donald Trump, it’s disgusting, unseemly, and in my view completely unethical for a prosecutor to run for office pledging not only to get a political opponent, but also his family. That’s what Letitia James did when she ran for New York Attorney General. She then fulfilled that campaign promise, weaponizing her massive and powerful office to scour through Trump’s businesses to find a crime, but she found none that could be prosecuted so she brought a civil lawsuit to ruin Trump and his family.

"Nothing about this process was within norms of how prosecutors should conduct themselves and their offices. It may not be unprecedented, but it’s still clearly wrong." . . .