New York: Groups Linked to George Soros, Mark Zuckerberg Lobby to Keep Accused Criminals Out of Jail

Jailbreak organizations with financial ties to billionaires George Soros and Mark Zuckerberg, who are worth a combined $86 billion, are lobbying New York lawmakers to preserve the state’s “bail reform” policies that help keep accused criminals out of jail.

As Breitbart News has chronicled, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) signed into state law the bail reform measures that allow suspects accused of second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, child sex crimes, and making threats of terrorism to walk free from jail without ever having to post bail.

Coinciding with the state law is New York City’s Supervised Release Program, which allows thousands of criminal suspects to be released following their arrests without having to post bail or be monitored by social workers.

As a result, crime in New York City has skyrocketed. The latest city crime statistics show that although murders are down compared to the same time last year, rapes have increased 24 percent, robberies have increased 46 percent, grand larceny has increased nearly 60 percent, grand larceny auto has increased 85 percent, and transit crimes have increased more than 70 percent.

“The most important city on the globe has become the laughing stock of the globe. And the dysfunctionality of our city has cascaded throughout the entire country,” New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) told a crowd of hundreds of New York Police Department (NYPD) officers this week.

“Don’t let anyone break your spirit, tell you that New Yorkers don’t love the men and women of the NYPD,” Adams said. “Everywhere I go they say, ‘Protect our police.’ Ignore the noise. … The people of their city want their city back.”

A set of proposals from Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) would only partially alter the bail reform law, including:

• Allowing judges to set bail based on prior criminal history
• Ensuring repeat criminal offenders are eligible for bail
• Making gun-related crimes eligible for bail

A number of jailbreak organizations — including the Soros-linked Center for American Progress, the Center for Popular Democracy, United We Dream, and MoveOn, as well as the Zuckerberg-linked FWD.us — are lobbying New York lawmakers to oppose any changes to the bail reform law.

“We are very troubled by recent proposals from Governor Kathy Hochul that would increase incarceration and racial disparities and undo years of work towards ending the criminalization of poverty and children,” the groups wrote in a letter:

Mass incarceration was born of hasty political posturing and the fallacy that we can have justice or safety, but not both. Mass incarceration delivered generations of harm to the same Black, brown, poor, and immigrant communities hardest hit by crime without delivering them more safety. [Emphasis added]

That is why we are calling upon Governor Hochul, Lieutenant Governor Benjamin, and legislative leaders to protect bail, discovery, and Raise the Age reforms. [Emphasis added]

Along with Adams, NYPD Commissioner Keechant Shea is urging lawmakers to quickly change the bail reform law, as she has attributed the drastic rise in crime to the policies.

Polling released this week shows that about 56 percent of New Yorkers believe the bail reform law has been bad for the state while just 3 in 10 said it is good policy. Nearly 64 percent said the law has increased crime across the state and 84 percent said judges should have broad discretion to set bail for criminal suspects.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.