This cycle especially, we've repeatedly seen politicans who were prosecutors in the past get trashed with phony "scandals" such as :
- You had the chance to prosecute this person and didn't, must be corruption.
- You prosecuted this person and they were innocent, you cold-hearted killer.
- You didn't solve every criminal justice problem in your state therefore they are all your fault.
- You "prioritized" prosecuting this group of people over that group of people, racist/classist much?
The public seems to just eat these up without even a second of critical thinking. And on top of that, just being a prosecutor in general leads to you getting labeled a "cop" (see Kamala Harris). Biden even implicitly made the case, during the second debate, that being a public defender was inherently morally superior to being a prosecutor, and it was well-received.
If your political opponent is a former prosecutor/DA/AG, your oppo research is easy as pie. Just go dig through their state's records.
Can you find a person we hate who did something "bad" during their tenure? Doesn't have to actually be bad, you just have to make it sound bad. Then you can say "{candidate} had the opportunity to prosecute {enemy} but let him off the hook, possibly due to corruption. Everything bad he has done since then is {candidate}'s fault."
Can you find a single case where they prosecuted someone and the person ended up being innocent? If so, the ads write themselves. People are stupid and think that a lawyer prosecuting a case means the lawyer personally hated that person and wanted to see them behind bars. "{candidate} should have known {person} was innocent, but she got him a life sentence anyway."
Is the state where they served not a perfect utopia? Then it's their fault -- just pick an issue. "{candidate} had the power to solve {issue} when she was {role}, but instead chose to focus on {pick the most trivial case they ever took}. That shows you where her priorities are."
Since this is America, black people probably got a raw deal from the courts. The candidate wasn't a judge or jury, but people are stupid and don't understand the difference, so this is the candidate's fault. "While {candidate} was {role}, black people received sentences 2.7x longer than white people. The state was named "most racist state in history" by Huffington Post."
Is it quickly becoming political suicide to be involved with the criminal justice system in any prosecutorial capacity? As these attacks keep working, because people refuse to understand how the justice system works, they will become more and more common and having been a prosecutor/DA/AG will become more and more of a political liability.
